Did Putin outplay Trump at Alaska summit? What Russia’s response to peace proposals tells us

The hype created and the hope raised following the Alaska summit, when US President Donald Trump hosted his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin seem to be dying down. Sharp differences have appeared in understanding and interpretation of the talks and outcomes of the Trump-Putin summit at an American military base.

Russia has rebuffed the European idea of negotiating peace from the position where Ukraine looks militarily strong, with a promise of security guarantee that Moscow has described as a threat. Europe, including Ukraine, has refused to accept Russia’s terms for peace talks.

Trump looks frustrated with the pace of progress for truce in Ukraine. He has used the old carrot and stick approach, but using it for both the warring sides. The prospects of ceasefire, as a result, still look distant, with critics slamming Russia for doubling down on maximalist demands.

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Attacks have intensified again. Russia launched the largest aerial attack in weeks on Ukraine on Thursday with more than 600 missiles and drones. Several civilian settlements came under attack, reports said. Russian missiles also struck an American-owned factory in the far-western province of Zakarpattia.

On Sunday, Ukraine launched a barrage of drone attacks on Russia. A nuclear power plant was targeted in Russia’s Kursk, sparking a fire at the facility as Ukraine celebrated 34 years since its independence.

Meanwhile, Trump on Friday granted Russia two more weeks to consider his requests for ceasing fire in Ukraine.

Trump has also faced criticism for delaying his promised sanctions against Russia. The contrast is sharper now after the bombing of an American factory. Trump’s stance also fits a pattern: Trump promised a ceasefire and floated proposals that many believed favoured Russia. When Russia rejected even those ‘favourable’ offers, Trump threatened — just like he warned of “severe consequences” before the Alaska summit.

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Putin outsmarted Trump in Alaska?

After the Alaska summit, Putin looked to be signalling that he had come out on the top. While Trump said that “some great progress” was made on unspecified issues, Putin stressed that he was “convinced” that the “primary causes” of the conflict must be addressed for the war to end.

In the past 10 days, Russian officials have made it clear that Putin wants Ukraine to surrender the entire Donbas region — not just the area under Russian control. They have also said that Putin wants a written pledge form Nato to stop onboarding of new member-states, permanent neutrality of Ukraine, limits on the Ukrainian military, and a veto in any security guarantees to Ukraine.

Such declarations have directly contradicted the American positions. However, much against what many expected, there has been no pushback from the Trump administration.

It seems that the White House has misinterpreted the message from Moscow, says Nicholas Lokker, a Russian foreign and security policy researcher at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), a think tank in Washington DC.

Contrary to what top US officials, including Vice President JD Vance, have suggested as major concessions, Lokker says that there is little evidence that Russia’s stance has changed following Trump’s separate talks with Putin, Zelenskyy, and other European leaders.

“Recently, the Kremlin has clarified that its position has not changed. It has not made reported concessions like agreeing to a Putin-Zelenskyy summit. Overall, it does seem that Putin has largely played Trump,” says Lokker.

Can European unity force Putin’s hand?

In unprecedented unity, some of the most powerful European leaders joined Zelenskyy at the White House to press Trump to push for a ceasefire at the earliest and US-backed security guarantees. But Trump has looked non-committal in echoing the intensity of their calls for a ceasefire and has endorsed security guarantees whose contours are still vague.

Even as Europe has stepped up its efforts for a stronger pushback against Russia, and announced it would buy weapons for Ukraine, Trump has put limiting conditions — he is selling those weapons at a 10 per cent premium and his defence department has barred Ukraine from using missiles to strike deep inside Russia.

For Europe, the Russian aggression is the biggest security crisis since the World War II and Ukraine is its first line of defence.

However, going by the constraints and the decades-long dependence on American defence apparatus, European nations are unlikely to be able to provide security guarantees on their own that can deter Russia, according to Prof Amitabh Singh, a scholar of Russian and European affairs at the Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi.

“For any security guarantees, the role of the United States, whether direct involvement or an indirect role as a backstop, is a must. Otherwise, European security guarantees on their own are unlikely to work as they do not have military might that is comparable to the United States. You cannot rule out US involvement at this point as President Trump has not given up on Nato. He has sought increased defence spending that members have agreed to,” says Singh.

As of now, however, neither the European unity nor proposals of Article 5-like security guarantees with potential American role have deterred Putin, says Lokker, the Russia scholar at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).

“If anything, the summits have resulted in decreased pressure on Russia as Trump has abandoned his demands for a ceasefire and backed off on his promise to impose new sanctions on Russia. While strong Congressional support for new sanctions could yet push Trump to reverse course again, the reality is that the efficacy of sanctions has been decreasing, and Putin does not seem to be swayed enough by them to alter his fundamental calculus,” says Lokker.

What’s the road ahead?

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Sunday said that Ukraine could only exist as a nation if it would accept linguistic and cultural demands and give primacy to ethnic Russians in the country. This also signals that whether in terms of territory or post-war Ukrainian nation, Russian demands barely changed since 2022.

Lokker, the Russia researcher at CNAS, says that as Putin has flatly refused to end the war by seeking a middle ground, the only way his hand could be forced is by increased pressure on the battlefield but that’s unlikely as that would require major increase in Western military support to Ukraine.

However, such increased support does not look very likely at the moment, at least from the American perspective, Lokker further says.

Singh, the Russia scholar at JNU, however, says that Russian territorial demands could very well prove to be the starting point for talks and the two sides could still arrive at a middle ground if America applies correct pressure on Russia and provides security guarantees to Ukraine.

“In the end, everyone will have to sell a victory to their people. That could only come with a compromise where each party gets something even as it gives away something. Whether Russia could be forced to make a compromise remains to be seen,” says Singh.