Playing Russia’s Game: When America is Desperate for Deals, Dictators Win
Trump, Biden, and Obama all pursued premature deals with hostile regimes. If dictators want a diplomatic bargain, all they have to do now is wait.
Fatima Abo Alasrar is the founder of the Ideology Machine Project and a senior policy analyst at the Washington Center for Yemeni Studies.
Few assessments of American leadership are as blunt as Russian propagandist Zakhar Prilepin's verdict on the recent Trump-Putin summit in Alaska.
Prilepin, who openly boasts of killing Ukrainians, published his analysis in Russian state media outlet RT a day after the meeting, reducing Trump's entire policy approach to a calculated transaction:
The faster there is peace, the more opportunities Trump has to maintain minimal political stability in Ukraine in order to use Ukraine's resources for his own personal purposes. Business! Only business.
To Moscow, this transactional approach isn't a flaw; it's exactly what Russia wants.
When diplomacy becomes an open ledger of gains and losses, Russia can calculate precisely how much to give up now for long-term advantage. That assessment now echoes from Tehran to Beijing: America seeks deals; the dictators seek time.
The White House meeting between Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and European leaders perfectly illustrates this dynamic. Ostensibly organized to chart a path forward on Ukraine, that gathering instead revealed how America's need for quick wins creates systematic opportunities for patient competitors.
Even US allies now appear more concerned with containing American missteps than confronting adversaries. European leaders who attended the Zelenskyy meeting did so not to co-sign Trump's vision, but to constrain it. Their soft praise was diplomatic nicety; what mattered was their presence, a signal that they no longer trust Washington to manage the crisis alone.
That's not partnership; it's quiet panic.
This pattern of legacy-chasing through crisis-to-crisis dealmaking spans administrations, from Obama's nuclear negotiations with Iran to Biden's Yemen policy to Trump's current approach. While Washington seeks breakthrough moments, adversaries advance long-term objectives that make each American "solution" temporary at best.
America's reactive approach serves the interests of adversaries perfectly. Moscow viewed US involvement during the 12-day Iran war as a welcome distraction because it diverted American attention from Ukraine. While the United States juggles simultaneous crises in search of quick resolutions, Moscow, Tehran, and Beijing dedicate sustained attention to reshaping regional orders. They operate on multi-year narratives designed to outlast American election campaigns, while US policy lurches between news cycle responses.
Consider India's response to Trump's 50% tariffs for buying Russian oil. Rather than breaking with Moscow as intended, India froze US arms purchases and announced Modi will visit China for the first time in seven years while hosting Putin later this year. Economic pressure generated exactly the multipolarity it sought to prevent.
What Moscow wants from Trump is not a grand bargain; it's erosion. Erosion of sanctions, of pressure, of the enforcement consensus. Russia's economy is under strain, but even temporary sanctions relief acts as a lifeline. If India can secure exemptions, or if energy restrictions are weakened for political reasons, that's not just a win for Russia, it's a breach. One they will exploit to rewire trade relationships, re-anchor influence, and buy time for the next maneuver.
The Biden administration’s Yemen policy offers another cautionary example. His promise to “end the war in Yemen” focused almost entirely on Saudi Arabia, sidelining Iran’s role and misreading the Houthis’ intent. In February 2021, President Biden withdrew the group’s terrorism designation, framing it as a step toward diplomacy. The Houthis saw it as validation. Less than a week after the US removed the Houthis from the official list of foreign terrorist organizations, they escalated their assault on the city of Marib and tightened their grip on territory. The Houthis enjoyed Iranian backing in the endeavor and faced little resistance. The result wasn’t de-escalation; it was the consolidation of power by a group that rules with absolutism and ideological coercion.
Trump's style accelerates this dangerous dynamic. His campaign promises to resolve multiple crises simultaneously and create expectations for rapid solutions that must be delivered within news cycles. Moscow, Tehran, and Beijing recognize this as an exploitable pattern; they read Trump as someone seeking quick transactional wins rather than sustained strategic engagement. They're happy to provide those wins, knowing each agreement serves their broader timeline while satisfying American domestic political needs.
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Of course, these powers aren't all-powerful. Russia is bleeding in Ukraine. Iran's proxies are hitting walls. Hezbollah is retreating from key positions. These aren't signs of strength. However, that's not where their leverage originates. Their advantage lies not in overwhelming success, but in understanding how America thinks, and how to turn our impulse for quick, clean solutions into strategic vulnerability.
And as they refine that strategy, experimenting with pressure, narrative warfare, and opportunistic diplomacy, it's civilians who bear the brunt. In Gaza, Iran’s proxies helped trigger a war that has left tens of thousands dead. The Islamic Regime in Iran boasted of arresting over ten thousand people following the 12-day Iran-Israel war, deepening its domestic crackdown. In Yemen, the Houthis rule through coercion while humanitarian aid props up their control. In Ukraine, Russia’s slow advance has pulverized entire towns. Millions of people are suffering slowly under the weight of this authoritarian competition.
Yet, through all of this, Tehran and Moscow want the world to see them as brokers of restraint, foils to perceived American excess. What links all of these is the way authoritarian systems test red lines while the West clings to the diplomatic process and the fickleness of public opinion. That's not just dangerous for those who live under these regimes, it's corrosive to our own credibility.
Their confidence is evident. As a pro-Kremlin Russian analyst, Ana Shafran put it after the recent Washington talks with Zelenskyy and the Europeans:
Until European leaders realize that pressure on Russia does not bring peace closer, but pushes it back, any negotiations will stall. Well, then we will have to wait. Time is on our side.
They're betting that Trump's desire for deal-making success will override strategic consistency, exactly the opposite of their approach, which treats every negotiation as one move in a decades-long game.
Russia and its partners are working around American power in specific domains, wagering that strategic impatience and domestic political pressures will create the space they need to build independent spheres of influence. They sign the agreements, attend the summits, and provide the photo opportunities American presidents need, knowing these temporary accommodations help preserve whatever influence remains while American attention inevitably shifts elsewhere.
This isn't about authoritarian brilliance or American dysfunction. It's about a mismatch: between systems built to endure and a superpower increasingly consumed by urgency. Strategic patience isn't out of reach, but it demands more than a summit and a press release. The recent White House meeting, another round of talks producing commitments that depend entirely on good faith from actors who have never demonstrated it, suggests this assessment remains painfully accurate.
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