Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin ended their three-hour private summit in Alaska on Friday night without reaching any deal to stop the war in Ukraine, or the sanctions heading Russia’s way.
The meeting, held at an Air Force base in Anchorage, was the first time both men met since 2019, but despite the buildup and the “Pursuing Peace” backdrop behind them, there was no progress on the main issue: stopping the bloodshed that’s already killed over a million people.
Trump said they had “many, many points” of agreement but admitted they hadn’t gotten to the big ones. “So there’s no deal until there’s a deal,” he said, summing up what ended up being three hours of talks with no actual results.
Putin gave short comments too, warning Ukraine and its European partners not to mess with the “progress,” even though nothing solid was presented. No questions were taken from the press. No documents signed. Just two presidents in front of microphones offering vague words and no commitments.
Zelenskiy kept out as Trump aims for a second round
Inside the base, Trump was flanked by Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, and Steve Witkoff, his special envoy to Russia. Putin came with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and top foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov.
They met in a secured room while the clock ticked, and by the end, the biggest headline was the lack of one. Trump’s original goal was to get Putin to commit to meeting Volodymyr Zelenskiy and hammer out a deal to end the war that began in February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine.
But Zelenskiy didn’t even get an invite. Fears from Kyiv and European capitals were mostly that Trump might let Russia keep the territories it’s already taken, locking in Moscow’s control over about 20% of Ukraine’s land.
Trump tried to calm those fears, saying he wasn’t there to “negotiate for Ukraine,” but just to push everyone toward the table. “I want the killing to stop,” he said before boarding Air Force One.
That killing didn’t stop. On the same day of the summit, a Russian missile struck the Dnipropetrovsk region, killing one and injuring another. Zelenskiy didn’t sit quietly. He posted on Telegram, writing, “It’s time to end the war, and the necessary steps must be taken by Russia. We are counting on America.”
But from Anchorage, Trump had nothing concrete to give him.
Putin walks out with optics, Trump leaves with questions
Putin may not have secured a deal, but he got something he likely wanted: the image of Russia sitting down with the U.S. again, not as an outcast, but as a major player.
Even with an active International Criminal Court warrant accusing him of deporting Ukrainian children, a charge Moscow denies, he got to shake Trump’s hand, walk the red carpet, and share the stage. Both countries aren’t members of the ICC, so the warrant had no effect on this summit.
Trump rolled out the welcome treatment. He greeted Putin on the tarmac with a handshake and a pat on the arm before both rode in Trump’s limo to the summit site. That visual, already blasted across media, is being used by Moscow to claim Western isolation has failed.
As for real outcomes, there were none. No agreement on a ceasefire. No next meeting scheduled. No roadmap. Just more promises from Trump, who once said he’d end the war “in 24 hours,” now admitting the job’s harder than he thought. “If this goes well, the three-way summit will matter more than today,” Trump said on Thursday, already downplaying the Alaska talks before they happened.
Zelenskiy still insists on no territorial handovers. He also wants U.S.-backed security guarantees. Neither was discussed publicly. Trump promised to call Zelenskiy and NATO leaders after the summit to update them. But again, what’s there to say? Nothing was achieved.
Keith Kellogg, Trump’s envoy to Ukraine, said earlier that combined casualties on both sides are around 1.2 million. And still, the summit ended with nothing but cameras and carefully worded lines.
