Trump enters ‘dangerous territory’ with private Putin calls: national security experts

President-elect Donald Trump recently claimed that he had a private phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin in which he asked Putin to not further escalate his war in Ukraine.

However, the Kremlin denied that such a call had ever taken place, which led to confusion about what had actually transpired.

As USA Today reports, national security experts are expressing concern that Trump’s habit of talking with international leaders outside of official channels greatly raises the risk of a major national security disaster occurring.

“We’re entering a dangerous territory of telephone games, where Trump is going to have private chats with foreign leaders, and they’re going to tell their teams one thing, and Trump is going to tell our national security team another,” explained former Obama administration diplomat Brett Bruen.

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USA Today adds that the State Department has traditionally coordinated calls for incoming administrations to ensure that the American government speaks with a unified voice.

“There can only be one foreign policy at a time,” Bruen added. “What Trump is doing is saying you need to do X or Y, even though he hasn’t been sworn in, even though he doesn’t control U.S. foreign policy right now.”

However, Trump has held a distrust of the State Department ever since details of his attempts to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to launch an investigation into a political opponent were leaked, which set in motion the events that would lead to his first impeachment.