US President Donald Trump’s Ukraine ceasefire plan was the focus of a call with European leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on 13 August, NBC News reports. European officials briefed on the discussion said the president told participants he will not discuss any division of territory when he meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on 15 August, but will push for an end to the fighting first.

Leaders stress truce before peace talks

NBC cites two European officials and three other people briefed on the call who said Trump’s stated goal for the Alaska meeting is to secure a ceasefire in Ukraine. The sources told NBC that Trump and the other leaders agreed no peace negotiations should begin until a truce is in place. Zelenskyy warned during the call that “Putin definitely does not want peace.”

Concerns over earlier land swap comments

European and Ukrainian officials had grown uneasy after Trump’s recent public remark suggesting there could “be some land swapping” between Russia and Ukraine. NBC’s sources said those concerns were addressed directly, with Trump assuring allies that Ukraine must decide any territorial concessions and that no such deals would be struck without Kyiv’s consent.

Sanctions threat if truce fails

According to NBC, participants in the call agreed that if Putin refuses a ceasefire, Trump will likely move to impose new sanctions on Russia. Two additional people familiar with the conversation told NBC that some European leaders left feeling more positive about the president’s approach, with one source saying achieving a truce is the top priority for the meeting.

Possible follow-up meeting with Zelenskyy

NBC reports Trump said after the call that there is a “very good chance” of a second meeting involving himself, Putin, and Zelenskyy soon after the Alaska summit. He suggested such talks could happen “almost immediately” if the first meeting clarifies each side’s position.

White House stays quiet on details

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told NBC the administration would not comment on private diplomatic conversations but reiterated that Trump wants to end the war and stop the killing. Vice President JD Vance, who also joined the Wednesday call, told US troops in the UK that ending the war in Ukraine is one of “our most important shared security goals in Europe.”

Trump and Putin will likely walk away Friday with aligned foreign policy against Europe—but no path to peace.

Trump has already demonstrated his negotiating skills by offering Russia substantial concessions before talks have even started. He has offered Putin nearly everything he demanded to even start negotiations with Ukraine.

In July 2023, I argued that Trump’s “peace plan” was a blueprint for Russian victory over Ukraine and the West. He has since offered even greater concessions while pressuring the victim and rewarding the aggressor.

That’s not negotiations. It is capitulation at the peril of the rule-based world order, Europe and the transatlantic relationship.

The talks between Trump and Putin in Alaska are unlikely to result in an unjust, temporary peace on Russian conditions. Nor will they produce the just and lasting peace the free world is calling for.

Why? Neither has the cards to change the strategic situation. But they will produce something both leaders want: deeper alignment against European allies.

Neither leader can deliver what they promise

Trump wants more than anything else to achieve a diplomatic victory, resetting relations between Russia and the United States, turning Russia away from China through a “reverse Nixon” strategy, and ensuring increased trade and access to Russian minerals.

These goals are far more important to him than lasting and just peace. They are also far more unrealistic than the latter.

There is a big gap between what Trump wants and what he can achieve.

• The United States cannot force Ukraine to withdraw from government-controlled territories, change its constitution, or recognize Russian sovereignty over occupied territories.
• It cannot force the Ukrainian population—the source of Ukrainian resolve and resilience—to accept anything contrary to their interests.
• Having stepped away from the Budapest Memorandum, any US security guarantee lacks credibility. Trump lost most cards when he stopped aid to Ukraine.
• Nor can the US force Europe to return frozen Russian assets, lift sanctions, or recognize Russian territorial conquests that violate international law. It cannot force the free world to stop supporting Ukraine’s fight for existence.

Trump has also forsaken all means necessary to force Russia to seek peace. He has aligned his foreign policy with Putin’s and declared himself unwilling to use US military power to pressure Russia. Threats of secondary sanctions and tariffs are unlikely to sway a country that is not waging war for territory but for great power status, strategic parity with the US, and a sphere of influence over parts of NATO territory.

The Kremlin has “played” all its “cards” short of nuclear weapons.

• It is bleeding soldiers and weapons on the battlefield without any prospect of an imminent breakthrough.
• It is advancing at a foot pace and will need an additional 3-4 years to occupy the rest of Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson oblasts.
• More crucially, at the present speed of advance, Russia will not occupy the rest of Ukraine before 2120.
• By the end of this year, it will have lost 1.5 million soldiers on the battlefield.
• More importantly, it will have lost most of its main battle tanks, armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, and artillery pieces.
• It has already lost the ability to conduct mechanized maneuvers, crucial for any hope of decisive battles.
• While it refuses to abandon its strategic aims and objectives, its economy is slowly collapsing.

Yet Putin believes he is winning. He has repeatedly rejected Trump’s so-called Peace Plan. Kremlin statements continue to demonstrate that Russia remains committed to achieving its original war goals and will not sign up to anything that does not deliver a victory.

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Putin came for the summit. Trump brought the white flag.

How Russia manipulates America’s diplomatic collapse

Besides the support from China, Iran, and North Korea, President Trump is possibly Russia’s best hope for a victory in Ukraine. He has already demonstrated his willingness to betray allies and partners to secure what he sees as the US national interests (hence his America First policy).

The Trump administration is actively pursuing a reset or normalization of relations with Russia. The administration and Russian officials are discussing economic cooperation and removing barriers to mutual trade, with Trump’s tone increasingly favorable toward potential business ties.

Additionally, the policy shift is naively believed to pull Russia away from China, undermining the strategic alliance between Moscow and Beijing.

The Kremlin is actively entertaining the idea that a reset of relations is both possible and mutually beneficial, offering potentially great economic rewards. It is actively manipulating a US administration that has recently fired over 1,300 career diplomats and civil servants, losing institutional knowledge, diplomatic capacity, language and cultural expertise.

Russia, in contrast, maintains a professional diplomatic corps with deep US expertise.

The talks between the US special envoy, Steven Witkoff—an American lawyer and real estate investor—and highly experienced Russian diplomats like Sergey Lavrov (Foreign Minister), Yuri Ushakov (Presidential Aide), Kirill Dmitriev (Head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund; Special Representative for Foreign Investment), and not least President Putin, demonstrates the extreme imbalance between the two parties.

Combined diplomatic experience? 172 to 0.5 years in favor of the Russian Team.

As Daniel Hannan, former member of the European Parliament, observed: “Whatever his motives, Trump has behaved exactly as a Russian asset would.”

President Trump has threatened allies with land grabs by military force, annexation, started a trade war, and increasingly aligned his foreign policy with that of Russia. The President sees the EU, which represents most of the US’s European allies, as “worse than our so-called enemies.” He argues that the EU was formed to screw the US.

The fundamental break with Europe

Statements by the Trump administration signal a deepening of the transatlantic chasm beyond different perceptions of Russia to an even deeper societal rupture about values and the nature of democracy. They mark an end to the era of shared US-European values.

President Trump’s repeated concessions to Russia and the absence of European representatives at the negotiations underline the scale and scope of the strategic split.

Given Trump’s all too generous offers, Putin’s persistent refusal to engage in meaningful negotiations, and their common refusal to involve Europe in the talks, the fear of betrayal comes easily.

What Friday’s meeting will actually achieve

The meeting between Trump and Putin will likely have limited impact on the war but significant impact on Western unity.

The meeting will likely be a “feel-out session” sharing perspectives on the war and the way forward. But both presidents will walk away with even more aligned foreign policy, united in ramping up pressure on Europe and Ukraine.

Trump has blinked, shown his cards, and demonstrated weakness and is, consequently, left without leverage. Putin gets an American partner in pressuring European allies while Trump gets to claim he’s pursuing “peace” while avoiding confrontation with Moscow.

It is, unfortunately, smoke and mirrors.

Hans Petter Midttun

Hans Petter Midttun, independent analyst on hybrid warfare, Non-Resident Fellow at the Centre for Defense Strategies, board member of the Ukrainian Institute for Security and Law of the Sea, former Defense Attaché of Norway to Ukraine, and officer (R) of the Norwegian Armed Forces. 

Editor’s note. The opinions expressed in our Opinion section belong to their authors. Euromaidan Press’ editorial team may or may not share them.

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President Trump hates the moniker TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out). But regarding Vladimir Putin and the war in Ukraine, Trump has repeatedly earned this sobriquet.

Despite repeated warnings that he would impose large secondary sanctions on buyers of Russian energy, Trump has caved to China and instead imposed substantial sanctions on India. This jeopardizes a generation of rapprochement with India and drives it closer to Moscow and Beijing.

When Trump, after six months of finding excuses for Putin and virtually offering him victory, announced his dissatisfaction with Putin’s refusal to commit to peace, many commentators argued he had finally seen the light. Now, they claimed, he would impose crushing sanctions on Russia and its Asian supporters—China and India.

This expression of irritation with Putin’s stalling was allegedly a turning point. Alas, it was not to be.

Trump’s unilateral concessions

On 7 August, Trump and the Russian government announced that instead of draconian sanctions being imposed on Russia, Trump and Vladimir Putin would hold a summit next week. Trump would probably meet with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy afterward.

But Moscow refused to commit to meeting Zelenskyy, although it might meet with other Ukrainians—again implying the illegality of Zelenskyy’s tenure. Trump duly conceded that Putin did not have to meet Zelenskyy, just hours after a White House aide stated that Putin indeed had to meet with Zelenskyy.

Russia rubbed salt in this wound by claiming the idea for a summit was Trump’s, emphasizing that he, not Putin, was the supplicant. Russian media, now exulting that Washington will finally accept Moscow as an equal by meeting with it, suggest this summit will not even discuss Ukraine but other bilateral issues.

Whether such claims have validity cannot be known. But they indicate Putin’s belief, shared by the Russian elite, that even if the West had the fortitude to impose greater sanctions or furnish Ukraine with more assistance, it would not matter—Russia is going to win.

Russian elite confidence

As Mikhail Zygar has written, the Russian elite is not scared and treats Trump’s earlier threats with disdain. This episode reveals that for all his bravado, Trump has imposed no sanctions on China or Russia but rather attacked America’s allies and partners in an act of extreme strategic incompetence.

Trump has already made two unjustified and unreciprocated concessions to Putin: asking to hold a summit with him and agreeing to exclude both Ukraine and Europe. When asked about this summit, a European official stated he was distraught:

“For all the bluster, Trump has not put a single iota of pressure on Putin—yet. Zero, zip.”

Cosmetic Russian concessions expected

Beyond these unilateral gestures to Putin, speculation suggests Russia will present nothing but cosmetic concessions—for example, suspending aerial and missile attacks on civilian targets. This costs Russia very little but impedes Ukraine’s attacks on Russian energy and logistics targets. This approach was reportedly what Belarusian President Lukashenka communicated to Washington.

Putin will not change his government to suit Russia’s taste, nor will he give ground regarding the five Ukrainian provinces Russia has seized since 2014: Crimea, Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson.

Instead, this “agreement” will likely pave the way toward Russia’s annexation of those provinces, as Putin and the Russian government have long embarked upon their Russification. There is little to expect here unless Trump magically departs from his fear of Putin and his steadfast refusal to understand what this war is about and how it connects to both international security in general and European security in particular.

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Nordic-Baltic nations remind before Trump-Putin meeting: international borders must not be changed by force

Putin’s broken promises

We already know in advance of this summit—even if Trump does not—that any agreement with Putin will not be worth the paper it’s written on. In invading Ukraine in both 2014 and 2022, Putin broke eight international treaties guaranteeing Ukraine’s borders and sovereignty.

He has also broken or walked out of virtually every arms control treaty except the ABM treaty and is obviously not interested in talks on a new one. Even assuming Russia negotiated such a treaty, it is unlikely to adhere to it. Apart from the eight treaties he broke, Putin also refused to abide by the terms of the Minsk agreements following Russia’s 2014 invasion.

Echoes of Munich 1938

This summit, taking place over the heads of the most directly interested parties, has already triggered considerable anxiety—like the Munich summit of 1938.

That anxiety, based on the first six months of Trump’s second term and his summits with Putin during his first term, is all too justified.

Stephen Blank

Dr. Stephen J. Blank, a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, is an expert on Russian foreign policy, Eurasian security, and international relations.

Editor’s note. The opinions expressed in our Opinion section belong to their authors. Euromaidan Press’ editorial team may or may not share them.

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on the evening of 13 August that Ukrainian forces will not voluntarily withdraw from territories in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts currently under their control, speaking to journalists three days before a scheduled Alaska meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.

“We will not leave Donbas – we cannot do this. Everyone forgets the first part – our territories are illegally occupied. For the Russians, Donbas is a bridgehead for a future new offensive. If we leave Donbas of our own free will or under pressure – we will open a third war,” Zelenskyy said, according to Radio Liberty.

The Ukrainian leader challenged potential American positioning on territorial concessions. “Of course, I would like to see America’s position given how it all started – our territory was occupied, Ukrainians are being killed, and after that they tell me: ‘Listen, do you want to stop being killed? You need to leave.’ And what security guarantees? Leave Donetsk oblast?” Zelenskyy said.

Zelenskyy said earlier that Kyiv would not recognize any Ukraine-related decisions made at the US-Russia Alaska summit. The Ukrainian president characterized the Trump-Putin meeting as potentially significant only for bilateral US-Russia relations, calling the very fact of the meeting Putin’s “personal victory.”

“It is impossible to talk about Ukraine without Ukraine, and no one will accept this. Therefore, the conversation may be important for their bilateral track, but they cannot decide anything about Ukraine without us. I hope that the US president understands and takes this into account,” Zelenskyy said at the “Youth Here” forum.

In domestic policy developments, Zelenskyy announced he has instructed the government and army to work on lifting travel restrictions for men under 22 years old. “This is a positive, correct story that will help many Ukrainians maintain ties with Ukraine and pursue education in Ukraine,” the president said.

Since Russia’s invasion, Ukraine has maintained martial law and general mobilization. Men aged 18 to 65 cannot leave the country’s territory. Men aged 25 to 60 are subject to mobilization, while men aged 18 to 24 can be called for basic military service, which during martial law lasts three months.

Europe leads military aid for Ukraine, surpassing the US. According to research by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy’s Ukraine Support Tracker, European countries have become the main donors of support to Ukraine, allocating over 35 billion euros for weapons procurement.

The Ukraine Support Tracker project monitors military, financial, and humanitarian aid to Ukraine based on open data. It covers 40 countries, including the G7 members, as well as Australia, South Korea, Türkiye, Norway, New Zealand, Switzerland, China, Taiwan, and India. 

Europe spent more on military aid than the US

From the start of the full-scale war until June 2025, Europe allocated at least 35.1 billion euros for Ukraine’s armaments — 4.4 billion euros more than the US. Importantly, a significant portion of weapons are purchased directly through the defense industry rather than taken from existing stockpiles.

The study highlights that Germany provided the largest bilateral aid package of five billion euros. Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK, and Denmark also provided significant aid packages.

The US supports, but Kyiv must finance purchases Itself

In May 2025, Trump’s administration approved large arms exports to Ukraine, but the country must finance these purchases independently.

Ukraine’s financing through international mechanisms

A significant part of Ukraine’s financial support is currently provided through the ERA loan mechanism, created by the G7 and the European Commission. A total of 45 billion euros is planned to be provided, partly financed by frozen Russian assets.

Experts warn that whether donors can maintain this level of assistance in the long term remains uncertain.