Top Russian Pundit Satanovsky: After All Is Said and Done, Trump’s Election Was Helpful to Russia

— But what if they do meet? It will be interesting because Trump and his team have quite different approaches.

— They've been discouraging him from this meeting.

— Trump has his own agenda so if Bolton brings his own agenda there's no chance but if he brings Trump's agenda he might succeed. I presume you know Bolton personally, Evgeny?

 

Evgeny Satanovsky, political analyst: I think he's alright. There are at least two aspects we share a common opinion on. One of them is the way we treat the UN. I treat it even worse than Bolton. Thank God, I have never represented anyone there. The situation's pretty clear. Bolton comes there and gets the Medal For Strengthening of Brotherhood in Arms and maybe even the Combat Medal for the Syrian Operation. Trump gets the Medal of People's Friendship. They can find a valid justification later. A pretty combination.

Look, guys: We have nothing to discuss with the US. Still, we have to communicate. And Bolton is not the one that worries me the most. He can be old or young his class ring can be too big for his grasshopper-like build or fit perfectly his mustache can be bushy or thin. I'm more worried about our negotiators. Some of them also have bushy mustaches that wiggle when they sob and go together with their sad puppy eyes. They say: "We must talk to the US," without wondering: Why? What about? Do we need to talk to them or interrupt the dialogue and give them an ultimatum? We're engaged in a romantic dialogue with the United States following the trend of the last 30 years in terms of diplomacy, disarmament, and arms control. We've got our bitter experience. We're proving our American neighbors that we remain the same dunces we've been since Gorbachev. There was a reason our Soviet Foreign Minister was nicknamed "Mr. No." Well, nobody liked him…

— You mean before Gorbachev.

— I'm talking about Gromyko.

— Just making sure the younger generation understands that.

— Gromyko was conscious of the interests he advocated and, if he needed, he could veto every Western proposal for it. There was also Primakov. With his famous Primakov's Loop, he proved that even in a situation far worse than the one we have today one must follow their principles.

— He was Prime Minister at that time.

— Right, but he also was our Foreign Minister. Still, our current policy is aimed at establishing a dialogue at any price. It's not clear who needs that dialogue at any price apart from the diplomats who are trained to give up our ground in exchange for empty promises. They simply can't calculate more complex combinations. They're not merchants. They lack the intelligence and reflexes of bandits. They can't... Has Lavrov ever signed an obviously "stillborn" agreement or the one he wasn't duly authorized to sign, like the Kerry-Lavrov deal? Kerry didn't mind signing that agreement. We signed it and were promoting it for half a year. It was a great victory of our diplomacy but then we discovered that the US has no means of carrying it out.

— Evgeny will continue his awful speech in a minute.

— It's clear that we only discuss what they want from us. We have no idea what we want from them. OK, fine, Trump's list. Does Putin have a similar one? You know, leave this and that, close this and that cease the sadistic migration policy that puts Mexican children in cages. You stopped it, great! But what about your international commitments?

— And then smack them with the Human Rights Convention.

— We should also mention their support for international terrorism. There's a long list of what happened in Syria and Iraq.

— They should withdraw their troops from Syria.

— We want our diplomatic missions back.

— That would be easy.

Evgeny Satanovsky: And tell them that we'll discuss serious matters after they stop treating us in a racist and sexist way.

— Fight them with their own terminology.

— That's something we must do.

— Why do they bring up Crimea? What about Alaska?

Evgeny Satanovsky: There are many other things as well like the reconciliation of Louisiana, for instance, and many other things.

— Our hearts are beating for the Mexicans. What about their California? And don't forget about New Mexico and Free Texas.

— I'd rather bring up all the territories to the west from Missouri. We can joke all we want about that.

— We'll end up demanding that they become the subjects of the British Crown again. But we must be realistic.

— Speaking about Trump, he should join Angela Merkel in Germany because his ancestors were never subjects to the British Crown. I am definitely... When you're treated as an idiot... That's how they view Russia. Like, we think we play a big role in politics, but we don't even play a small role, we're a joke. That's the case, actually. One should play for keeps. We mustn't tremble in anticipation guessing whether Bolton comes or not and whether he's received by Putin or not. Why should Putin receive him?

Concerning Ukraine, we started dancing with the big white chief from Washington around those Minsk Agreements. During the Maidan, a lady from that vulgar cookie organization came to us to "smoke a peace pipe." And we talked to her. Why? What about?

In this regard, if we want to talk to America we should start acting like America. If we want to talk to Trump we should act, at least, like Trump or even act more like Trump than Trump does. And then, you'll succeed.

— You know, we've actually been following your advice so far. The Kremlin hasn't confirmed or approved anything, it has remained indifferent. Like, we'll say something when we're ready.

— Come if you want to.

— Right. We'll feed Bolton with borsch.

— Well, Trump didn't throw Merkel a wrap, he gave her a couple of candies.

— And everybody's now searching for the candy brand.

— Secondly, for us Trump is…

— He actually gave her a couple of lollipops.

— So that she doesn't say that he doesn't give her anything. Here you are, a couple of candies. That was a great joke.

— It'll become a diplomatic legend.

— Actually, Trump's reinforcing our relations with Iran by his existence per se. We should just let Trump, his Senate, and Congress talk and despite Iran being a hard partner to cooperate with, our relations will improve. His sanctions strengthened the Russian elite. He rallied it. Together with the British, he created a new trend of returning money from the British and American accounts back to Russia. The billion-worth accounts. It's good. It might seem rude and offensive but it's good for our economy. The sanctions finally made us do something about our economy instead of pumping our money to the US to buy their securities. I understand that it's nervous for the financial bloc because they managed to withdraw half of them. God grant they'll take the second half. Maybe we'll start dealing with our internal issues.

— Did they transfer it into gold?

— It doesn't matter. Our eternal suffering due to our inability to establish good relations with the US is very handy for those responsible for pumping money from Russia. If our relations get worse they'll have to do something with their money, families, and real estates. But what does the rest of the country have to do with that?

Secondly, we have something to discuss with Bolton. He could say hello to Kushner for us. We'll tell him every detail about Putin's trip to Jerusalem and show him the photo of Putin standing beside the Wailing Wall with Netanyahu.

— We can make him watch all the goals the Russian team scored at the World Cup.

— Bolton specializes in two aspects. He's against Iran? Great! Who has Israeli Minister of Defense Lieberman just visited? He's visited Shoigu to discuss the situation with Iran at the Syrian border. He didn't visit the US because it doesn't control anything there. That's what we can discuss with Bolton. Everything else would be excessive. I'm not sure whether it's a task for Lavrov or Maria Zakharova who will convey the information later.