CROOKE: Alaska Optics Masked a Deeper Bargain

At Anchorage in Alaska, Crooke says the meaning was in the optics, not a paper deal. For years, Europe enforced a cordon sanitaire—boycotts, walk-outs, and open disdain for Russia and Putin. That image cracked the moment Trump personally met Putin on the tarmac and, as Crooke recounts, invited him to share “The Beast” back from the plane—behavior he calls symbolically “huge,” because it breaks the ritual isolation Europe had cultivated 【2:22–5:12](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETbGCNerYhk&t=142s).

Crooke frames Trump as operating in a “mythic” register—someone whose commanding presence and improbable political survivals (assassination attempts, innumerable legal cases) have created an aura beyond normal politics. He contrasts the old image (European leaders looming over Trump in 2019) with this week’s tableau: European officials “like schoolboys” waiting on corridor chairs for entry to the Oval Office 【5:20–9:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETbGCNerYhk&t=320s).

Crucially, Crooke says Trump recognized comparable stature in Putin. At the joint appearance, “who led… wasn’t Trump. It was Putin,” speaking first and with evident ease and control. Out of this, Crooke says, came not a detailed treaty but a “framework of understanding” to end a war that stalemate cannot solve 【11:05–14:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETbGCNerYhk&t=665s). Cliffhanger: The framework, as Crooke tells it, is stark: Trump steps back, Putin forces an outcome on the ground, and together they aim to reset Europe’s security architecture—if the Arctic energy undercurrent, Europe’s empty backstop, and a widening Caucasus front don’t blow it up first.