As the people of Ukraine know, neighborliness is not among Putin’s great qualities.

Still, it was with a reference to the US and Russia being neighbors that Putin kicked off his conversation with President Trump in Alaska yesterday.

On the red carpet at the airport he apparently said to Trump: “Good afternoon, dear neighbor. Very good to see you in good health and to see you alive.”

…

Trump’s own remarks at the joint press conference were friendly and formal.

But he acknowledged that while the talks were a start there was no deal.

Because there were still a number of small things and “one which is the most significant” that the two sides had not agreed on.

Presumably that one big thing was whether or not Putin should be allowed to keep the territory of Ukraine that his forces have already annexed.

This is a point of contention not only for the Ukrainian people, but for America´s NATO allies, who are united in the belief that giving Putin something of Ukraine will not satisfy his appetite for land, but only encourage it.

There are those at home in the US who say that this is fever-dream of war-mongers. But America’s allies in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Finland, Sweden and nearly all of the rest of Europe fear it.

And for them this is not some theoretical, grand-strategy game.

It is a matter of whether their countries will be at existential risk of invasion by Putin next.

Douglas Murray, New York Post