The Trump–Putin meeting didn't go as badly as we feared, but it appeared to go well from Putin's perspective. So, what can be concluded from the brief press conference and the details that have emerged?

Both of them said no clear or final agreement was reached. That's one way to put it, but that may have been the point — both the U.S. and Russia had previously signaled that no formal deal would be reached or signed.

Some sort of talks took place, and the U.S. president is trying to claim that progress toward some sort of agreement was made. But exactly what that entails still remains unclear. It's likely the U.S. president will speak more about it soon, as media coverage of the meeting has been pretty brutal for [Trump].

Still, Putin was greeted with a handshake on the red carpet and even invited to [the presidential] limo — and it was highly unusual for him to accept. At the press conference, Trump didn't speak himself as he normally would, with foreign leaders sitting there nodding along; this time, it was Trump nodding along as Putin spoke. And it seemed they even agreed on a meeting in Moscow?

I don't think they agreed on that directly — it seemed to catch even Donald Trump a bit off guard when President Putin mentioned it at the press conference.

But what's clearly a win for Russia is that Russia has effectively stalled the U.S. process for new sanctions and given the U.S. president the impression that some kind of progress is being made toward halting military hostilities. Let's call these "discussions" — "negotiations" might be giving them too much credit.

And in this regard, the U.S. has already made significant concessions compared with President Trump's early August rhetoric.

Looking at it from another angle, Russia probably realizes it can't fully achieve everything it has demanded so far. And now, based on current reports, and we'll probably learn more in the coming days, it seems Russia is pursuing a ceasefire under very favorable conditions — something it has pursued for years. Because I believe Russian leaders understand, and so does [Putin], that the Russian Army isn't capable of swiftly capturing significant additional territory in Ukraine.

A ceasefire would also serve to pause major Western weapons deliveries and other military aid to Ukraine, giving Russia time to prepare its forces for a new offensive. That's likely how the Russian president is thinking.

But what would constitute favorable conditions for Russia to agree to a ceasefire? There are likely two main components being discussed. One would be for Ukraine to cede additional territory to Russia in exchange for certain security guarantees or a ceasefire. And the second could be sanctions-related — no new sanctions would be imposed, and existing sanctions may be suspended or lifted.

This is a plausible negotiating position for Russia. And it's clear that the U.S. president didn't dare — or was unable — to make such a deal himself. Instead, he's now taken on the role of pressuring Ukraine to accept this deal — to agree to some kind of deal as though he had laid the groundwork for it. At least that's one way to interpret it, although we don't know if that's exactly how things went — that remains to be seen.

In a Fox News interview after the meeting, Trump emphasized that he and Putin are "the right people," great leaders and great friends, and that the real problem is Ukraine and Europe, which are small and difficult. Yet there was no full delegation meeting as originally planned. So overall, it probably wasn't all that friendly, then?

I think the main issue here is that the U.S. would have preferred a one-on-one meeting, but the Russian president avoided that entirely, which is why a reduced-delegation meeting took place. And the meeting ended up relatively brief, [as] it's reasonable to assume the U.S. president didn't agree to finalize any agreement with the Russian president, insisting on a meeting with the Ukrainian president instead.

This is a matter of optics for Russia — it doesn't look good for [them]. For various reasons, but the Russian president himself has consistently indicated, directly or indirectly, that he doesn't want to meet with Ukraine's president, whom he calls an illegitimate ruler. That's likely why the larger delegation meetings and other elements were dropped.

And it seems the U.S. also didn't allow itself to be pushed into including the broader set of topics as Russia had wanted, which would have given Russia the impression it was trying to project — that a so-called global issues summit or discussion was taking place.

Even the lunch planned for after all of the delegations' song and dance was canceled. So it seems the U.S. has stood its ground here, and it seems President Trump insisted that the Ukraine issue be addressed first.

--

Follow ERR News on Facebook and X and never miss an update!