As you are aware, CTH is watching the small details closely on the U.S-Russia alignment against the backdrop of friction with the European Union, the U.K and NATO on issues surrounding Iran. In the past several days there have been several smaller moments lost amid media chatter of bigger news items, this is one such example today in the Oval Office.
During a press availability with the Artemis II astronauts, President Trump was asked for an update on the Ukraine conflict and seemingly stalled negotiations between U.S. intermediaries and Russia. At 04:12 of the video below, President Trump notes he spoke at length with Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin today on issues related to the Ukraine conflict, and {{{thoughtful-pause}}} Iran. WATCH:
President Vladimir Putin is in no hurry to ceasefire in Ukraine, and the U.S. military operation in Iran is not against his interests.
On April 12, 2026, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent quietly extended the sanction relief for Russia, permitting oil/gas sales loaded on vessels by 4/17/26 for transit and sale through 5/16/26. This permits Russia to push oil to Asia, specifically China, India and ASEAN countries where it is needed, while simultaneously the UAE and Saudi Arabia increase oil pumping avoiding the issues with the Strait of Hormuz.
This is happening while the U.S. is providing large oil and LNG supply increases to South/Central America, Europe and Japan to offset any global shortages.
Russia supplies China, India and Southeast Asia; the U.S. supplies Europe and Japan; the UAE supplies India and Australia; while Saudi Arabia supplies Africa and Europe. Global markets stable, Iran then faces operation financial fury led by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. {Go Deep}
So, we can reasonably see the general tone of the conversation between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
Well, after this press briefing, President Trump sent the following message on Truth Social.
During the press briefing President Trump noted, yet again, his profound disappointment with Europe, the U.K and NATO allies. Trump delivered praise for King Charles as a statesman but separated the political policy aspects of the U.K from his impression of the monarch.
These remarks about drawing down U.S. troop levels in Germany comes against the backdrop of German Chancellor Fredrich Merz being highly critical of President Trump’s intention to incapacitate Iran from gaining a nuclear weapon. Chancellor Merz is looking for any distraction he can come up with to avoid the issue of a severely contracting German economy.
Most Americans do not fully appreciate how the German national identity is defined by their industrial economy. The traditional people of Germany have a self-image that is -in large measure- the result of their economic condition. Everything centers around industriousness. Weaken that a little bit and the hardcore German people get visibly angered.
Commissar and European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, is also not happy. “In just 60 days of conflict, our bill for fossil fuel imports has increased by over €27 billion, without a single molecule of additional energy,” she told the European Parliament in Strasbourg.” {CITATION}
For all reasonable intents and purposes President Trump has withdrawn support for Ukraine. At the same time President Trump has openly been questioning NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte about the seemingly irrelevant purpose of the alliance.
Now, we might think this is just some transitional matters that have been visited before in various peaks and valleys of the geopolitical relationship. However, that is not the case this time.
How do we know this time it is something far more significant?
Well, the EU is debating dropping their climate goals.
BRUSSELS — Energy companies will be able to break the EU’s pollution limits and get away with it, under measures being considered by the European Commission ahead of a gathering of EU leaders in June.
The EU executive is considering a “zero-penalty” option that would allow national authorities not to fine companies that break strict rules governing methane emissions scheduled to come into force next year, according to two people familiar with the matter who were granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive discussions. (link)
The IC and deep state have made us believe for 80 yrs that Russia is a boogeyman to fill their budgets and dark budgets.
Russia has never been the boogeyman like most believe.
Not when it has been controlled by actual Russians who love Russia.
It is necessary to subtract the Rothschild controlled oligarchs period between Yeltsin and Putin, as well as the communist decades period just before that from Stalin forward, and, most especially, the virulently anti – Christian, slaughterhouse Bolshevik period.
The genuine London animosity began after the real Russian revolution against the Holocausting Soviet Union which they collapsed to the chagrin of London. Soviet Union was a construct, a golem.
Lend-Lease: Western Aid for the Soviet Union
Stalin and Khrushchev ???
I have to disagree. I was in the Navy before the Berlin wall was taken down. When Russia was the USSR, I can tell you they were not our friends. They were the boogeyman. Show where they were not, but you cannot. So please don’t say 80 years. I am only 58, and I know how much the Cold War was not cold. Now, I believe that Russia today is not our enemy, but please don’t blow smoke up my ass saying we weren’t at each others throats a mere 35 years ago.
Follow the money, not the troops or the arms.
Russia collapsed when Reagan stopped the economic and trade subsidies, is my understanding.
I spent 6 years in post Soviet Russia (I am 60, so same vintage as you) on behalf of our military and IC, and I wholly concur with your statement. Soviets were indeed a threat. Russia not so much. The people of the Soviet Union and Russia are a separate story from the leadership.
^^^^
The worst Communists in the Soviet Union were Ukrainian and Georgian!
When I remember how the USSR (led by Russia, right?) was funding all the left wing groups in the US back on the 50s and 60s etc, I know that Russia was not our friend.
Many of the groups we are having trouble with today are the offspring of those groups.
And with Putin being ex-KGB, he is well aware of the damage they did to us.
The groups we are dealing with today owe their allegiance to George Soros and the Tides Foundation.
It goes back further than Soros. Soros is riding the coattails of more sinister people behind the scenes like the Rockefellers. Almost every globalist anti-American organization has the Rockefellers involved in their creation or initial financing long before Soros.
The Soviets were doing their best to stir up trouble in black America and succeeded.
Stalin and Khrushchev were very real threats.
Go view Khrushchev’s speech at the UN where he proclaimed to the U.S. and the West, “We will bury you”.
President Trump in yet another end run around the powers to be.
Powers that were…. No more🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
I imagine that DJT is the first thing that pops into the spongy brains of the globalists above and the last thing at night. Truly, a pathetic lot-
The Coke Brothers.
President Trump’s MAGA energy policies are the engine for domestic prosperity and drive strategic international alliances that greatly benefit America!
I remember when POTUS offered Mrs. Merkel a very generous and advantageous deal for LNG, and she instead chose to cut off her nose to spite her face. He immediately went before the cameras and stated that she would live to regret it-and still they keep underestimating him while he continues to run the table. The oh-so-smug-and-superior Germans are finding out just how badly they’ve been conned by their betters-
Attacking Iran has altered the administration’s energy policy bigly. The ongoing liquidation of the world’s strategic oil reserves and fake news media’s attempts to cover up the consequences of such are not going to work for much longer.
The Global Oil Crisis Just Escalated To A New Level And U.S. Farmers Are Planting The Fewest Acres Of Wheat Since Records Began In 1919April 29, 2026 8:09 pm by Alex
by Michael
Every single day that the Strait of Hormuz is closed, the damage that is being done to the global economy is getting even worse. But the full consequences of the global oil crisis that we are facing will not be felt for a while because nations all over the globe are still running through their strategic oil reserves. And the full consequences of the global fertilizer crisis that we are facing will not be felt until harvest season. So don’t judge the severity of this emergency by what we are experiencing at this moment, because the truth is that what we are experiencing at this moment is just the very small tip of a very large iceberg.
NATO is like three day old fish…ready for the trash bin!
Considering the USPS-just like Lucca Brazzi.
Since we’re on the subject of the EU and UK I need to point out that King Charles was right yesterday. If it wasn’t for the British 275 years ago we’d all be speaking French today! Cheers! 😎
It was a joke in reference to the long historical rivalry between Britain and France for control of North America; may be historically plausible but not guaranteed, resting on the British victory in the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), known in North America as the French and Indian War.
Exactly! The French and Indian War was actually The Seven Years War which raged across The Carribean, Europe, the Middle East and India. The British were fighting just about everyone. In fact, the war continued after the formal French surrender as Chief Pontiac’s War with the siege of Fort Pitt, capture of a dozen British Forts through Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin and ended with the Battle of Bushy Run in Western Pennsylvania when a Highland Regiment of Black Watch and Royal American Units defeated the Indians. Young George Washington was a British Officer at the time.
I took it as a retort to the often expressed true reminder that if it wasn’t for the U.S., the U.K. would be speaking German.
Speaks to Putin, entertains KC3, meets the lunar astronauts, holds a presser all within the span of 12 hours or less. I’m sure there was more.
But he has no plan. /sarc
biden couldn’t even climb the stairs if AF1 fall free in that time line
Commissar and European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, is also not happy. “In just 60 days of conflict, our bill for fossil fuel imports has increased by over €27 billion, without a single molecule of additional energy,” she told the European Parliament in Strasbourg.”
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes! #FAFO.
They shouldn’t have let Biden blow-up the Nordstream Pipelines!
Hey Ursula, how much has the EU’s bill for fuel increased in the more than 1500 days of the Ukraine war? (That Europe keeps prolonging and trying to expand.)
“Most Americans do not fully appreciate how the German national identity is defined by their industrial economy.”
Without cheap energy, There can be no industrial economy.
The irony is that they stopped applying the American system which built up their industries and nation to such heights started in the first place by Bismarck.
It is not too late for them to reverse course, but that is not without political costs that many are unwilling to pay.
If the German national identity is defined by their industrial economy, was the populace asleep while their government dedicated their future to Net Zero?
I would ask the administration to communicate more (in laymen’s terms) about the machinations described above RE the movements & consumption of oil. Am still hearing people ask the reasonable question: “If we’re selling to all these people that used to get it from Iran, and we have so much damn oil, why is our gas still so expensive?” There’s a PR effort that, I think, needs to get to the heart of the matter in a way that doesn’t presume half the country drops by here daily (or more).
Gas going back down to $2.25 a gallon would send the message in the most direct fashion!
Here in northwestern Ohio it has just cracked $4.00, after stabilizing c. $3.25-3.69 for the past weeks.
A few gas stations still have it at $3.89.
Went up ten cents a gallon in the SW burbs of Chicago…4.59.
https://oilprice.com/
Brent crude 119.8
West Texas Intermediate crude 107.3
An interesting article, further down the website:
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Pentagon-Has-268-Days-to-Replace-Americas-Most-Critical-Supply-Chain.html
Southern Maine, today at about $4.40 for regular unleaded.
I would really appreciate cheaper gas.
Come to SW Missouri. I am paying $3.29 a gallon after a 25 cent increase yesterday.
Okay Ausonius how much more “pain” can your auto stand?
Some more can be endured, but obviously Iran needs to crack sooner rather than later.
At my location in western WI it was $1.82 the day Pres. Trump left office in 2021, so that’s my benchmark to him. It’s been 3.89/3.99 for quite awhile and overnight went to 4.29.
We are mostly selling LNG. We don’t sell gasoline just some oil. The price of gas of course is related to the price of oil, but the refineries don’t control the price of oil. What we need are a bunch more refineries.
Given what it takes to put a refinery into operation right now is the best chance to start one given there’s a better-than-normal possibility that the planning & permitting could go faster than the usual 5 years.
https://energiesmedia.com/new-u-s-refining-development-america-phase/
“Many millions of barrels of light shale crude are being exported simply because many of our existing facilities are still optimized to handle much heavier foreign crudes.
Over time, this quiet reality created a structural weakness in the U.S. energy infrastructure system – and it began to be harder to ignore as we continued to export large quantities of crude and continue to import large amounts of petroleum products.”
…
“While this project may represent “the same old thing” for some observers, the fact that it represents the first new refinery to be constructed in nearly five decades in the U.S. makes it unique among new refineries.
More importantly, unlike most existing refineries, this project will be specifically designed to process only light shale crude — which will reduce dependence on foreign crude imports and improve overall efficiency.”
Goodbye China if all their accumulated carbon credits are useless. President Trump, you are the best!
Roosevelt was determined to get America into WWII despite the fierce opposition within America. Lindbergh said there were 3 main groups clamoring for America to join the mass murdering Soviets. One was the Roosevelt Admin, the other the UK, take a guess who the third group was.
Awesome. After a day of King Charles III trying to schmooze Trump into maintaining the “special relationship” that has nearly destroyed America since WW II (or is it 11?), the first world leader Trump talks to is Putin. The special relationship is over.
The not-so-subtle digs Charles took at Trump in his speech to Congress and remarks at the State Dinner was the tell. A British royal would never insult his host unless the pompous flattery failed.
The Russian Federation and it’s people are not the natural enemy of the United States and it’s people.
Our Congress and Senate are far more communist than the Russian Federation.
Look no further than the communistic Thune, who doesn’t want free and fair elections in the United States.
Thune is blocking free and fair elections, just as was done in the old Soviet Union.
The Republican majority in the Senate are so totally pathetic that they allow this blatant disregard of the peoples will to go on.
We traded places when the Cold War ended
From 1918-1991: Russia (The USSR) was incredibly hostile to religion, individual freedom and capitalism; was constantly pushing to expand its empire; and it sought to bring the entire world under a single authoritarian government that would rule with absolute authority. The US led the opposition to that vision.
After 1991 (until Trump) we traded places. The US and the Globalist New World Order became incredibly hostile to religion, individual freedom and capitalism; constantly pushed to expand its empire (eg. NATO, the “rules based international consensus” etc.) and sought to bring the entire world under a single authoritarian government that would rule with absolute authority (you will own nothing and be happy.) Russia led the opposition to that vision.
Bring all our troops home from Germany as far as I’m concerned! Not needed like NATO! JMO
I have not even got to the 4 minute mark-but I will soon. My first impression after just 1 minute is, do any of these 4 or whatever support this greatest President of my lifetime?
Does it matter?
They do their job.
They do it well.
They haven’t made it political.
President Trump is a genius! Everything he has said and done since his second inauguration has been for the following purposes:
1. Make the United States and her citizens the richest, most independent nation on earth.
2. Create conditions across the globe that will foster success and prosperity in all the nations of the world who will “play ball” with the United States.
3. Punish and eliminate “bad actors” who create death and destruction around the world.
President Trump is dismantling the “rules based international order” because its only purpose was to enrich the elite. He is bringing back “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” here in the United States and around the world.
May God continue to bless and protect President Trump.
And guide him and his administration.
I like where this is all going long term. The Country, once past this speed bump, will see things turn around quickly. However, the Left Coast continues to slide further into the ditch.
The shortage of energy supplies to Europe and Asia is not a bug, it is a feature that punishes worthless allies who went all in on the New World Order of energy scarcity and mass migration to crush their citizens. Go Trump! Best President ever!
So the Germans are waking up to the green scam finally.
Sounds like they may have a chance to get their country back if they get Merz out and the illegals.
Maybe hope for them.
Bet the German people like President Trump.
Laughable European Logic:
“We have NOT changed our rules for Climate Control!” *
*but we aren’t going to enforce them, so we basically capitulated and admitted how ridiculous we are.
Claiming methane (CH4 or a fart if you will) is dangerous is nonsense.
CH4 breaks down very quickly when exposed to sunlight. If it wasn’t so, this planet would be unliveable. The amount of natural methane emissions dwarfs human emissions.
Chemical breakdown which happens in hours is CH4 + 2O2 => CO2 + 2H2O.
We used to do experiments regarding this as kids. Fart in a jar, put it outside under the sun and watch it turn into a drop of water at the bottom of the jar.
Demonising methane is a political control act, not a scientific act.
If it’s a splatter fart, does it turn into a democrat?
never trust a fart!
In another venue I heard discussion that Aragchi ended his recent Pakistan – Oman – Pakistan with a last stop in St Petersburg to be greeted by Lavrov and a 90 minute conversation with Putin.
If this is factual, would be interesting to know the tone of that discussion. Seems to me Putin is a realist, and what could Aragchi possibly offer him?
“In just 60 days of conflict, our bill for fossil fuel imports has increased by over €27 billion, without a single molecule of additional energy,”
The Gall of this one!
But when my energy bill increased like mad without actually using more for the Build Back Better agenda, then it was just “for the greater good”, and only “transitory”
Im trying not to hate, but they make it real difficult
The most stubborn races are the Germans and the Scots. Is it any wonder Pres Trump has such toughness and drive? His mother from the Isle of Lewis Scotland, and his father from German extraction.