larry johnson thinks the orange man is setting the stage for more war;

Trump and a raft of pundits and US intelligence officials continue to operate on a set of false assumptions and delusional beliefs about Russia and the war in Ukraine. Sy Hersh is out with a new article, and the quotes from his source (or sources) in the Trump administration illustrate this.

The article is titled, WILL TRUMP MEET PUTIN? As of now, the answer is, yes. The meeting is set for next Friday in Alaska. I want to focus on four paragraphs from Sy’s piece that illustrate the continued failure of the West to understand what Putin means by “root causes.” Here are the choice quotes from Sy’s article:

Putin talks to Witkoff because he understands he’s got power and speaks for the boss,” a knowledgeable US official told me. He said it was Witkoff who understood that the way to get Putin’s attention was to cut off his access to the oil markets in India and China by increasing the US secondary tariffs on both buyers. Interest rates in Russia have risen to 18 percent and the economy, hit hard by the cost of the ongoing war, is limping along in part due to Putin’s ability to keep on selling government bonds to Russian banks.

The official told me that in essence Witkoff “has said to Putin: You need the oil money and we can control the market. . . .............more...........