Janan Ganesh: “If Trump were clear and consistent that he is abandoning Ukraine, as well as Europe and Nato, the continent would have no choice but to become militarily self-sufficient as soon as possible. It might fail, of course, but there could be little doubt what should be done. If Trump were clear and consistent that he stands with democratic Europe, to the death, there would be no problem. One of these situations is ideal. The other, while grim, is an impetus for Europe to change: a fixed point that its leaders and voters can plan around.”

“The worst of all worlds is one in which Trump blows hot and cold, and we are living in it.”

“If Russian President Vladimir Putin agrees to meet his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, as urged by President Trump, he will come face-to-face with a man he has spent 3½ years excoriating as an illegitimate leader and puppet,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Negotiating directly with Zelensky would run sharply counter to the narrative Putin has carefully constructed and sold to Russians in an effort to justify his 2022 invasion of Ukraine: that the war is part of a broader conflict with the West in which Zelensky and his country are mere pawns.”

“Syria’s foreign minister held a rare direct meeting with an Israeli delegation in Paris on Tuesday, talks that were brokered by the United States as part of a diplomatic push for Syria and Israel to normalize relations despite a recent surge in tensions between them,” NBC News reports.

“No matter what Americans think of their politics, the United States still operates in the open. When the most powerful politician and the richest businessman fell out, the public got the full spectacle: barbed posts on social media and sniping in speeches,” the New York Times reports.

“China is the opposite. The country still doesn’t know why former President Hu Jintao was abruptly escorted out of the 2022 Communist Party congress, or what really happened when former Premier Li Keqiang died at 68 in 2023. And decades later, the full story of Lin Biao, Mao Zedong’s chosen successor, who fled China and died in a plane crash in 1971, is still unknown.”

“The secrecy has spawned a niche industry of ‘bedside eavesdroppers’ — Chinese online commentators who parse rumors and fleeting clues for signs of political shifts.”