Senior officials in the Trump administration—including the president himself—have verbally recognized Crimea as a part of Russia, a remarkable reversal of long-standing U.S. policy that made Kremlin propagandists on state-sponsored television laugh at the downfall of American power.

President Trump said during his phone call with Vladimir Putin that he compared the war in Ukraine to a fight among children, suggesting they ‘fight for a while.’ Trump also said he warned Putin not to retaliate against Ukraine over its recent drone attack on Russian bombers.

Donald Trump says Ukraine gave Putin 'a reason to bomb the hell out of them'. Asked about Russia's most recent attack on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv in the early hours of Friday that killed at least six people,