Trump Says He Knows Putin Wants to End Ukraine War ‘Through Deals’

Trump's stated basis for reading Putin's intentions is his own dealmaking experience rather than any intelligence or diplomatic assessment, which places the credibility of the claim on his negotiating instincts alone. The practical significance is that Washington's posture toward ending the war now appears to rest on one leader's personal confidence about another's motives, a subjective foundation that shapes what leverage, if any, gets applied to each side. The open question is whether that confidence translates into a concrete framework, since a stated belief about Putin's desire to deal is not itself a deal.