Donald Trump pulled out all the stops for Vladimir Putin—military jets, a red carpet, a personal limo ride, and warm applause. But after hours of private talks in Alaska, Trump walked away empty-handed. No ceasefire. No breakthrough. Just a photo op with a war criminal.
“There’s no deal until there is a deal,” Trump admitted, standing beside Putin after their closed-door meeting at Joint Base Elmendorf–Richardson. “We didn’t get there, but we have a very good chance of getting there.”
For all the spectacle and ceremony, the summit was a humiliating failure.
Putin, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes in Ukraine, got everything he wanted: international legitimacy, praise from Trump, and a stage to rewrite history—without giving up a single inch of Ukrainian territory.
Trump, on the other hand, left with nothing to show except vague promises and an awkward grin.
The president had vowed to push for a ceasefire. “I want to see a ceasefire rapidly,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One on the way to the summit. “I’m not going to be happy if it’s not today.”
It wasn’t.
Instead, Trump honored Putin like a VIP guest. American soldiers knelt to roll out a red carpet at the base of Putin’s plane. Trump clapped for him on the tarmac. A B-2 stealth bomber and four fighter jets thundered overhead in salute.
Then Trump offered Putin a ride in the presidential limousine. The two men were seen laughing together through the tinted windows, without any interpreters present—raising more questions than answers.
Putin used the moment to lecture the world and praise Trump. “We see the strive of the administration and President Trump personally to help facilitate the resolution of the Ukrainian conflict,” he said. “This history is precious.”
He mocked the years without a U.S.-Russia summit, calling them “very hard for bilateral relations” and saying they had fallen to “the lowest point since the Cold War.”
Putin even extended an invitation: “Next time, in Moscow,” he said in English.
Trump, rather than pressing Putin on his invasion or the war crimes charges, returned to his old talking points—griping about the 2016 election investigation. “We were interfered with by the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax,” he said. “He knew it was a hoax, and I knew it was a hoax.”
The event had been billed as a press conference. It wasn’t. Neither leader took any questions. Trump spoke for barely four minutes.
The entire affair echoed Trump’s 2018 summit with Putin in Helsinki—where he sided with the Russian strongman over his own intelligence agencies. But this time, the stakes were even higher: Ukraine is still under attack, and Putin is still ordering strikes.
Trump’s team had floated the idea of brokering a face-to-face between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. That didn’t happen either.
In the end, Trump gave Putin everything—respect, recognition, and a global stage—and got nothing in return. No ceasefire. No peace plan. Not even a promise.
Just an embarrassing show of weakness on American soil.
