Last Friday Donny and Putin held their head to head talks on ending the Ukraine debacle….and how did that go?

President Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke for three hours on Friday, but they did not cinch an agreement to end the war in Ukraine. “We haven’t quite got there, but we’ve got some headway,” Trump said at a cordial news conference afterward, reports the New York Times. “There’s no deal until there’s a deal.” Trump said he would now call Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and other world leaders to update them on the details of the talks, which were not divulged during the news conference. Trump said some major sticking points remained, without elaborating, but he also called the meeting “extremely productive.”

Putin, for his part, praised Trump and thanked his “dear neighbor” for hosting the “long overdue” summit, per the Washington Post. He said the two nations had reached an “understanding” on a path toward peace, and he warned Europe not to “torpedo the nascent progress,” per the AP.

• “Russia is interested in ensuring that the settlement in Ukraine is long-term,” he said. “I hope that today’s agreements will be a starting point for achieving peace in Ukraine.”
• Putin also said he agreed with Trump’s past statements that the war would not have started had Trump been in the White House.
• He also invited Trump to come to Moscow for another summit at some point. Trump joked that he might take “some heat” about that but called it a possibility.

“Extremely productive”?

In what sense?

President Trump said on his flight to Alaska that there would be “severe consequences” if Russian President Vladimir Putin didn’t agree to a ceasefire during their meeting Friday. “I’m in this to stop the killing,” the president said on Air Force One. But Putin did not agree to stop the fighting, there were no consequences, and by Saturday, Trump had abandoned the idea of a ceasefire altogether. The result, Peter Baker writes in a New York Times analysis, is that Putin has been given a free pass to keep waging his war on Ukraine indefinitely, without fear of penalty.

“Even in the annals of Mr. Trump’s erratic presidency, the Anchorage meeting with Mr. Putin now stands out as a reversal of historic proportions,” Baker writes. A former US ambassador to NATO under Barack Obama said Trump’s longtime priority changed fast after the friendly tarmac greeting, chatty limousine ride, and brief sessions. “He got played again,” said Ivo Daalder. “For all the promises of a ceasefire, of severe economic consequences, of being disappointed, it took two minutes on the red carpet and 10 minutes in the Beast for Putin to play Trump again.”

Skipping the ceasefire step makes the peace talks based on Ukraine turning over territory it controls to Russia, per the Times. The tough new sanctions Trump had threatened to impose on Russia, complete with deadlines, appear to be off the table, as well, per a CNN analysis by Stephen Collinson. “Because of what happened today, I think I don’t have to think about that now,” Trump told Fox News later Friday.

As usual the gas bag of a president accomplished NOTHING that he said he would…..as usual any threats made were idle words.

Next up is a visit from Zelenskyy today…..but what will this accomplish…..will it be yet another ambush?

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he’ll meet US President Trump in Washington on Monday after a Russia-US summit in Alaska ended without an agreement to stop the fighting in Ukraine after 3 1/2 years, reports the AP. Meanwhile, in a reversal only a few hours after meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump said an overall peace agreement, and not a ceasefire, was the best way to end the war. That statement echoes Putin’s view that Russia isn’t interested in a temporary truce and instead is seeking a long-term settlement that takes Moscow’s interests into account. More:

• Zelensky: The Ukrainian leader, who didn’t receive an invite to the summit, said he had a “long and substantive” conversation with Trump early Saturday and that he’s looking forward to meeting with Trump in DC to “discuss all of the details regarding ending the killing and the war.”
• Trump: The US president spoke to Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Friday after the summit, calling his Putin get-together a “10 out of 10” and a “very warm meeting between two very important countries,” per Fox News. “I think we’re pretty close to a deal,” he added, but “Ukraine has to agree to it.”
• Trump II: The president wrote early Saturday on Truth Social that “it was determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up.” He added that he’d be willing to have up a three-way meeting with himself, Zelensky, and Putin “if all works out,” which he reiterated to Hannity. “Not that I want to be there, but I want to make sure it gets done—and we have a pretty good chance of getting it done,” he told the Fox News host, per Fox.
• Europe: The general sentiment among leaders on the Continent is one of wariness, especially with one big issue at hand for Europeans, per the New York Times: “They have no strategy of their own for bringing the war to a close, let alone for defeating Moscow.”
• Ukrainians I: The vast majority of people in Ukraine don’t trust Putin, and the sentiment around the summit is one of “deep skepticism,” per the BBC. “Many soldiers gave their lives for these territories, for the protection of our country,” a Ukrainian sniper says. “A freeze [on the front lines] would mean demobilization would begin, wounded and exhausted soldiers would be discharged, the army would shrink, and during one of these rotations the Russians would strike again. But this time, it would be the end of our country.”
• Ukrainians II: A minority of Ukrainians, either due to war fatigue or due to pro-Russian sentiment, are OK with compromises on ceding territory. “My belief is that the war should be stopped in any way possible,” a retired factory worker in Donetsk tells the BBC. “The further it goes, the worse it becomes.”

What will this repeated meetings with Donny actually accomplish?

Is any of this truly about ending this deadly conflict?

Or is it just semi-clever stagecraft?

I Read, I write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”