President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin arrive for a press conference at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson on August 15, in Anchorage, Alaska. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Timing in diplomacy is everything, and the Kremlin seems to have timed its latest, lengthy phone call with the White House – the eighth in the past eight months – to perfection.

With US President Donald Trump poised to meet Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky in Washington, and publicly weighing the risks of supplying Kyiv with long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles, Russian officials described the call they initiated as “positive and productive,” and “held in an atmosphere of trust.”

In fact, it was a nearly two-and-a-half-hour intervention by President Vladimir Putin – a last-minute bid to halt in i

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