-Working together,
we will begin the urgent task of rebuilding our nation and
renewing the American dream. November 9th, 2016. And Donald Trump
had just been elected as the new president of the United States.
Hillary Clinton, the favorite, had lost. -She congratulated us,
it’s about us, on our victory. In Moscow, the election result
was also being celebrated. -We are pleased that the best candidate
has won. Let Grandma Hillary have a rest. -We were baffled: in the State Duma,
nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky held a special reception to
celebrate Trump’s victory. -There were reports of people popping
champagne corks at the time. I don’t know anyone personally,
but I heard about it. Well, a love of grandeur is part of the
Russian national character. Vladimir Putin was
one of the first to congratulate the surprise
winner Donald Trump. -Russia wants to completely restore
its relationship with the U.S.A. -The fact that Trump was focusing on
the slogan “Make America Great Again,” that he wanted to promote his own
country rather than pushing for globalization,
was good news for us Russians. -President Putin and President Trump
shook hands on a new friendship. But the first two years of Trump’s
presidency were overshadowed by the so-called Russian Affair. The charge was
conspiracy against the United States. Did the two men
illegally collude? -I never worked for Russia
and you know that answer better than anybody,
I never worked for Russia. There were signs of male bonding every
time the two presidents met. But could a true partnership ever really develop?
Could these men really become friends, or were their states
destined to remain enemies? Back to 2016. In the run-up to the U.S.
presidential elections, Russia’s state media backed the Republican
candidate, Donald Trump - a man known for his
affinity towards Russia. -We're going to have a great
relationship with Putin and Russia. Political tensions between
Russia and the U.S. had been rising, amounting, even,
to talk of a new cold war. -The politics of U.S.
Democrats and President Obama had steered the Russian-American
relationship down a blind alley. The Democrats’ new presidential candidate
was Putin’s arch enemy, Hillary Clinton. -She even compared him with Hitler.
Quite blatantly - she said he was just like Hitler. So, it was obvious that relations
would be difficult if she became president. Moscow pinned all its
hopes on Donald Trump to revive the relationship
between the two nations. -Trump expressed himself quite differently.
He said he would find a - common language with Putin,
that it was possible to work together with Putin and that’s exactly
what he was planning to do. Donald Trump and Vladimir
Putin: two men with two common enemies: Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama. Despite having different reasons, Trump
and Putin both shared a feeling of being disparaged by the outgoing U.S.
president and the American establishment. -I think that from Putin’s perspective,
Donald Trump was a better prospect to lead the U.S.A. than Hillary Clinton.
Putin knew Obama’s position and had tried to outperform him several times
in world politics — without success. Putin’s mistrust of the U.S., its
president and its allies, was deep-rooted. After the collapse of the Soviet Union,
Putin had experienced what Western betrayal actually meant: the expansion of NATO
into formerly Communist eastern Europe. -First Poland joined, then it was the
Czech Republic and Hungary, then it went on and on and on. Now the Baltic
States - Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia - are all members of NATO too. They share
borders with Russia. On which basis should Putin or anyone else trust
a word the West says? I don’t know. Even with President Obama, relations
did not improve. Putin was rattled by Obama’s advocacy of regime
change in the Arab world. -He always had the feeling that things
were moving in the wrong direction. That nothing was going the way it should.
The key change was the Arab Spring. -The situation in Libya was dramatic,
and then Gaddafi, the head of state, was murdered live on camera. That
scene must have hit Putin really hard. But Trump’s dislike of Obama, on the
other hand, was personal, not political. 2011 was a trial run for Trump.
He launched his own unofficial election campaign, aiming to run as the
Republican candidate in the 2012 presidential election,
challenging Obama. -He doesn’t like Donald
Trump? and the last guy in the world he wants to run
against, is Donald Trump. Trump rekindled an old rumor about
Obama, claiming that his true birthplace was Kenya, and that the president was
therefore not eligible for office. -Trump was not, I think, on anybody's radar
other than as a bit of a lark, right, in this back-and-forth; I mean, again,
as with so many things about Trump you don't take it seriously, at first, because
it just seems so outlandish and bizarre. Obama finally published his birth
certificate. In April 2011, at the traditional correspondents’ dinner in
Washington, the president hit back. -No one is happier, no-one is
prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than The Donald. And
that’s because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter
- like did we fake the moon landing? A slap in the face that Donald Trump
wouldn’t quickly forget. His showpiece had backfired - two weeks later he
withdrew his presidential candidacy. But Trump declared that he would still win at
the next election. Too arrogant to be true? Trump sought his
revenge on Obama. And he was not the only one. In Russia,
Putin too was waiting for the moment to take revenge on his American counterpart.
But he had to win an election first. Yet, in the run-up to the elections
of March 2012, Moscow became the epicenter of an unprecedented wave of
demonstrations against the government. -The protests began after the
parliamentary elections in early December 2011 — which were hugely rigged.
What happened next, was what happens elsewhere when citizens realize
their votes are not being heard. They go out on
the streets. Putin blamed Hillary Clinton for
giving the signal for the protests. -At the time she was Secretary of State.
The U.S. State Department provided funding for Russian NGOs to observe the
elections. To Putin, this was direct interference in his regime:
Hillary Clinton wanted to topple him and organize
a revolution in Russia. Putin decided to smash the
opposition and accused the U.S. of threatening Russia
and its traditional values. -In 2012, I warned my friends from
the liberal camp to prepare for the inevitable. They would have to take
sides — either us, Russia, or the West. -I thank everyone who
has said yes to a strong Russia!
I asked you - will we win? Yes! Putin’s tactics paid off.
He was the clear winner of the presidential elections,
with 64 per cent of the vote. -Putin has shown that his politics
are geared towards traditional values: family, loyalty to the people and
service to the Fatherland. These values have always been typical of the Russian
service class’, as it used to be called’. In November 2012, President Obama was
also re-elected. His second term began. -We have fought our way back and we
know in our hearts that for the United States of America,
the best is yet to come. Russia, however,
was not very high on Obama’s agenda. -There's no big economic relationship,
there was no big need at the moment for focusing on nuclear weapons or non-
proliferation treaties?they weren’t coming up at that point, so, for Obama, it was a
focus completely on other issues - on the Middle East, on terrorism, on domestic
affairs. Russia was really an afterthought. But one U.S. citizen was vying for Putin’s
attention: Donald Trump. As early as 2013, he had recognized that Russia was
also a land of unlimited opportunities. As the owner of the rights to Miss
Universe, Trump had voted to hold the beauty pageant in Moscow. He launched a
charm offensive on Twitter: could Putin be his new best friend? He was certain
that Putin would attend the contest. In November 2013 Trump arrives in
Moscow, flanked by beauty queens. -Moscow is a city that does glitz really
well and Trump, as we know, is a guy who likes a lot of flash - the more it gleams
gold, the more exciting it is to him. -It’s an amazing location and Moscow
and all of Russia is going wild over it, so we’re very happy, the Miss Universe
pageant is just setting records. Russian billionaire Aras
Agalarov was hosting the event. Trump had met him just five
months previously in Las Vegas. Michael Idov, editor-in-chief of
GQ Russia magazine at the time, was approached by Aras Agalarov to
write a cover story. He refused. -My compromise was that we're not going
to write anything about this little horror, but I will come, and I'll hang
out at the opening party for the pageant and I will get photographed for,
you know, for the society pages. In spite of all Agalarov’s efforts to
persuade Putin to attend the beauty pageant, the Russian president didn’t
turn up. Trump’s trip to Russia later fuelled allegations that Moscow had
recruited him as an agent — engineered by host Agalarov,
a man with close contacts in the Kremlin. -Welcome
to Moscow! -If I knew that this idiotic event
would somehow become kind of the crux, the focal point of the 21st
century's biggest conspiracy theory, I would probably have paid closer
attention or tried to hang out with Trump and the Agalarovs.
But I honestly doubt that this was when
the plot was hatched. During his stay in Moscow, Trump continued
his offensive: against Obama, for Russia. -All over the world people are laughing at
us, they’re ripping us off, I mean we’re? you look at what’s going on in Russia,
in Moscow, you look at how it’s just booming and how well it does and to have
the Olympics - as you know we tried to get the Olympics and came in fourth place
?.now figure that one out, fourth place. Yet Putin ignored
his advances. -For the average Russian, Trump was
a money magnate, a man with a trophy wife, who built towers all over the world.
No more than that. He was a businessman, one of many.
I don’t think Putin perceived him any
differently at this point. But giving up was not an option for
Donald Trump. He was determined to find a way to get Putin’s attention.
But the Russian president had more important plans. He wanted to get
his country back on the world stage. Fast. And he could
see a way to do it. In early 2014, the Ukrainian peninsula
of Crimea became the center of the most serious East-West crisis since the end
of the Cold War. On the 22nd of February, Viktor Yanukovych, the Moscow-loyal
president of Ukraine, was ousted from office. Putin realized
he had to take action. -Since he couldn’t help President
Yanukovych to stay in power, Ukraine had to be punished. He wanted to
show that a people’s revolution could only worsen a country’s situation. It was
also a clear warning to his own country. Putin, whose empire
borders on Ukraine, wants to prevent Ukraine
moving closer to Europe. -If this state joined the West and
became a member of the EU and NATO, first of all it meant that NATO troops
would be stationed all along this long border. Furthermore, it was obvious
that if Crimea belonged to Ukraine, it was no longer Russia’s most important
naval base. Instead, we could have the American sixth fleet, for
example, coming to Sevastopol. Putin called a midnight
meeting and decided that Crimea should once
again belong to Russia. -You know, people, the Sochi Olympics
were still going on or they had just ended. The world was distracted. And so,
Russia clearly had plans on the books to take back Crimea. They didn't invent them.
It wasn't an impulsive move, if you like. Moscow acted quickly. Just three
weeks after the Ukrainian president’s overthrow,
Crimea declared its independence. -The annexation of the strategic Black
Sea peninsula quickly followed Sunday’s hastily called referendum in which
its residents overwhelmingly backed breaking from Ukraine
and joining Russia. -I would like to congratulate
all citizens of Russia, Crimea and Sevastopol on
this significant event. -Sometimes, for Americans, I try to
explain that it would be as if by an accident of history the U.S. lost part of
South Florida, but not just South Florida — Orlando, Disney, and if, by chance,
the opportunity arose for a President to grab it back what would people say?
That it was a violation of international law or Disney is ours?
And that's what you hear in Russia, the cry goes up,
Krim Nos — Crimea is ours. The United States and the
European Union reacted by imposing economic
sanctions on Russia. -Sanctions have arrived as the new way
of conflict between countries, because it's perceived as being inexpensive. It's
something that's politically satisfying. There is an entire class of new
sanctions experts and they offer their services to the sovereign - and
the Congress, and the President, they’re all very interested
in having these services. At the Nuclear Security Summit
in The Hague in March 2014, Barack Obama attacked the
Russian president again. -Russia is a regional power that is
threatening some of its immediate neighbors, not out of
strength, but out of weakness. Obama’s derision only served to
encourage Putin to advance further into Ukraine. Tensions rose in April as
fighting erupted between pro-Russian and pro-government forces in the
East Ukrainian Donbass region. -Putin has said it so many times:
Russia and Ukraine are one nation. They belong together.
One people, one empire, one leader. -Russian policy on Ukraine is viewed
as very fundamental to Russian national identity. When you hear Russians,
officials, media, ordinary people talking all the time about my Ukrainian
grandmother, my summers in Ukraine, Ukraine is my left arm,
my right arm’, whatever, right. It's a deep feeling of
closeness to Ukraine. As if he also understood what Ukraine
meant to Russia, Donald Trump chipped in? -Putin, Russia is like, I mean they’re
really hot stuff and now you have people in the Ukraine ? who knows, set up or
not ? but it can’t all be set up, but Russia, I mean what he’s done
for Russia is really amazing. Trump’s praise for
Putin fell on deaf ears. -Before Trump ran for the presidency,
no one saw him as particularly influential, let alone as a person
to watch out for politically. As a penalty for the ongoing fighting
in Ukraine, the U.S. and Europe imposed new sanctions on the Russian finance,
energy and defense sectors in September 2014. Putin retaliated. For
him, the U.S. was the real troublemaker. -You might think the United States’
special position and leadership was really a blessing for us all. Well, let me
tell you, this was not the case. Instead of solving conflicts, it led to their
escalation and the spread of chaos. Instead of democracy,
support for dubious groups was growing, from neo-fascists
to radical Islamists. Provocation from Moscow was
nothing new for the West. -After annexing the Crimea, and the
events in East Ukraine, Russia was in total diplomatic isolation.
Putin was virtually ignored at the G20 meeting in Australia.
He left it early. Putin needed a new front to demonstrate
Russian strength. He found it in Syria. -Russia’s always had strong relations
with the Syrian government, sold weapons to the Syrian government over
many years, often on credit and after a while that credit would
magically be forgiven. The civil war in Syria had been raging
for five years. In its fight against the insurgents, President Bashar al-Assad’s
army had laid waste to entire cities. Amid the chaos,
the so-called Islamic State had seized control of great
swathes of Eastern Syria. Putin did not want to see another Arab
dictator toppled. He decided to intervene. -With Bashar al-Assad, it wasn’t
about supporting him personally — the problem was keeping the Syrian state going.
What has U.S. and European intervention in other states’ internal
affairs ever achieved, with this excuse of teaching you about democracy and
your way of life? Only chaos and collapse. This applies to Afghanistan,
Iraq, and Libya. And now, in Syria, Russia was saying: “Stop!
That’s enough." On the 30th of September 2015,
Russia launched its air strikes. Officially, they were targeting
Islamic terror militia. Putin’s American champion gave it his
full backing. On American television, Trump endorsed Putin’s
intervention in Syria and said no one should get in Russia’s
way against the Islamic State. Yet Trump was alone with his message
of support. The U.S. and its allies demanded that the
Russian air strikes stop. Their missiles were also
hitting innocent people. -We are Russians. We wage war.
And when we wage war, we want to win. And we do win.
Even if only 15 or 20% of our bombs hit their target,
they still hit their target. Russian military support changed the
situation in Syria dramatically — in favor of the Assad regime. The international
community could no longer ignore Putin. -He needed a breakthrough,
an opportunity to return to the world stage. He wanted to regain his place
at the table with the other players. Russian intervention in
Syria was his ticket. -They went in there, they started the
bombing campaign and really forced the U.S. to talk to them. And ever since
then, you know, the Russian and American militaries have been engaged in
de-confliction talks on a daily basis. At the same time, Donald Trump was
eyeing the U.S. presidency once again. He had already launched his
election campaign in June 2015. -I am officially running for
President of the United States - and we are going to make
our country great again. -At this time, Trump was already leading
the race for the Republican candidacy. People were starting to take him seriously.
So, of course, they also started following his
comments about Russia. Trump’s attempts to curry favor with the
Russian president finally paid off. In December 2015, Putin mentioned Donald
Trump in public for the first time. -He is a very striking and no doubt
very talented man. He appears to be the great favorite in the
presidential contest. Trump was happy to
accept the praise. -He came out of nowhere two days ago
- and he said Trump is brilliant. He’s great. He’s the leader. He’s the leader of
the parties’. And he said nice things, I didn’t know, I never met him, so I didn’t
know. He says nice things and then all of a sudden, it’s like, oh, isn’t it terrible
that Putin said? That’s not terrible that’s good, 'cause that’s a good thing, not a
bad thing. He can’t stand Obama, Obama can’t stand him. They’re always fighting.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we could get along, like, with people?
You know? -I guess what begins in late 2015 was this
sort of mutual flirtation, if not a love affair with Trump having praised Putin
and Putin now, seeing the possibility that Trump could play in
this election and praising Trump as somebody who
could be presidential. -There’s something I find important
and can only approve of. I see nothing wrong with it, on the contrary.
Mr. Trump said he would be willing to restore Russian-American relations.
What’s bad about that? We all want that
— don’t you? -From the Russian perspective it was
clear whom to support in the election. Putin spoke favorably but also quite
carefully about Trump. He said it was good but didn’t say he thought Trump
was great or anything like that. He was much
more reserved. On 22nd of July 2015, Trump became the
official Republican presidential candidate. -I am asking for your support tonight so
that I can be your champion in the White House - and I will be your champion.
Nobody knows the system better than me,
which is why I alone can fix it. Trump presented himself as
Putin’s western kindred spirit. -Due to his character and his upbringing,
he didn’t just like Putin as a politician, but also as a person with a personality
similar to his own, with strength, trust, consistency and enormous resilience.
Just like Trump himself. A few days later, Trump appeared
before the press. The question came up again: would he recognize
Crimea as Russian territory when he became president?
Or lift the sanctions? -We’ll be looking at
that, we’ll be looking? His comments contradicted both U.S.
government and NATO policy — both wanted to keep sanctions in place until
Russia returned Crimea to Ukraine. But Trump saw NATO chiefly as
a competitor to the U.S. -Donald Trump begins to cast enormous
skepticism and doubt on the NATO alliance, his point being that NATO, like
everything else he's ever done, should be transactional - how much the United
States is paying versus how much other allies are contributing should be the
determining factor, rather than the idea of collective security that has been the
bedrock of the alliance since its founding. -Trump is an isolationist, he says: NATO
is sucking away American resources. He believes this. Yet he understands nothing
about foreign policy, nor does he wish to. -And I'm sure that from Vladimir Putin's
point of view, this is music to his ears. In July 2016, Hillary Clinton
made U.S. history as the first female presidential
candidate of a major party. -And so, my friends, it is with
humility, determination, and boundless confidence in America’s promise
that I accept your nomination. In the same month, she accused Russia
of interfering in the presidential elections. Russian hackers were alleged
to have stolen and published emails from the Democratic National Committee.
Their aim was to sow seeds of discord in her party
to benefit Donald Trump. -In 2016, Putin set out to create chaos
in the United States, mostly so he could say to the Russians at home, “Look at
this, this democracy is a complete mess.” Trump was very enthusiastic. He encouraged
the hackers to find even more emails. -If Russia or China or any other country
has those emails, I mean to be honest with you, I’d love to see
them?Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the
30,000 e-mails that are missing! Putin denied all the accusations and said
Russia had not interfered with the U.S. elections and that the scandal surrounding
the alleged stolen emails was fake. -The most important thing was the
content, which the public now knows about. That’s the only thing that
matters, not who stole it. -I always say to Americans: Do you
actually realize that we totally control the U.S? Our hackers control everything!
But of course, that’s utter nonsense. From my point of view,
the most stupid thing is, they use this excuse to oppose Trump's
domestic policies. On November 9th, 2016, something that
very few people had thought possible happened: Hillary Clinton lost
the presidential election. -This is not the outcome we wanted or
worked so hard for, and I’m sorry that we did not win this election for the values
and vision we share for our country. A historic election night was over.
The winner was Donald Trump. -I pledge to every citizen of our
land, that I will be president for all Americans,
and this is so important to me? There was applause
from Moscow too. -So, this is not only the victory
for the Americans, who defended their democracy against the liberal globalist
elite. No, this is the victory that American people brought
to the whole world. -The reality is, a great number of
Russians felt vindicated. They felt that something right had happened.
Now justice will be done, and Russia's grievances will be respected
by a new American president. -We are the champions
of the world? -At the end of the day, Trump stands
for protectionism in the economy and for greater U.S. sovereignty. He doesn’t
want any migrants in the country, for instance. His way of thinking
was much closer to Putin’s. So, was the outgoing President Barack
Obama now history? Not quite. He still had one card to play. In December,
his government expelled 35 Russian citizens in retaliation for Moscow’s alleged
interference in the elections. But there was no reaction
from Putin — yet. -We only react when we can benefit.
Obama’s presidency was more or less over. Why should we have
wasted our political capital? Even in 2014 or 2015,
he could no longer do a lot. -Putin signaled that Moscow was
waiting for the arrival of President Trump in the White House and
would solve the problems with him. -Putin didn’t want to start the
relationship with President Trump off on this sour note and instead sent Trump
this positive message. Trump responded and said Vladimir Putin was
very smart in not retaliating. Putin even defended the newly elected
president, even giving a surprising answer to questions about rumors that
Russia had compromising material on Trump — including images with prostitutes
during his visit to Moscow in 2013. -I can hardly imagine that
he went into a hotel to meet girls with low sense
of social responsibility. Even if they are, of course, the best in
the world. People who fake pictures of the kind now circulating, of the elected
U.S. president, to use them in a political battle, are worse than prostitutes.
They have absolutely no moral standards! On January 20th,
2017 - Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the
United States of America. -I, Donald John Trump, do solemnly swear
? (that I will faithfully execute) ? that I will faithfully execute, (the office
of President of the United States), the office of President of the United States.
(So help me God), So help me God.
(Congratulations Mr President?) Would the relationship with
Moscow now be rebooted? -Putin was entertaining the hope that
he could create a different kind of relationship with the U.S.A.
to the previous one. Which meant gradually rebuilding the world to fit his own
rules and turning Russia back into a superpower. He and Trump would make a deal
on how the rest of the world would live. But Moscow’s hopes of a fresh beginning
with Washington were soon dashed. First of all, by Nikki Haley, Trump’s
new ambassador to the United Nations. Haley’s first appearance in February
2017 marked a tougher stance. -I consider it unfortunate that the
occasion of my first appearance here is one in which I must condemn the
aggressive actions of Russia. ? the dire situation in Eastern
Ukraine is one that demands clear and strong condemnation
of Russian actions. Contrary to all of Trump’s
previous comments, Ambassador Haley confirmed that U.S. sanctions would remain
in place until Russia withdrew from Crimea. The U.S. government’s anti-Russian tack
continued. In March, FBI director James Comey confirmed that his agency would
conduct an official investigation into the Russian government’s alleged interference
in the 2016 U.S. election campaign. -And that includes investigating the
nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign
and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination
between the campaign and Russia’s efforts. In April, UN ambassador Haley once
again condemned Russia’s complicity with the Syrian Assad regime,
this time citing a poison gas attack. -Yesterday morning, we awoke to
pictures, to children foaming at the mouth, suffering convulsions, being
carried in the arms of desperate parents. The truth is that Assad, Russia and
Iran, have no interest in peace. When the United Nations consistently fails in
its duty to act collectively, there are times in the life of states that we
are compelled to take our own action. Three days later, U.S.
missiles hit the Syrian military airport where the poison gas attack
was allegedly carried out.
