Trump's Putin Call, Ukraine Oil Strikes, Russia Hits Kyiv
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- Trump held a 90-minute call with Putin and a separate call with Zelenskyy over the weekend, with Zelenskyy agreeing to continue talks at Tuesday's NATO summit in Ankara
- Ukraine struck a major oil terminal in St. Petersburg and the Kronstadt Naval Base — home of Russia's Baltic Fleet — on Friday and Saturday, sparking fires at both sites
- Russia hit Kyiv with missiles and drones in the early hours of Monday, killing at least 11 people in the capital's second large-scale attack in less than a week
- Putin told Trump that Russian troops are advancing and claimed forces have seized the eastern town of Kostyantynivka, according to Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov
- The Institute for the Study of War assessed that Putin is injecting "false narratives" about an imminent seizure of Donetsk Oblast into Western information space to push the West toward capitulation
- Trump signaled potential renewed US support for Kyiv, a shift the article links to the recent signing of an interim peace deal with Iran
- Putin recently acknowledged for the first time the impact of Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian fuel production, per the article
Why it matters: Putin publicly acknowledged that Ukrainian drone strikes are hurting Russian fuel output — combined with Trump's reopened channel to the Kremlin and Kyiv's deep-strike successes — changes what both sides bring to the Ankara summit, but ISW warns Moscow's 'false narrative' campaign about Donetsk advances is designed to extract concessions before battlefield realities force a harder compromise.
