US President Donald Trump has said that his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin would have been happier if his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton would have won the last year’s general elections, as this would have made Vladimir Putinweaker.
In his first major interview after his last week’s maiden meeting with Putin in Hamburg, Germany on the sidelines of the G-20 Summit, Trump said he and the Russian leader both are advocating interest of their respective countries. But there is scope for co-operation between the two at the global stage.
“We are the most powerful country in the world and we are getting more and more powerful because I’m a big military person. As an example, if Hillary had won, our military would be decimated. Our energy would be much more expensive. That’s what Putin doesn’t like about me,” Trump told Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) in an interview.
“And that’s why I say, why would he want me? Because from day one I wanted a strong military, he doesn’t want to see that,” he said, according to the excerpts of the interview released by CBN.
“From day one I want fracking and everything else to get energy prices low and to create tremendous energy. We’re going to be self-supporting, we just about are now. We’re going to be exporting energy – he doesn’t want that.
“He would like Hillary where she wants to have windmills. He would much rather have that because energy prices would go up and Russia as you know relies very much on energy,” he continued.
The full interview is scheduled to be telecast on Thursday.
“So there are many things that I do that are the exact opposite of what he would want. So what I keep hearing about that he would have rather had Trump, I think ‘probably not,’ because when I want a strong military, you know she wouldn’t have spent the money on military,” he said.
“When I want tremendous energy, we’re opening up coal, we’re opening up natural gas, we’re opening up fracking, all the things that he would hate, but nobody ever mentions that,” said the US President.
In the middle of a political storm, because of allegations of Russian connections by his campaign, Trump said the two countries can get along together.
“Well he wants what’s good for Russia, and I want what’s good for the United States. And I think in a case like Syria where we can get together, do a ceasefire, and there are many other cases where getting along can be a very positive thing, but always Putin is going to want Russia and Trump is going to want the United States and that’s the way it is,” Trump told CBN.
