Alaska : moment which will decide the fate of war

Defence affairs - Nigel Gould-Davies

Senior Fellow for Russia and Eurasia

The imminent summit in Alaska could well prove a decisive moment for Europe, Russia, Ukraine and the United States.

Today’s summit in Alaska between United States President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin is a fluid and fateful moment for Europe. The stakes are high and uncertainty immense. Putin’s position is highly unlikely to shift. The outcome thus depends on Trump’s response.

President Trump’s invitation to Putin a week ago was his most abrupt shift yet. Having returned to the White House in January with a flawed theory of peace – to induce Russia and pressure Ukraine – he appeared to be learning that the war could only be ended by doing the opposite. He took part in a successful NATO summit in June, made his first harsh comments about Putin in July, and earlier this month moved two nuclear submarines in response to threats by former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev. But Trump’s sudden invitation rewarded, rather than punished, Putin for failing to meet the ceasefire deadline he had set for 8 August. Hosting the meeting on American soil – and especially in Alaska, former Russian territory and far from the diplomatic scrutiny of the Washington bubble – compounds this.

Deep uncertainty, fuelled by a daily drip-feed of remarks, surrounds Trump’s thinking. He initially appeared to put territorial swaps at the centre of his design. Two recent American diplomatic successes where territorial issues were key – the Thai-Cambodian ceasefire and the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace declaration – may have encouraged him in this, despite the very different nature of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Some sources suggest that Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, in his Kremlin meeting that teed up the summit, misinterpreted Putin’s position on this issue. But Ukraine will not agree to a forcible transfer of territory. And since Putin continues to seek the complete subordination of Ukraine, and remains confident he will eventually achieve this, such a transfer would, at best, merely pause the war.

Europe

Europe’s urgent diplomatic response to America appears to have borne fruit. Both sides judged their virtual summit on 13 August a success. Trump agreed to provide a backstop for a ‘reassurance force’ in post-war Ukraine, renewed his threat of ‘severe’ sanctions on Russia, and has lowered expectations of Alaska as a ‘feelout’ exercise for a diplomatic process that may bring in Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders. None of this is welcome to Moscow.

Yet Trump can change his position in a moment. A wide range of outcomes is possible. At one end, Trump could definitively back Putin’s demand for recognition of Russian-claimed regions – which include land Ukraine still controls – and renew pressure on Kyiv by depriving it of support while easing sanctions on Russia’s now-struggling economy. At the other end, Trump’s disillusionment could return if Putin overreaches – as he has before. Trump could then renew his criticism and apply real, not just rhetorical, pressure.

While the fact of the summit alone is a victory for Putin, he also faces risk. He will seek to reframe, but not moderate, his demands, feigning interest in peace while proposing conditions unacceptable to Ukraine. More broadly, he will try to persuade Trump that US interests lie in normalising their relations and subordinating Europe’s concerns to this. If Putin fails, he must find a way to reject any alternatives while avoiding open disagreement and ensuring the diplomatic process continues while remaining strictly bilateral.

Trump’s options

Trump has long argued he must sit down with Putin to end the war. If this fails, he will have exhausted all options except one: imposing the severe pressure on Russia he has so far only threatened. Pessimists will argue that he may once again find a reason to avoid doing so. This would be decisive proof that Russia occupies a uniquely favoured position in Trump’s eyes. It would also leave the peace – and coveted Nobel Peace Prize – that he has invested time and effort in pursuing more remote than ever.

But if, on the contrary, he accepts a version of Putin’s view of the war, and the demands that follow from it, then America and Europe would be divided on the latter’s most severe and urgent security threat. This would provoke the most serious breach in transatlantic relations since 1945, as Moscow intends.

Diplomacy is approaching a moment of truth where Trump must choose between Europe and Russia. Rarely has a major summit been so significant, hastily prepared, and uncertain in outcome.