It’s obvious what Putin got from this meeting – for Trump, not so much

Anchorage: On the flight from Washington to Alaska, Donald Trump told Fox News’ Bret Baier he would be unhappy if he left his meeting with Vladimir Putin without “some form of a ceasefire”.

Fast-forward six hours and Air Force One ended up leaving Anchorage more than an hour early, taking the US president home without a ceasefire or any other firm deal on peace for Ukraine. “We didn’t get there,” he told reporters. “But we have a very good chance of getting there.”

There were signs this meeting was not going to be an immediate game-changer. While Trump’s meeting with Putin lasted a lengthy 2½ hours, a mooted working lunch was scrapped. Journalists were hurried into the room for a joint press conference that ended up lasting about 12 minutes.

Unusually, the visiting Russian president spoke first, and Trump – uncharacteristically – said very little. He sounded flat, and the leaders took no questions.

Reporters were shocked and confused by the abrupt ending. Had the leaders actually agreed to anything? What the hell just happened?

Some will say that all that happened was Putin was brought back in from the deep freeze, in front of the whole world. That a man wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, and liable for arrest in more than 120 countries, was walking the red carpet on American soil, shaking hands and doing business with the US president, and taking a ride in his limousine.

Putin got all this without having to give up anything, other than some lip service about wanting to resolve the conflict and making progress towards a ceasefire.

The one thing Trump did get was a useful sound bite – Putin agreeing with his oft-repeated assertion that if he had been president at the time of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine instead of Joe Biden, the war never would have happened.

Others will give Trump more credit. He always said this was going to be about listening – “feeling out” Putin, gauging his sincerity about peace. He played down expectations, saying it was about “setting the table” for a second meeting, this one with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Indeed, it’s difficult to see how much of consequence could have come out of a meeting that excluded the Ukrainian leader and Europe.

However, Putin could have pretended to make concessions. He could have thrown on the table a temporary ceasefire until a second meeting could be arranged. He could have publicly committed to meeting Zelensky. Trump could have secured some sort of pledge about returning the Ukrainian children abducted by Russia.

This summit was always unusual because it was convened hastily and without largely pre-determined results. But as much as Trump might have played down expectations, if you are going to hold an event like this, people will expect you to walk away with something to show.

After the meeting, Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity he believed a deal was close. “It’s now up to Zelensky to get it done,” the president said. “And I would say the European nations have to get involved.”

Well, many would point out the Europeans are intimately involved, and say Zelensky should have been invited to Anchorage, too.

The danger for Ukraine is that Trump may have bought into Putin’s pretence of wanting peace. He came away saying as much. Previous US presidents have made that mistake; notably George W. Bush in 2001, who said he looked the Russian in the eye and saw his soul.

We might yet learn details about the apparent progress that was made in Alaska on Friday (Saturday AEST). You cannot discount the possibility this summit will pay dividends later. Lisa Murkowski, the Republican senator from Alaska who is sometimes at odds with Trump on multiple issues, said she was cautiously optimistic.

“It was also encouraging to hear both presidents reference future meetings, which I hope will include Ukraine,” she said.

On that point, Putin ambushed Trump at the end of the news conference, suggesting in English that their next rendezvous should take place in Moscow. Trump smiled and said it was a possibility but noted, correctly, that he would cop a bit of heat if he agreed to that.

The meeting also featured Trump’s trademark obsession: everyone wanting to do business with the United States. And both men sounded bullish about that prospect.

It’s clear what Putin got out of this exercise: a global stage, a warm welcome and the prospect of thawing relations with the world’s biggest economy. What Trump got out of it is much less clear, at least for now.

On the way home he confessed to Hannity that the Russia-Ukraine conflict was proving to be much harder to resolve than he imagined. “I thought this would be the easiest of them all, and this was the most difficult.”

Perhaps the one thing Trump took away from Anchorage was a dose of humility.

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