The Dictator’s Whisper: Trump, Putin, and the Fiction That Tells Too Much Truth
On June 4, 2025, Donald J. Trump posted on Truth Social—his digital confessional, his oracle of grievance—the following:
“I just finished speaking, by telephone with President Vladimir Putin, of Russia. The call lasted approximately one hour and 15 minutes. We discussed the attack on Russia’s docked airplaines, by Ukraine, and also various other attacks that have been taking place by both sides. It was a good conversation, but not a conversation that will lead to immediate Peace. President Putin did say, and very strongly, that he will have to respond to the recent attack on the airfields.”
One reads such words and wonders: Why this tone? Why this deference, this soft curtsy in the direction of a man whose boots still carry the mud of Bucha?
And then, as in all good fiction—and especially in those rare fictions that masquerade as metaphor only to reveal the mechanics of truth—we stumble across a passage that speaks louder than any real-world press conference ever could.
In the novel Fort Knox: The Greatest Heist of All Time, Kim’s bizarre and servile relationship with Wanja—a shadowy figure whose name carries the Slavic chill of familiarity—offers a disturbing mirror. The genders of both characters remain undisclosed, yet the emotional power play between them drips with political allegory. In their dance, fiction and reality bleed into one another like oil and ink:
“Kim’s efforts to end the war in Ukraine, however, belonged to an entirely different plane of existence. Unquestioning loyalty—this was what Kim demanded from those who reaped the benefits of an association with Kim. And yet, in matters concerning Ukraine, the roles were reversed. Here, it was Kim who found an obligation to remain loyal to Wanja. And so, without hesitation, without the faintest flicker of doubt, Kim cast aside America’s self-proclaimed mantle as the guardian of the free world. Before the eyes of the international stage, in the cold glare of the cameras, Kim renounced the weighty pretense of righteousness and, with deliberate calculation, crossed the threshold to stand alongside a dictator—because, in the end, was it not all in service of the greater design? To sow discord among the nations, to dismantle the fragile order that kept America at its center—this was the true objective, and in pursuit of it, nothing was sacred.
And so, behind closed doors, in hushed conversations where history itself seemed to hold its breath, Kim offered Wanja the following proposal for peace:
Ukraine would lay down its arms and recognize the territories annexed by Russia as sovereign Russian land.
Ukraine would immediately hold new elections following the peace agreement, with Russia serving as the sole overseer of their legitimacy, without the presence of international observers.
After the elections, Ukraine would independently decide which political and economic bloc to join.
In return, the United States would receive from Russia the right to extract a predetermined quantity of raw materials from Ukrainian territory.
To Kim, these demands seemed just and reasonable. Any remaining sense of reality had long since been eclipsed by an unshaken devotion to Wanja.
Beyond the geopolitical turmoil such an agreement was sure to ignite, Kim was certain of one thing: a peace of this magnitude would, without question, secure the Nobel Peace Prize. And that, too, was part of the plan.”
Is Trump today’s Kim? Is Putin Wanja with a scarred smile and a hand always just out of frame?
Fiction does not predict the future—but it sometimes explains the present better than the news ever could.
Fort Knox is not just a heist story. It is a philosophical decoy, a hall of mirrors reflecting the dangerous seduction of power, and the madness that masquerades as peace.
And for those who think such tales are only make-believe: remember, the most dangerous fiction is the one that makes you forget it’s fiction at all.