Everything is heading towards a meeting between Putin and Zelensky.

By: Ricardo Israel - 19/08/2025

It was a two-stage meeting. On Friday the 15th, it was between Trump and Putin, and on Monday the 18th, it was between Trump, Zelensky, and a delegation of European leaders. On Friday, I had the feeling that Trump wasn't happy, mainly due to his nonverbal language and because it ended earlier than scheduled, but on Monday, he seemed very satisfied, so now everything is moving toward a meeting between Ukraine and Russia, with the US president and his organization in attendance.

"In a week or two, we'll know if there's a solution to the war," Trump declared, adding that Russia has accepted Western security guarantees. In a press interview, Trump listed his successes, including agreements seeking peace between India-Pakistan, Cambodia-Thailand, Congo-Rwanda, and Armenia-Azerbaijan. Although these agreements have made progress and halted the fighting, it is striking that there were no formal ceasefires in some of them, demonstrating the unique characteristics of the US as a superpower, as it also remains the only Middle Eastern power still seeking a ceasefire in Gaza.

However, the war in Ukraine has proven to be the most difficult to bear fruit, since it is not a three-year war as has been repeatedly said, but an eleven-year one, given that the military aspect began in 2014 with the seizure of Crimea and the occupation by Russian separatists of two of the four regions of the Ukrainian Donbas, all with the full support of Moscow.

How optimistic can one be about the future meeting? In general, different governments, the White House with different presidents, struggle to understand other mentalities. Obviously, it's difficult for everyone in the case of China or the Middle East, but also Russia. It may be that, in this case, not only Ukraine and Russia, but also the United States, are expecting different things. Putin, something that has been demanded of him throughout his public life, at least since May 7, 2000, when he assumed his first presidential term, that is, the entire 21st century. The truth is, he had previously served as prime minister under Yeltsin, whom he replaced when he unexpectedly resigned on December 31, 1999.

Putin has always said the same thing: that the end of the USSR was so rapid that it was truly a collapse, so much so that not only did 15 countries emerge, but it was the end of an empire. Negotiations are pending to agree on the establishment of the borders of those countries, and that, as its successor, these negotiations must be conducted with Russia, that is, with him. In other words, when Putin insists that we must go back to the origins of the Ukrainian war, he is thinking of a negotiation of these characteristics, of which the Ukrainian war would be the beginning, not the end. Behind this, the end of the USSR should be seen as the end of an empire, that is, no different from what happened with the Spanish Empire in Latin America in the 19th century, and with the disappearance of the Ottoman Empire after the end of the First World War. Therefore, throughout the 19th century, we witnessed border wars and invasions of the countries that emerged there, as well as a good part of the current conflicts in the Middle East, which have their roots in what happened in 1918.

The other reason is that today the war is being won by Russia, slowly and with many victims on each side, but, even if it is in meters and not kilometers, the advance is Russian, with the added fact that Ukraine is suffering a lot today, perhaps too much, since there are daily attacks on civilians, with many deaths, attacks for which Ukraine has no defense against those missiles, and that it happens every day and every one of them.

Instead, Trump is thinking of something else: an urgent solution to the issue of the number of people who are dying, that is, a Ceasefire, which today is a generous offer, since it is most likely that this Ceasefire will become a de facto border, that is, definitively, as happened with Israel and its Arab neighbors in 1949, and with both Koreas in 1953, also until today the border respected by all, that is, the 20% of Ukrainian territory where the Russian invasion has settled would be frozen.

But are expectations exaggerated? Will this future dialogue between Putin and Zelensky work? In the past, various attempts failed to resolve the conflict, and today, difficulties are also evident. Everything now seems to depend on concessions from kyiv. However, something nevertheless determines what can be done, since Zelensky has something pending: the call for elections that should have taken place last year, but which were not, arguing that it was impossible to do so during a war. And any concession would confirm what the polls had shown both in 2024 and more recently: that Zelensky would be defeated by the former Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and current ambassador to the United Kingdom, General Valerii Zaluzhnyl, considered the architect of the successful defense against the invasion, and that he would be dismissed after the 2023 counteroffensive failed.

Trump is right in the sense that for years this has been a stagnant war, with no end in sight, despite the fact that all the characteristics for it are in place, except for one, that the combatants have not lost the desire to continue fighting. In addition, contrary to what is thought, Trump's entire public life is against the idea that a military confrontation can solve this type of problems, and rather thinks in terms of the limited use of military instruments and not in prolonged wars, for example, what just happened with the United States in Iran.

Zelensky is clear about this war deadlock, as is his difficulty in making concessions. For his part, Putin is aware of his economic and diplomatic difficulties, and that it could be extremely difficult to continue financing the war if secondary sanctions are imposed on countries that buy Russian oil, some as important as China and India, the latter of which resells it at a cheaper, but profitable, price to a number of nations, including European ones, which include those critical of Putin and the US, in another demonstration of international hypocrisy.

The difficulties in achieving a ceasefire not only exist in the future, but are also evident in the past, since these attempts not only appeared under Trump, but also several failed agreements in previous years, since, as stated, this war began not three but eleven years ago.

This is how Russia's narrative about the origins of the war is different, as they have told themselves a lie: that the origin of the war was not their invasion, but that it was "provoked" by the West with the Maiden Square unrest in Kyiv in 2013 and the subsequent resignation of President Yanukovych on February 22, 2014, an event they describe as a "parliamentary coup." They also blame the West for the failure of the Minsk Agreements, designed to end the war started by pro-Russian separatists and which called for a kind of federal system, through autonomy and decentralization for the provinces where the Russian language predominated. They also blamed, without evidence, the US and the UK for pressuring Ukraine to reject Moscow's conditions for withdrawing its troops, at the meeting the two countries held in Istanbul in 2022, mediated by Erdogan, shortly after the invasion.

However, the failed attempts are not limited to those mentioned above. There is also an Israeli failure, which began with the surprise visit of then-Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in March 2022 at the request of the US. Israel had a good relationship with Russia and Ukraine, primarily due to the number of immigrants born in both countries. In any case, there was an agreement that worked in the Syrian civil war between Netanyahu and Putin, which has continued ever since. Despite having been on opposite sides in that war, they never clashed, as they were able to understand each other's strategic needs. At the time, that situation was presented as an example that, with Putin, "negotiations were possible," but it wasn't a negotiation, merely a dialogue, but it yielded results, which didn't happen in this case, so Israel didn't mediate again. Today, it is known that, on that occasion, Bennett was considered pro-Russian in kyiv.

Just as the Minsk Agreements made concessions that would have been impossible after the invasion, given Russia's much more intense role. For example, in those agreements, Ukraine agreed for the only time to allow the then only two separatist republics, the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic, to participate under that name. Other attempts would also involve European countries. Thus, in December 2019, Ukraine and Russia agreed to resume meetings, leading France and Germany to revive the Normandy Four, allowing the first face-to-face meeting between Putin and Zelensky to take place in Paris. This demonstrates that the Ukrainian's current desire for something similar is nothing new.

Furthermore, a formal ceasefire with the separatists was announced in July 2020, no less than the twentieth such attempt since 2014. This also sheds light on how Russia has responded to the US today and how it did to the Europeans back then. Another precedent is the presidential election campaign, since in October 2019, candidate Zelensky announced that his government would respect the elections held in the occupied provinces in exchange for Russia withdrawing its troops. This never happened, not only on Russia's part, but also in Ukraine, a militia with a name still in force did the same, as the nationalists of the Azov Battalion also refused to accept any agreement.

Finally, it is also useful to allow the review of everything that failed, but that at some point was signed, even if there was non-compliance, as was the case frequently cited by kyiv and which explains the insistence on asking for assurances, given that the Budapest Memorandum signed in Hungary on December 5, 1994, was never respected. This Memorandum assured Ukraine of the inviolability of its borders after Ukraine, along with Belarus, renounced the atomic bombs that remained on its territory when the USSR disappeared. In kyiv, the annoyance in this case is with other signatories such as the United States and the United Kingdom, which, along with Russia, participated in that signing and did not react in 2014.

This story gives an idea of the various efforts made over the years for a Ceasefire, and the difficulties faced by Donald Trump's current attempt, where not even a Nobel Peace Prize easily appears as a deserved reward. This is due to the particular characteristics of this Nobel Prize, one of the five instituted by Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite and manufacturer of weapons, which according to the Will is awarded each year "to the person who has done the most or best for fraternity among nations, the abolition and reduction of armed conflict, and the conclusion and promotion of peace agreements." But with a peculiarity, since unlike the other four, it is not awarded by a Swedish academy, but is an eminently political prize, since it is awarded by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, five people selected by the Norwegian Parliament, which explains the criticism that the selected prizes frequently receive.

Furthermore, because it's Norway, there are religious, political, and ideological orientations that reflect the realities of that country. This makes it difficult for Trump's positions and image to be welcomed in that parliament. Furthermore, there are special situations, such as the one that occurred with Obama, who won the prestigious award shortly after his election, before he had even made significant decisions in the White House, something the former president himself laughed at.

Among those who have now erred may have been Putin, as there is no evidence that the US wants to enter into extensive negotiations, and, conversely, Trump's patience may be running out. Deep down, Putin wants something that wasn't even available at the end of the USSR, just as Gorbachev hoped and criticized in his memoirs. Today, Putin wants something similar to what the US negotiated after Cuba, the so-called policy of peaceful coexistence that would become known as "detente," where Europe was simply not considered among the negotiators. Today, as a self-proclaimed defender of the Russian minorities who remained living elsewhere in the former USSR, Putin wants the US to negotiate with Russia—that is, with him—the borders into which the former empire was divided.

What would the US gain? Two things, besides preventing further Russian invasions, resolving future flashpoints in places like Kaliningrad and Moldova, but even more importantly, something that never existed, not even when both were communists: an alliance with China, where Russia is the junior partner. But it doesn't seem, and he has never said so, that Trump wants to make the trip to Moscow this time that Nixon made to China in 1972 so that it wouldn't end up in Soviet hands, after the chaos of the Cultural Revolution.

Perhaps more likely, if he doesn't get the necessary and essential Ceasefire, Trump will lose interest and look to build his legacy elsewhere, as he has less and less time left, since next year there are midterm elections in the US and after that everything will focus on the next presidential election, without Trump as a candidate.

In this regard, it helps to review the names of the presidents who met with Putin. The first did so 28 times, including George W. Bush's two terms. After the first meeting in 2001, Bush said that he had "looked Putin in the eye" and found him "trustworthy," having captured, no less, "his soul." Barack Obama met with Putin nine times and twelve more with Dmitry Medvedev (2008-2012). Even today, the great "reset" button Hillary Clinton handed to Sergei Lavrov in 2009 is remembered, with the problem that the word that accompanied it in Russian did not mean that, but rather "overload." For their part, Putin and Joe Biden met only once as presidents, in Geneva, in June 2021.

During his first presidency, Trump met with Putin six times. Alaska was the seventh, and let's remember that they had a good human relationship, but both were tough negotiators, and contrary to what has been said, there is no political or economic gesture that would have unduly favored Putin and Russia, due to the MAGA issue, and above all, how the false accusation that Putin intervened by "electing" Trump derailed that relationship with the so-called "Russian plot," which was effectively an illegal, but local, interference in the US democratic process by the so-called deep state.

For the future, we must not lose sight of what Winston Churchill said in 1939: that Russia was "a riddle wrapped in a mystery within an enigma." It is complex and opaque at the same time, making its actions difficult to predict. It also occurs in a context of a sustained decline in Europe's relevance.

If the Putin-Zelensky summit fails, will Trump lose interest?

@israelzipper

Master's and PhD in Political Science (Essex University), Bachelor of Law (University of Barcelona), Lawyer (University of Chile), former presidential candidate (Chile, 2013)

«The opinions published herein are the sole responsibility of its author».