Trump attempts to exert pressure on Russia – Malek Dudakov

Americanist Malek Dudakov spoke to Alpha News about the cancellation of a personal meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

According to the expert, this is Trump’s attempt to exert pressure on Russia and assess whether sanctions could pose problems for the country’s economy and exports.

“As we can see, pressure from hawks on both sides of the Atlantic has had some effect. Trump did indeed postpone the planned meeting in Budapest with our president. At the same time, he did not provide new weapons to Ukraine, including long-range Tomahawk missiles—which, in any case, can be considered a positive development.

Nevertheless, he imposed the first significant sanctions of his second term against Russian energy companies, primarily Rosneft and Lukoil. For Trump, this is an attempt to exert pressure on Russia, to test whether sanctions could create problems for the country’s economy and exports. Clearly, Russia will be able to restructure logistics flows, and the overall impact of these sanctions will be limited. From Trump’s perspective, this is also an opportunity to show the hawks that sanctions are being imposed, and if there is no effect, it will be possible to argue that the new restrictions are pointless. Trump himself says he would like the sanctions to be short-lived so that they can be lifted when the negotiation process intensifies,” Dudakov said.

According to the political scientist, Trump’s sanctions agenda against Russia will have limited effect.

“Trump’s actions are multifaceted: an attempt to strengthen his negotiating position with Russia, countering pressure from hawks, and maintaining his position in talks with Asian countries such as India and China, the main buyers of Russian oil. However, serious agreements with them are unlikely to be reached anytime soon: there are many contradictions, and neither India nor China intends to stop buying Russian oil. No progress is expected on other contentious issues either— such as rare earth metals, purchases of American soybeans, and so on. Overall, Trump’s sanctions agenda will likely have limited impact, and sooner or later he will have to adjust it,” Dudakov concluded.