The discovery of America

Russia sent humanitarian aid to the United States, and the presidents of the two countries talked about oil

The telephone conversation of Trump and Putin (on the initiative of the American side) gave rise to the manufacturers of the American Slantsy hope that with the mediation of the United States Russia and Saudi Arabia will agree to stabilize world oil prices. And the Russian cargo aircraft of the An-124 Ruslan with medical dressings and other disinfection equipment, which landed on Wednesday at the John F. Kennedy New York Airport, deprived of both the Pentagon Hawks and the Washington "Kremlinologists. They warn the president: Vladimir Putin made another spectacular propaganda move, sending help to America.

The main topics of the telephone conversation of the two presidents Trump (which is unusual) announced in advance: cooperation in the fight against coronavirus, world prices for oil, sanctions and Venezuela. Vladimir Putin offered America humanitarian help, Trump accepted it (very nicely). For the first time, two presidents were spoke against the backdrop of a pandemic, which claimed more than 48 thousand lives around the world.

Fear the "evil Samaritans"

The 45th President of the United States again had to explain with journalists: “To get along with Russia is good. I said this constantly during the (election) campaign, and then these lousy politicians have brought the same thing: Russia, Russia, Russia. Honestly, the United States has more problems with other countries than with Russia. They would like to trade with our country. But you know, it was very difficult to meaningless nonsense, which turned out to be a complete deception. ” By nonsense, deceit and “witch hunt”, Trump implies the investigation of the special prosecutor Müller about “the conspiracy of his election team with Moscow, which influenced the outcome of the elections”. The investigation decided: there was no conspiracy, but there was an intervention.

Meanwhile, for the local media and for the critics of Trump, humanitarian aid from Russia was at least a surprise. Washington Post writes: “The idea that Russia, which is under the regime of US sanctions for the 2016 presidential election and the annexation of Crimea in 2014, directed medical care in the giant military aircraft on Earth, it seems amazing.”

The analyst of the Carnegie Washington Foundation Andrew Weiss wrote on Twitter: “This is madness,” calling the action “Kremlin propaganda trick”.

“This is a gift for the Kremlin, not from it,” as the former US Army Commander in Europe Ben Hodges assesses the situation.

“Putin’s propaganda move,” said British expert Andrew Foxal, “has the goal of demonstrating that in the context of the global crisis of autocratic regimes, it can be more effective than those proud of their democracy.”

And the masses of Russians, experts believe, send such a signal: the Americans are even worse, we help them, not them.

“Fear the evil Samaritans,” writes The Foreign Policy, noting that humanitarian aid from the PRC and the Russian Federation may have “not altruistic motives”.

The American media note that the Russian authorities send hundreds of boxes with masks while they are missing in their own country.

At the same time, earlier Moscow sent 15 aircraft with medical equipment, military virus and epidemiologists to Italy. There were trucks with the inscription “From Russia with Love”, and Russian TV many times showed a certain Italian turning the flag of the European Union and unfolding the Russian banner.

However, the American media recall that 80 percent of Russian supplies to Italy were useless or unprofitable.

“In other words, delivery was more likely to be a pretext,” said the official of the Italian government, the leading newspaper La Stampa.

According to him, the Russian supply contained, for example, equipment for bacteriological disinfection and a field laboratory for chemical and biological sterilization, rather than fans and personal protective equipment, so necessary for Italians. The newspaper noted that medical experts were sent by the Russian Ministry of Defense, not the Ministry of Health. The presence of the Russian military in the country of NATO, especially near the US air base, causes fears that the Russians will use their stay to collect intelligence, The Foreign Policy notes.

Analysts suggest that the Kremlin expects to influence the withdrawal of American (and in the case of Italy - European) sanctions. In addition to sanctions related to the elections in the United States and Crimea, sanctions in the energy of President Putin personally affect: Venezuelan oil, North Stream-2 gas pipeline, obstacles to foreign investment in Arctic oil and gas projects and the Russian shale sector.

Senators are happy

John Huven and Kevin Kremer, republican senators from the state of North Dakota, where they massively produce shale oil, called Trump’s conversation with Putin “encouraging”. The oil price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia hit first of all to their voters. Legislators who scolded Trump for passivity are now glad that the president promised to intervene and do something with the price of oil, which, in his figurative expression, today "has become cheaper than water." The price of oil of $ 20 per barrel paralyzes the business of shale companies.

The most important result of the conversation of the two presidents - the parties “agreed on the importance of stability in world energy markets,” said Jadd Dir, official representative of the White House. Trump later told reporters that he was talking on the phone not only with Putin, but also with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Muhammad Ben Salman.

“We will all gather together and see what we can do because you lose (due to low prices) industry, thousands and thousands of jobs,” Trump said.

He added that "the two countries are already discussing this."

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia threatens in May to increase its export by another 600,000 barrels per day.

Bloomberg observer Julian Lee notes that with a massive drop in oil demand as a result of the Covid-19 virus pandemia, you cannot cope with the help of sanctions and market adjustment. Goldman Sachs analysts believe that the demand for oil from airlines, whose share accounts for about 16 million barrels of daily world consumption, may never return to the previous level. According to Goldman Sachs, global oil demand this week decreases by 26 million barrels per day, or by 25%. This is more than the total consumption of the United States, Canada, Mexico, Central America and the entire Caribbean.

According to Bloomberg, the deputy minister of energy of the Russian Federation Pavel Sorokin said last week that Russia expected that oil prices would fall up to $ 30 per barrel as a result of the failure of the deal with OPEC+. The budget of Russia becomes scarce when prices fall below $ 40 per barrel of Urals oil (the same price is critical for American oil manufacturers from shale). In other words, after Russia's exit from OPEC+ everything did not go as expected.

Therefore, Trump's call to Putin came “very helpful”. According to Andrei Kortunov, director of the Russian Council for International Affairs, quoted by the American media, “the Kremlin considers the call itself as a kind of diplomatic victory,

Trump's attempt to seek help from Russia in terminating the oil crisis can allow Putin to take a stronger position, even if you need to make some concessions. ”

Meanwhile, skeptics believe that in the presence of a long list of mutual claims and the lack of confidence in the political elites of the two countries, the calculation of breakthrough in bilateral relations now seems to be fantastic-much larger than the arrival of Ruslan’s New York with a load of humanitarian aid of Trumpovsky America from Putin's Russia.

PS

The US State Department of the United States made a clarification: medical equipment delivered the day before from Russia was “acquired” by the United States and transferred to the Federal Emergency Situations Agency, said the official representative of the State Department Morgan Ortegus. Clarification is important, although somewhat belated, given the wave of criticism, which the White House from the press and experts in Russia in connection with the “gift”, which they called the “propaganda action of the Kremlin” received.