it actually sounded less bad than it might have, and certainly less bad than anything Trump's burbled about in public - and here I'm partly reflecting the opinions of some of the Ukrainian figures I read, who are trying to remain, on the face of it optimistic. I'm not in their shoes, so I have to hold out a glimmer of hope on their behalf, much as my personal inclination is to distrust implicitly anything that comes from near Trump.
What Trump and Kellogg have to get through their heads is that the US doesn't get to call all the shots now. There are other parties involved (not least the Ukrainians, of course, who seem to be trying to pander to Trump's ego), and other go-betweens who might be acceptable to both parties (some Middle Eastern powers have been constructive in negotiating prisoner exchanges, for instance). Europe might struggle to fill the gap if the US did abandon NATO (I suspect that's an idle bluff as it would be giving up real and soft power in an arena that's long been part of the US's sense of identity, but who knows with Trump?), but the "coalition of the willing" that's developed is at least talking a good game at the moment, and time is of the essence for Russia. Growing numbers of economists feel that next year will bring a major crash for Putin, and no amount of fiddling the books (as its central bank has been doing for a few years now - let's be polite and call it creative accounting) will be able to cover it up this time.
Kellogg has a least spent some time in Ukraine, which has won him some degree of trust from the Ukrainians, and has recently expressed his intent to spend some time listening to both parties as a first course of action. How much sway he may have with Trump, we'll have to wait and see.
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