By Stephen Smoot
During one long summer a long time ago, the great power broker of the globe brought leaders of the globe’s Great Powers together.
He explained his reasoning best to a married couple, powerful in their own right until 18 months prior to this conference. The wife asked about the reason behind the august assemblage.
Prince Otto von Bismarck, Chancellor of the German Empire, gave the most succinct, yet accurate explanation to Mrs. Julia Grant, the former First Lady of the United States, that “Russia has eaten too much Turkey and we are trying to help her to digest it.”
Historical and cultural gravity has always pulled Russia toward the south and east. Their imperial legacy comes from their nation serving as a “daughter” of the Byzantine/Eastern Roman Empire. Russia has always seen Constantinople, now Istanbul, as a beacon, both because of history and strategic location.
In 1877 and 1878, Russia invaded the declining Ottoman Empire. Its armies rolled through the Slavic territories in Europe that the Ottomans had seized over the centuries. Great Britain sent the Royal Navy to Constantinople and used it as a public tripwire. Russia dared not antagonize the British, so they imposed the Treaty of San Stefano that took most of former Ottoman Europe and put it in a new, and large, Bulgarian state that Russians envisioned would be a satellite of their empire.
Bismarck cared little for Russia and less for the Ottomans and Bulgarians, but understood well that a major war would involve his own German Empire. He also had no qualms about fighting a controlled war for national interest, but also quietly believed that any major war would result in a German defeat and worked the rest of his life to prevent war.
With the Great Powers muttering “war,” Bismarck called representatives of the major European states together, one of the last major power conferences that did not involve the United States of America.
Bismarck regarded Americans like an indulgent uncle would an ornery nephew. He thoroughly enjoyed meeting and chatting with former Union generals in particular, but also famously said “God protects drunks, small children, and the United States of America.”
For a month, he put the diplomats through their paces. The conference started on June 13; all understood that agreement must be reached by July 13 because the next day, Bismarck left for his vacation and he refused to alter his schedule.
During the official daily sessions, the Chancellor sat at the head of the table, alternately munching on large handfuls of black cherries and steamed shrimp. In the evenings, he cajoled diplomatic representatives to move toward the middle and find agreement.
By the drop dead date, an agreement emerged. Russia would pull back, allowing its “big Bulgaria” to be cut in half, with the part bordering Turkey given a loose quasi independence as “Eastern Roumelia,” a geographic designation that made as much sense as the “East Moorefield” exit, but checked a box.
Britain walked away with possession of the island of Cyprus, which irritated most participants. They received a strategic island, but it was full of Turks and Greeks who violently despised each other, too.
Eastern Roumelia quickly after drifted into the new Kingdom of Bulgaria, which invited a member of the German ruling family to become monarch. Bulgaria sided with the Germans in both world wars, trying desperately to escape the satellite fate planned for it by the Russians.
Czar Alexander III pushed to extend the borders of his empire because the weakness of his opponent coincided with what the Russian Empire saw as its destiny. He was not evil, but “played” by the rules of European nation-states going back to before the Peace of Westphalia.
Russia, alone of the Great Powers, plays by those same rules today. And President Donald Trump not only understands that, but operates in the same fashion, which is why he may very well succeed in ending the Russo-Ukraine War.
The barrier to understanding lies in the global post-traumatic stress response to the legacy of the Second World War. Far too many see it as the alpha and omega template by which to judge human political and international conflict.
What makes World War II such a poor template is also what makes it such a traumatic event. The 20th century saw ideological revolutions in Russia, Germany, China, and elsewhere bring about rulers driven by a passion to idealistically and ruthlessly transform the world into their image. They took their inspiration from the French Revolution, where people in power cared much about not only the actions, but also the thoughts of their opponents.
The destruction and evil done to other human beings and the world demands examination, especially of Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, and Mao Tse-Dong. That said, putting Vladimir Putin in that club and his Russia in the same league as the revolutionary ideologues makes no sense.
Putin is wrong, but not evil, an important distinction. He does not proceed from a desire to transform the globe and to massacre millions, but to brutally address the demographics trends eroding Russian power.
It was wrong for Neville Chamberlain to give in to Hitler at Munich, but that came from his lack of understanding of what he was dealing with. He thought he was working with a hysterical and erratic, but ultimately practical, version of a Bismarck, not a new type of creature altogether. President Franklin Roosevelt made the same mistake when dealing with “Uncle Joe” Stalin, thinking he could charm the Soviet dictator like he would an American urban ward boss.
Assuming that Putin rises to a level of a Hitler produces the same barrier to understanding and diplomatic solutions. The reality of the Russo-Ukraine War in 2025 is that no way exists, short of NATO intervention, to blast Russia out of all the territory it has taken from Ukraine. Putin has no incentive to stop if the Western position remains that he has to abandon his conquests. He knows that no Western government would democratically survive launching a war with Russia and seeing its sons and daughters killed in that conflict.
Trump has painstakingly crafted a series of moves that appear small in themselves, but increasingly pressure Russia in different ways. Europe’s concession to purchase more US energy takes money from Russia’s economy. Trump’s settlement of the endless conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan suddenly put more American influence right on Russia’s fence line.
At the same time, he has pushed hard for a negotiated end to the war. While as a Walter Russel Mead “Hamiltonian,” Trump understands and worries about war’s destabilizing effects, he also seems to truly hate its human toll. The president has remained relentless in pushing both sides to stop the carnage, pushing and pulling levers to get both sides to the peace table.
At that point, the game boils down to the material and tangible steps that must be made to not just end the fighting, but resolve the conflict for the long-term.
The highway to peace leads not through ideology, bluster, or threats that no one believes, but by building and using leverage to get the parties where they need to be. Under President Joe Biden, not only did the US lack leverage, but the nation’s leadership did not even think in those terms.
World conflict has returned to traditional form. Trump has wrenched diplomacy back as well.
