Moscow, Russia
CNN
—
President Trump has effectively handed Vladimir Putin an extraordinary green light: 50 days to finish off his brutal summer offensive in Ukraine before facing any consequences.
Only if there is no deal to end the war by the end of that period, in early September, would the threatened 100 percent tariffs on Russia and secondary sanctions on Russian trading partners kick in.
That must seem like an eternity for millions of sleepless Ukrainians now enduring an escalating Russian onslaught of deadly missile and mass drone strikes on their towns and cities.
But in Moscow, officials are quietly breathing a sigh of relief. After all, it could have been much worse for them.
Sanctions could have been immediate, if President Trump had wanted, or much higher – such as the 500 percent tariff rate being proposed in a bi-partisan bill in the US Senate.
Not that a renewed threat of sanctions is certain to alter the Kremlin’s course in Ukraine.
Far from it.
Russia is already one of the world’s most heavily sanctioned countries, punishments for allegations of US election interference, as well as other malign activities from Crimea to Syria to Britain and beyond.
The Kremlin has already established a complex set of flexible workarounds to keep its fragile economy afloat, while refusing to change its behavior.
“Life has shown that no sanctions decisions against Russia produce results,” commented Anatoly Aksakov, a key Russian lawmaker, when asked about the latest sanctions threat.
“They lead to Russia confidently moving forward, developing its economy, carrying out structural restructuring of its national economy,” he added.
Moreover, Kremlin insiders suspect that the 50-day window before any new US sanctions hit is plenty of time for their military push in Ukraine to pay off – or, failing that, for a notoriously changeable President Trump to change his mind on Russia once again.
“In 50 days, oh, how much can change, both on the battlefield and in the mood of those in power in the US and NATO,” said one prominent Russian senator, Konstantin Kosachev, on social media.
“But our mood will not be affected,” he vowed, underlining how Russia sees itself as having a long-term approach to Ukraine while Western governments, specifically the Trump administration, are seen as fickle.
Still, Russia is genuinely alarmed at the prospect of US weapons, even defensive Patriot missile defense systems, flowing back into Ukraine.
Moscow sees the almost daily aerial barrages of Kyiv and other Ukrainian towns and cities as an essential aspect of its current military push, along with the grinding offensive on the Ukrainian frontlines.
The idea is that Ukrainian resolve to keep fighting will be worn down, that political will in Europe will wane, and that the country will eventually capitulate.
But the deal to provide more US-made Patriot missile defense systems, which provide umbrella protection from aerial attack, makes that outcome less likely.
And frustrated Russian politicians are lashing out, accusing President Trump of talking peace, but prolonging the war behind the scenes.
“Ukraine, this man is deceiving you!” declared Leonid Kalashnikov, an outspoken Communist Party lawmaker.
“He wants this war to continue, but not by his own hands,” Kalashnikov added.
On state television, tightly controlled by the Kremlin, Washington’s U-turn on providing weapons to Ukraine has been roundly slated, with President Trump being compared to his presidential predecessor, widely despised in Russia.
“Trump has now followed in the footsteps of [former US President] Joseph Biden and is promising weapons to Ukraine in order to bring Moscow to the negotiating table,” said Olga Skabeyeva, a prominent pro-Kremlin host.
“Biden was doing this for the last three and a half years. But as we know, he had no success,” she scoffed