MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/. Despite all the difficulties, US President Donald Trump is really trying to improve relations with Russia, American economist, professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University Jeffrey Sachs said in an interview with TASS.
"Trump is trying to put things on a different course, again, with a limited attention span, limited skills, partial understanding, but he's trying to put things back on course. But he's surrounded by a whole set of institutions and voices in the Congress that say, ‘Don't make peace. We need war.’ And so this is why all of this effort remains quite fragile," Sachs said.
He opined that Trump's good personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin is hardly just inspiring words for the public, but the problem here lies in what the Russian leader himself said a few years ago. "American presidents come into power with ideas, and then they're visited with men in dark suits and briefcases who explain to them, and then with blue ties (meaning the Democrats - TASS), I should add, and then they explain to these presidents reality. In other words, they explain, ‘You can't make peace. You have to fight Russia.’ And then President Putin said that suddenly all those ideas that you heard disappear. You don't hear from them again. And what he's saying is that there is a deep state in the United States that is rather consistent in its policies. It's been anti-Russia for many, many decades. It continues to exist," the economist stated.