On his weekly program, Dmitry Kiselyov, the Russian host who not so long ago talked about Russia’s ability to reduce the United States to a pile of radioactive rubble, positively reviewed the Trump Administration and declared that Russia and the US have “always cooperated in difficult times” (rusmonitor.com/pavel-pryanikov-dmitrijj-kiseljov-napominaet-chto-rossiya-i-ssha-v-slozhnye-momenty-vsegda-byli-druzyami-i-soyuznikami.html).
Given the central role of state television in Putin’s regime, such a statement was clearly intended to send two important signals to Russians: Russian-American cooperation is back now that Trump is president, and this cooperation will take the form first and foremost of a combined military effort against ISIS in the Middle East.