But in his speech, Trump dealt with the Russian challenge in one monotone sentence: “We also face rival powers, Russia and China, that seek to challenge American influence, values, and wealth.” With that box ticked, he followed up not with an elaboration of the challenge but with a lengthy explanation of why and how he seeks a partnership with both nations. An animated Trump described how recent intelligence cooperation between the CIA and Russian intelligence to foil a terror plot offered an example of where he wanted to go. He never mentioned Russia or China again.

Trump’s silence followed a remarkable story last week in The Washington Post that said the president cannot stand to be briefed on the Russian political threat to the United States and has refused to do anything to counter it. He was furious at the new sanctions imposed on Russia, blamed Congress for the downturn in relations with Moscow, and has done everything in his power not to implement them. We also know that Russia wasn’t even on the agenda at the NATO summit earlier this year, so nervous were U.S. allies of antagonizing the president.

So, we’re left to ponder the question once more: Who to believe? Is the United States serious about countering Russian power? Or is it asleep at the switch? The answers are yes and yes—parts of the administration are actively working to counter Russia, even as one important part is not and prefers to embrace Putin.

The National Security Strategy’s subtext, just like that of the adults in the room more generally, is that the president is extraordinarily weak, so weak that he has little bearing on his own foreign policy.

The notion that Trump is weak and ineffective is the unstated assumption behind the school of thought—particularly prevalent among conservatives sympathetic to him and some foreign governments—that this is all going to work out okay. Of course, they never say that outright, but it’s what they mean. They always point to the bureaucrats and the “actions” (as if Trump’s actions do not count), and never the president himself.

The story of year one is that of a president who remains as radical, erratic, and thin-skinned as ever. He entered office with no Senate-confirmable foreign-policy loyalists. He turned to the military and titans of industry and they constrained him and took control of the bureaucracy. He has had to tolerate being handled, but he is not happy about it. He breaks out whenever he can—defying them on Iran or on Jerusalem or with a phone call or in a speech.

We look at the fact that the mainstreamers were ascendant in year one, and assume that progress is linear—weak president and a strong bureaucracy means normalization. Not so fast. Since World War II, the foreign policy of every administration has been defined by the character and opinions of its president.