What’s behind Trump’s Putin infatuation?

President-elect Donald Trump’s refusal to flat out concede that Russia tried to meddle in our election and to accept the findings of the intelligence community makes little policy or political sense. To the contrary, his weird defense of our most formidable geopolitical threat has fueled doubts about Trump’s loyalties and intellectual fitness to govern. One rationale favored among nervous Republican hawks goes like this: President-elect Donald Trump just got hung up over fears that his critics would say he did not really win the election; once in office, he will be solid on Russia.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., seems to fancy that argument. On CNN, he had this exchange with Wolf Blitzer:

Blitzer: Do you think that the president-elect trusts Putin?

Cotton: I can’t speak for what the president-elect thinks. I don’t trust Vladimir Putin, and I would counsel him that he should not trust him. Ronald Reagan used to talk about trust but verify in the context of the Soviet Union, I would recommend distrust but verify in the case of Vladimir Putin. …

Blitzer: When you read [the intelligence report on Russian cyberwarfare tactics], what was your reaction? You are also privy to the sensitive, classified information, the sources and methods, that were used to come to those bottom-line conclusions.

Cotton: I have no reason to doubt the conclusions in the published report, but as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, we’ll obviously be reviewing the classified version and the sources very carefully.

Blitzer: Have you done that? Have you reviewed the sources and methods, the classified information?

Cotton: I have reviewed the classified version of this report.

Blitzer: Do you have high confidence, like the intelligence community leadership, that what they - what they concluded is true?

Cotton: … I have not seen anything that gives me reason to doubt that it was Russian security services or their affiliates who hacked the [Democratic National Committee] and John Podesta. I can’t say it’s surprising, either, because that’s simply what Russia does. This is one small instance of Russian aggression and provocation against the United States and our interests over the last eight years. …

Blitzer: It looks like, based on this report, he had three objectives. The first objective, as it points out, to simply undermine the credibility of the U.S. democracy. The second, assuming Hillary Clinton was going to win, to make her look as bad as possible - to weaken her if in fact she were to become president. The third is they would prefer Trump because they think they can get along better with Trump.

Cotton: Vladimir Putin has tried to undermine the credibility of democratic processes in countries around the world, but especially the United States and our NATO allies. Again, this is not surprising that he is doing this. I strongly doubt, though, that Vladimir Putin had any idea that Donald Trump was going to win. … He was focused on sowing discord and undermining our democratic system here. We shouldn’t allow him to do that. We should focus on the specific transgressions of hacking the DNC and John Podesta’s email, and we should hold him accountable and pose a stiff price.

Blitzer: You would like a stronger reaction from Trump?

Cotton: Not just for these hacks but for what he’s done consistently over the last eight years to undermine U.S. interests around the world.

Cotton continues to argue that Putin did not want Trump to win, only that he wanted to sow discord. As for Trump’s remarkable under-reaction to an attempt to throw the election to a pro-Russian candidate, Cotton says he just wants Trump to react to the gamut of Russian behavior, in effect imploring Trump to respond robustly even if he cannot concede the intelligence findings’ validity.

Excusing Trump’s defensiveness as “just” worry about his own election legitimacy strikes us as defining deviancy down for a president-elect. A president unable to separate his own emotional needs from the country’s interest has no place governing.

As bad as the “Trump’s immaturity prevented him from evaluating the Russian hacking objectively” explanation might be, the alternative theory must horrify Trump’s Republican supporters: Trump is simply Putin’s pawn. What if Trump, for personal (his concealed tax returns leave open the possibility of financial dependency on Russia), ideological (any autocrat who throws critics in prison is OK by him?) or emotional (He said I was smart!) reasons, always favors Putin, finds excuses for inexcusable behavior, quibbles with our intelligence findings that cast Putin in a bad light and abandons allies in lieu of confronting him?

Putin’s behavior fits a pattern, as Cotton points out, but so does Trump’s reaction. Trump’s admiration for Putin has been a feature of his campaign from the start. Trump sounded unaware or unconcerned that Putin would invade Ukraine. He attacked the essence of the NATO alliance (Article V, the obligation to come to one another’s aid in case of attack). He questioned whether Putin has had journalists killed, insisting “our country does plenty of killing.” He falsely insisted that Russia is fighting the Islamic State, pretending our interests are aligned. In other words, Trump seeks to minimize Putin’s culpability in years of anti-American action (just as Cotton seeks to minimize Trump’s consistent support for a U.S. foe). Both Trump and Cotton avoid the implications of the larger picture.

With time we will see how effectively Putin manipulates and bamboozles Trump. We will assess Putin’s success in convincing Trump that getting along with Russia means giving up U.S. interests. (Iran found great success with Secretary of State John Kerry along similar lines.) If Trump defers again and again, we will have to conclude that the problem far exceeds Trump’s vanity over election results or delight in Putin’s compliments. Since Trump tells us he has a “good brain” and has mastered the art of the deal, we couldn’t attribute his subservience to stupidity or incompetence. If Trump’s peculiar Russia-friendly stance continues, we will have little choice but to conclude that Trump feels he cannot challenge Putin for fear of getting on his bad side. That’s when the American people should worry that for whatever reasons, Trump feels obligated to put Russia, not America, first.

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One rationale favored among nervous Republican hawks goes like this: Presidentelect Donald Trump just got hung up over fears that his critics would say he did not really win the election; once in office, he will be solid on Russia.

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