And so it was, just two days after Donald Trump revealed he had decided to lift his administration’s pause on the supply of US-made weapons to Ukraine, that Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov,

That included a Monday joint statement from Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham and Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal calling Trump’s threat of ramped-up economic penalties if Russia doesn’t cut a peace deal in next 50 days “a real executive hammer to drive the parties to the negotiating table.”

Only tough pressure can force the Kremlin to make concessions. And the American president, Donald Trump, is capable of this, states Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to the New York Post.

Trump's threat against Russia runs parallel to a Senate-led effort to pass crippling sanctions on countries that buy Russian energy.

“Putin will not negotiate as a loser,” one of his longtime associates tells TIME by phone from Moscow. “He knows that winners don’t get punished, and if he wins, all of this” — the sanctions, the tariffs — “will go away.”

U.S. President Donald Trump said he was "not done" with Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to a BBC interview published on Tuesday, hours after he said he was disappointed in Putin and threatened Moscow with sanctions.

Fox News chief political analyst Brit Hume on Monday said one thing is now “clear” from President Donald Trump ’s comments about Russian President Vladimir Putin. And that is that Trump “got played” for a long time by his counterpart over the war in Ukraine, Hume told “Special Report” anchor Bret Baier.

Vladimir Putin’s conduct has prompted Donald Trump’s shift as Russia’s war effort in Ukraine has gotten only more aggressive.

President Trump reveals how Russian leader 'talks nice, then bombs everybody' as the U.S. prepares to send Ukraine Patriot missiles under a NATO agreement.