Posted on 09/14/2025 7:35:22 PM PDT by Mount Athos
President Donald Trump wants to reopen the U.S. embassy in Belarus in the near future, normalise ties, and revive the economic and trade relationship, John Coale, a Trump representative, said on Thursday. Coale was speaking in Minsk to Belarusian reporters after holding talks with President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who agreed to release 52 prisoners in what he called a humanitarian gesture.
In return, the U.S. will grant sanctions relief to Belarus's national airline Belavia, allowing it to service and buy components for its fleet, which includes Boeing aircraft, a U.S. embassy spokesperson in Vilnius said. "Right now it's a good relationship, but not a great relationship and I think we eventually want to open up our embassy again, we want to have trade between the countries and that's not exactly happening now," said Coale. Asked when the U.S. embassy might reopen, Coale said: "I can't tell you the dates, but it's in progress. I know it has to happen and will happen in the very near future."
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
I was near the embassy in 2001. The Belarussians had put a huge antenna right across the field from the embassy and had it pointe toward the embassy. Probably a lot of other things also. Very funny.
The current moment presents a good opportunity to start peeling away Russia's allies, such as they are. Kazakhstan has been canoodling with the Chinese, Azerbaijan has gotten peeved at Moscow brutalizing its citizens in Russia and interfering with its pipeline/transit deal with Armenia and Turkey, with which the US has played a major role.
Now Lukashenko is loosening his bonds to Moscow as well.
This sounds like a Nixonian move to pull them away from Russia.
Smart. Lukashenko holds power through rigged elections and rigged constitutional amendments with the help of Russian secret police forces.
When Lukashenko dies or is “retired” expect the Kremlin to try to take over Belarus and end its independent sovereignty, with it simply becoming a part of the Russian Federation.
I don’t think Lukashenko wants this for his country, but when Belarus is so utterly dependent on the Kremlin for everything the prospects for a continuing independent Belarus are weaker.
John Coale is married to Greta Van Susteren, former host at Fox News. She mentioned on X.com her husband was there to get prisoners released.
Belarus GDP $73.1B. Last year’s growth 3.9%.
Population 9 million, down 0.5% last year, like most developed countries. Without strong inward migration, population does not rise, case in point US. (Latinos were 50% of total US pop growth 2010 to 2020).
Belarus immigration very slightly positive.
Ethnicity 85% Belarussian, 7.5% Russian, 3% Poles.
The probity of the proposal depends on the motivations of Donald Trump. Belarus is indisputably both the origin and transit area of armed drones that have repeatedly penetrated the airspace of NATO nations, including Poland and the Baltic states. It is currently massing troops and hosting Russian war games.
Apparently, Trump is willing to overlook these drone incursions, as he evidently has done with incursions recently into Poland, as part of a misconceived plan to entice Russia into a peace deal over Ukraine by offering financial "deals" with the US and others.
This is in keeping with Trump's course of negotiations with Russia from the beginning in which he, in effect, endorsed Russia's entire demands for Crimea, all lands presently occupied, other lands presently coveted, neutrality for Ukraine, denial of NATO membership for Ukraine, regime change in the Ukraine. In exchange for Russia getting everything demanded, Trump even sweetens the "negotiation" with attractive trade "deals" with Russia and the US.
Are we seeing the same pattern now with Belarus?
When this war in Ukraine concludes, as it inevitably will, why should the United States or any European nation enter into deals with a Russia which is in grave economic difficulty, that would reward Russia for its aggression and perhaps save the criminal regime of Vladimir Putin?
Western Europe, especially Germany, can find other sources of energy and minerals. There are other potential sources of gas and oil. Ultimately, Germany must reverse its suicidal anti-nuclear energy policies and rebuild nuclear energy production facilities.
It is worth noting that the AFD party in Germany is surging in the polls and, significantly, it openly intends to trade with Russia and China. The election of AFD is critical for the survival of Germany but it recites Trump's plan word for word to deal and trade with Russia. Are we to believe the repeated endorsements by this administration of the AFD are coincidental?
The pipedream of benign relations with Russia under the dictatorship of Vladimir Putin is entirely illusory, as is the understandable but forlorn hope that we can entice Vladimir Putin to abandon his axis with China. Vladimir Putin's personal survival has been staked with China, he cannot do otherwise.
No deals with Russia absent regime change in Russia. If they take Ukraine so be it, but to add insult to injury, to reward them for Vladimir Putin's crime is too much.
Let’s turn that into another Ukraine. That’s working out so well.
This isn't about money: it's about status and Putin's vision of what he thinks should be Russia's place in Europe and more generally how the inferior peoples surrounding Russia should genuflect before Russian "greatness." If they refuse, they should be killed or driven out of their homelands to be replaced by Russians.
And of course this isn't just Putin: this has been Russian state policy for centuries. It's part of the legitimation of the Russian state, which makes a deal with it's populace that no matter how much they are murdered, robbed and beaten by the Russian state, they will have an opportunity to do the same to their neighbors. A huge number of Russians are simply mini-Putins, yearning to be set free to murder, rape and pillage.
My support for Trump's gambit is meant as a rebuke to those who believe we shouldn't deal with dictatorships, principally the Europeans. This isn't the post-1989 world of US supremacy anymore. As in the Cold War, we need to make deals that help our security, just as we did with Tito.
That element of Realpolitik in Trump's decisions regarding Belarus I think is good. Whether it's also accompanied by illusions of the sort you detailed is something we'll find out.
For example, we use to know how to deal with savages: ask the Comanche and the Sioux. Contrast that with the war in Afghanistan.
Trump's "Let's Make a Deal" approach to Russia and China may be the opposite of the "nation building" and "pro-democracy" actions of the last set of illusions dominating US foreign policy. But it is simply the latest in a long series of US policies based on illusions.
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