[1]
By John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with [2]
Nuri al-Said, the long-serving but ill-fated Iraqi prime minister of the 1940s and 1950s, once said that you can rent an Arab but you can’t buy him.
On July 15, 1958, he ended up shot by an Iraqi Army coup, buried, dug up, and his corpse mutilated as it was dragged through the streets of Baghdad. His end confirmed his truth.
President Vladimir Putin knows better than most that the Nuri Pasha maxim applies to American government officials up to and including the presidents — except that they don’t honour their promises, demand more bribes, and survive intact to die in bed (most of them).
Still, Putin has delegated Kirill Dmitriev (lead image left), a US-educated and trained investment banker, to deliver the bribes (left, right) to President Donald Trump (extreme right) and his go-betweens, and return with what Dmitriev claims to be their promises for terms of settlement of the Ukraine war, the lifting of sanctions, and the release of about $300 billion in Central Bank of Russia (CBR) funds frozen and part-confiscated over the past four years.
Putin has done this so that he can ask the General Staff, the intelligence services, and the Security Council what they make of the deal by a show of thumbs up, thumbs down, after Dmitriev presents the costs and benefits of his proposal and the Trump administration’s response. Dmitriev was sent back to Miami last weekend.
When he returned to report to the Kremlin, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said [3] “there will be no details. You’ve heard the conceptual assessments from both sides, from Dmitriev and from Witkoff. In general, these were quite positive and constructive talks.” Witkoff had tweeted the adjectives, “productive and constructive”.
Witkoff also revealed [4] that several Americans were with him at the meeting with Dmitriev: US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Jared Kushner and Joshua Gruenbaum. This is the first time Putin has authorized a single representative to meet a full US delegation. On January 22 [5], in addition to Witkoff and Dmitriev, Kushner and Gruenbaum were matched at the Kremlin by Putin himself and Yury Ushakov, the Kremlin national security advisor.
Bessent’s attendance in Miami signals the talks with Dmitriev covered terms for ending the US sanctions on Russian trade and assets, including the secondary sanctions on Indian and Chinese purchases of Russian oil. Bessent’s press office at the US Treasury has remained silent [6]; so too his Twitter stream [7].
At the same time, Bessent has continued to sharpen sanctions against Iran, tweeting [8] “the regime has chosen to squander what remains of the nation’s oil revenues on nuclear weapons development, missiles, and terrorist proxies around the world. President Trump stands with the people of Iran and has ordered Treasury to sanction members of the regime. Treasury will continue to target Iranian networks and corrupt elites that enrich themselves at the expense of the Iranian people. This includes the regime’s attempts to exploit digital assets to evade sanctions and finance cybercriminal operations. Like rats on a sinking ship, the regime is frantically wiring funds stolen from Iranian families to banks and financial institutions around the world. Rest assured. Treasury will act.”
Bessent’s public attack at supper time on January 30 on “networks and corrupt elites” was not what he said privately to Dmitriev, representing Russian business networks and elites, when they met at breakfast the next day. The selective sanctions relief which Dmitriev has been asking for, and the bribes he has been offering, have been understood in Moscow for a year now [9]. But criticism of this line and of Dmitriev’s role which has been gathering force in the Russian Security Council and State Duma has so far been kept behind closed doors and off the record.
A Moscow source in a position to know says Dmitriev is now proposing to reclaim the $300 billion of CBR reserves and place them in an international fund to be jointly managed by Dmitriev, Trump’s sons and son-in-law, and Witkoff’s sons. After some small allocations have been made to Trump’s Gaza redevelopment and to the post-armistice Ukrainian regime, most of the money would then be invested in joint US and Russian projects whose disbursement would legalize the American bribe-taking, and add Russian takers as well.
“Look,” the source says [10]: “Trump must get the money out of the European repositories. From our point of view, the increase in value of the CBR’s gold reserves has almost overtaken the value of the frozen cash reserves. This scheme takes the money out of the hands of [Central Bank Governor Elvira] Nabiullina: no one wants her to get her hands back on the money. So what’s wrong with investing the money better than she has done? Everybody gets rich.”
In a podcast requested by the Tehran Times and recorded on February 2, the formula of Money plus Votes plus Bullets equal Power (M +V+ B = P) has been applied to the parallel negotiations Trump and Witkoff are running with Iran and Russia. For elaboration of the formula, click to read this [11].
Trump is retreating on both foreign fronts, and also on his home front.
The evidence cited in the podcast includes these two statements by Trump over the weekend in which he intimated that he has abandoned two of his earlier demands – that Iran halt its missile development programme and reduce its nuclear enrichment to zero.
Saturday, January 30 [12]:
“Q: Sir, could you give us an update on where, where your thinking is right now with Iran, if you are, uh, have made a final decision on what you want to do there?
Donald Trump: I mean, I certainly can’t tell you that, but we do have very big, powerful ships in, heading in that direction as you know. I can’t tell you. Okay. But I hope, I hope they negotiate something that’s acceptable.
Q: Saudi Arabia, uh, commencements are quickly submitted in the US backs office strike [as published]. That will be important to Iran. What’s your reaction to that, sir?
Donald Trump: Some people think that and some people don’t. Well, we could make a negotiated deal that would be satisfactory with no nuclear weapons that said they should do that, but I don’t know that they will. But they are talking to us. Seriously talking to us.”
Sunday, February 1 [13]:
Question: Sir, uh, on Iran, uh, the Supreme Leader today said that, uh, US attacks could spark a regional war. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Donald Trump: Why wouldn’t he say that? Of course, he’s gonna say that. But, uh, we have the biggest, most powerful ships in the world over there. Very close, couple of days. And, uh, hopefully we’ll make a deal. If we don’t make a deal then, uh, we’ll find out whether or not he was right…”
The money market evidence that Trump will not attack Iran for fear of triggering the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and a cutoff of Persian Gulf shipments of crude oil is that the forward price of oil began to decline sharply from peak on January 29. Since then West Texas Intermediate (WTI) has fallen by 6.5%; Brent by 8.1%. Trump’s retreat is as plain as the direction of these price indexes downward.
[14]Source: https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts/ [15]
The calculation of Trump’s domestic vote loss, especially in his white working-class base, has been reported in this Pew Research Centre poll of January 20-26:
[16]Source: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VkONJuHHujySkkXJmJbyd5jR-z1ZPoXG8-THGRNyJVo/edit?gid=0#gid=0 [17] Trump continues to tweet “the highest Poll Numbers I have ever received. Obviously, people like a strong and powerful Country, with the best economy, EVER!” -- https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/116004407990106189 [18] In the compilation of all polls on Trump’s voter rating, fear of inflation and disapproval of Trump’s performance on that economic indicator continues to grow worse.
[19]Source: https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/approval/donald-trump/issues/inflation [20]
One result has been Trump’s backtracking [21] on his deployment of National Guardsmen and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) paramilitaries in Minneapolis and other “poorly run Democrat Cities…Unless, and until, they ask us for help. We will, however, guard, and very powerfully so, any and all Federal Buildings that are being attacked by these highly paid Lunatics, Agitators, and Insurrectionists.”
The podcast also questions why the Iran side should continue negotiating with Trump’s emissary Witkoff after the record he made as a deception operation ahead of the 12-day war last June; and whether Iranian negotiators are seeking the same role in their negotiations as the Russians have required in their Abu Dhabi talks — that is, for the chief US military officer responsible for attack plans and operations against Iran. This is Admiral Brad Cooper [22].
The Russian alternative framework for peace negotiations with Iran to address the root causes of the conflict as a region-wide problem, and to assure mutual and reciprocal security for the regional states, was issued on August 21, 2021. Read it here [23].
[24]Listen to or view the Tehran Times podcast, hosted by Sahar Dadjoo, when the link is released today. A text will follow in the Tehran Times website. https://www.tehrantimes.com/ [25]