Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are meeting, but peace may be more than a conversation away

Australia Broadcast Center

a day ago

When Vladimir Putin arrives in Anchorage today for peace talks with Donald Trump to try to end the war in Ukraine, he's likely to walk in believing he has the upper hand.
Russian forces have advanced at least 10 kilometres on a front in Ukraine's east this week — a breakthrough, of sorts, after months of incremental territorial gains.
Moscow's drones and missiles have been pounding its neighbour's cities, killing scores of people and chipping away at the morale of those who remain.
Despite all that aggression, Putin — considered a pariah by much of the international community since his full-scale invasion in 2022 — has been rewarded.
An in-person meeting with the leader of the free world awaits on Friday, local time.
Trump, for his part, has said he's searching for a pathway to peace. That idea could be unrealistic.
A chasm remains between the Kremlin and Kyiv's ceasefire wish lists.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week outlined several demands he said Trump had "agreed" to raise with Putin.
Among them was that Russia cannot veto his country's ambitions to join the European Union and NATO.
Putin, however, has consistently framed that prospect as a dealbreaker.
Zelenskyy also said Ukraine had to be involved in any ceasefire discussions.
As the country that was invaded, that might seem obvious. But it hasn't been invited to Friday's meeting.
"So whatever might come out of that summit between the US and the Russian presidents, those will not be terms that can be simply imposed on Ukraine," said Jaroslava Barbieri, a research fellow at London think tank Chatham House.
She added Trump would need to be wary of Putin's spin.
"One of the key objectives of the Kremlin … is putting forward proposals that are unacceptable for Ukraine in order to present Ukraine as an uncooperative and ungrateful actor to Trump's peace brokering efforts," she said.
Since the Alaska summit was announced last week, Trump has made several references to the possibility of "land-swapping" between Russia and Ukraine.
Judging by the rhetoric coming from both Moscow and Kyiv, the idea either side would be prepared to do that in exchange for peace appears far-fetched.
The Kremlin's stance on ending its invasion has not budged since Putin set out conditions last year.
He wants Ukraine to abandon its NATO aspirations, reduce its military, become a neutral state, and cede territory occupied by Russian forces during the war.
Two territories in Ukraine's east — Donetsk and Luhansk — are particularly prized by Putin, and analysts say it will likely be a key demand discussed in Alaska.
Russia has partially occupied both since 2014, and last month claimed it had captured all of Luhansk, more than three years after its full-scale invasion was launched.
Zelenskyy has said his troops will not leave either.
Ukraine's leader has also said he would not cede his country's territory, arguing tens of thousands of soldiers had died defending it and Russia could use it to launch future attacks.
Such a move would not only be unpopular among Ukrainians. It's illegal under the country's constitution to redraw borders set in 1991.
Putin, too, has constitutional headaches.
Back in 2022, seven months after his full-scale invasion began, he signed amendments to Russia's constitution that four Ukrainian territories — Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia — had been integrated into his country.
After years of fighting and massive casualties, his troops control only one of those completely.
Zelenskyy says he's already warned Trump: "Putin is bluffing" when it comes to peace.
"He is trying to put pressure before the meeting in Alaska along all parts of the Ukrainian front. Russia is trying to show that it can occupy all of Ukraine," he said.
Zelenskyy isn't the only key player not going to Alaska.
European allies, who like the US have tipped billions of dollars in financial and military aid into Ukraine, have also been barred from taking part.
This week they, and Ukraine's leader, had a video call with Trump. It was a last-ditch attempt to shape his approach.
"We as Europeans are doing everything we can to help set the agenda for that meeting," German Chancellor Frederich Merz said on Wednesday, after the hook-up.
Among the European Union's main concerns is that after Ukraine, an emboldened Putin will launch further invasions on the continent. At most risk, they say, are the Baltic states, and Poland.
Boris Bondarev, a former Russian diplomat to the United Nations, who resigned in 2022 because he was "ashamed" of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, said he did "not have very high expectations" for Friday's meeting.
"What Vladimir Putin wants goes strictly against the national interest of the United States and the Western countries," he said.
"To accept Putin's demands and his conditions would mean surrender, not only of Ukraine, but of the West itself — surrender to open aggression, to rewriting of national borders, and it would be a green light for the continuation of such policy by Russia or any other would-be aggressor."
So when is peace possible?
Anna Mateeva, a visiting fellow at Kings College London who specialises in Russian politics and security, said Friday's summit should be viewed as the first step in a long process.
"The most important thing which can be achieved is the two-leaders assessment of each other, and to what extent they are serious about what they are saying they can do," Dr Mateeva said.
Many analysts argue the in-person meeting between Trump and Putin has the potential to be something constructive en route to a ceasefire. But actually getting there appears a distant goal.
On the battlefield, fighting remains ferocious, and off it, the gulf between Kyiv and Moscow's lists of demands has not been closed.
It could take more than a conversation to change that reality.