Between the election and the inauguration, when Donald Trump was still praising Vladimir Putin as “very smart,” I wrote a column in the Washington Examiner predicting that their relationship would sour. How did I know? Not through any Nostradamus-like prophetic powers. It’s simply that every U.S. administration follows the same trajectory vis a vis Russia’s strongman. George W. Bush began by calling Putin “very straightforward,” and ended by arming Georgian troops to defend their country against him. Hillary Clinton began by offering him the famous “reset” button, and ended by imposing economic sanctions.

With President Trump, the falling out came more quickly. During the election campaign, the Donald was so warm in his rhetoric about Putin that many of his critics believed he was elected with Russian help. He described Putin as “doing a great job” and hoped he would be “my new best friend.” As recently as last month, the president came close to saying that America was morally no better than Russia when it came to having people assassinated. Now, following the U.S. missile strike in Syria, we are back to Cold-War-style hostility on both sides.