The headlines say the Alaska summit between President Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin was about Ukraine . Commentators in Brussels and Washington rehearse the familiar debates: Was Trump too soft on Moscow? Did he undermine Kyiv?

But that framing misses the bigger picture.

The Trump administration has already set the terms of the 21st-century contest: The United States faces its greatest long-term threat not from Russia, but from China . From sweeping sanctions on Beijing’s access to advanced AI chips, to trading U.S. security guarantees for alignment in the Middle East and Indo-Pacific, Trump has consistently structured foreign policy around containing China’s rise. Against that backdrop, his Russia outreach is not a distraction. It is a deliberate attempt to bring coherence to an

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