A possible Putin–Trump–Xi summit has revived fears of a new Yalta. But Europe’s anxiety says more about its own influence than any secret deal
When will the world end? Well, the Mayan calendar supposedly had it down for 21 December 2012 and more recently, a South African preacher picked 13 October 2026. Now, if one believes the more excitable voices in Europe, civilization as we know it faces another appointment with destiny, on November the 18th or 19th.
Those are the dates of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzhen, China, where Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, and Xi Jinping could meet together. Nothing has been formally agreed, yet the possibility alone has revived a familiar nightmare for Europe’s small and middle powers – that three great powers will sit down, divide the world between themselves and leave everyone else to discover which sphere of influence they inhabit.
The comparison already being made is with Yalta in 1945 and in this telling, Putin gets Ukraine, Xi gets Taiwan, and Trump gets whatever he wants in return, meanwhile Western Europe is expected to accept the outcome without having been invited into the room.
It’s a dramatic scenario, but it’s also a considerable leap from the available facts.
We know that the three leaders may be in Shenzhen and that Moscow has discussed the possibility of a joint meeting and Trump has expressed an openness to the idea, but we don’t know whether the encounter will take place, much less what its agenda would be. To predict a wholesale redistribution of the international order at this stage requires more imagination than intelligence.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: rt.com
