The Alaskan summit: The context

By Ben Langer

On Friday Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump will meet to discuss the future of the Russo-Ukrainian war. They will meet in Alaska and crucially the summit will not be attended by Volodymyr Zelensky, despite his best efforts to be involved.

This meeting comes at a brutal stage of this war, the Russians have suffered over one million casualties in Ukraine and in return the Ukrainians have suffered over 400,000. Every night in Ukrainian cities air raid sirens occupy the skies, while Russia continue their brutal bombing campaigns with drones and missiles. As each night goes by many civilians are injured and killed. On the front, the picture is the same as it has been for quite some time. Russia slowly gain land, but only do so by painfully sacrificing thousands of lives. This war is becoming ever more painful and costly to both nations involved. Both sides will want to end this conflict, however they will want peace on very different terms.

Putin's aims have been clear even before the war began. In July 2021 Vladimir Putin published an essay titled “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians”. In this essay he claimed that Ukrainian and Russians were the same, that they were brothers and sisters and should be united as one. Since his full scale invasion commenced in February 2022 his renewed aims have been repeated until as recently as last month. Putin wanted Ukraine ‘demilitarised’ and ‘denazified’, in other words he wanted them unable to fight against the Russians and he wanted a regime change that would bring

Ukraine back into the Russian sphere, ending their long and painful political struggle to be united with the west, which has lasted decades and which has seen many a revolution.

With this meeting, Trump isn’t just helping Russia emerge from the political wilderness, he is letting him into the house, and at the head of the table.

However, what does Putin want from this summit in particular? Well firstly he wants something that he gets just by this meeting taking place, recognition. Since Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine, Putin has been politically isolated, global leaders have stopped any communications with Russia in attempt to delegitimize them. Making it clear, if they wanted to rejoin the political world, they would have to play by the rules. This has hurt Russia, sanctions and lowering oil trades have hit their economy hard. However, with Trump in office this is a theme of the past. They will notably not meet in a neutral territory but host the Russians on American soil, rather poetically thousands of miles from Europe and Ukraine. With this meeting, Trump isn’t just helping Russia emerge from the political wilderness, he is letting him into the house, and at the head of the table.

Talking in negotiated terms, we must talk about land. Up until recently the Russian position had been that Russia demanded full control of the 5 Ukrainian regions that Russian troops are in and in return it will stop its offensive and offer limited ceasefires such as an end to air strikes. This was completely unacceptable to the Ukrainians. While they do control Crimea and Luhansk, the land of which they are yet to conquer in the regions of Donetsk, Zhaporizhiha, and Kherson equates to tens of thousands of

square kilometres, including a topography that would be difficult to progress through. Meaning that Russia would want land that they have been unable to take in three years of conflict claiming that they already control a majority of these regions, roughly 75% of all three. However, within the last week the Russian position has shifted dramatically, claiming that they would stop conflict on the front lines as they are currently, if Ukraine withdrew from the region of Donetsk and give control of Luhansk and Donetsk to the Russians.

After Trump's initial claims on the possibility of ‘land swaps’ the Ukrainians scrambled they had been very resistant to this idea, further complicated by the fact ceding land to an occupier is illegal in the Ukrainian constitution. Ukraine were terrified of Trump agreeing to give away large parts of land to Russia to reach peace, the Ukrainians are scared that as they are not at the table, they are on the table. In response on the 12th of this month they scrambled together a meeting of all European Foreign ministers (besides Hungary) and as a result launched a joint statement. This joint statement

emphasized that ‘the path to peace in Ukraine cannot be decided without Ukraine’ as well as saying that ‘A just and lasting peace that brings stability and security must respect international law, including the principles of independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and that international borders must not be changed by force.’ Essentially European leaders will support Ukraine and have agreed that they will not release any statements or ideas of their own about what territorial concessions have to be made to end the war. In essence they now tediously wait for Ukraine to decide the next step and will back them entirely.

While Trump's position on anything is always unreliable, this meeting on Wednesday was a positive one bringing some reassurance to the Europeans who, wary of the need for American continental security, have been nervous about potentially opposing America on these talks.

Going into the summit, reportedly the Ukrainians are accepting the tough decisions that will have to be made. The Brussels correspondent for the Telegraph on Tuesday reported that in speaking to Europe the Ukrainians are coming to terms with the possibility of giving up land controlled by Russia. They are accepting the reality that they are unable to take back territory lost and that while Ukrainian controlled territory is off the table they may be willing to give up Russian controlled land. This would be done de facto to avoid constitutional trouble, however they are increasingly accepting of the strong possibility that they may have to give up territory.

Looking to (newly federally controlled) Washington DC, Trump’s aim remains clear, he wants to end the war. He would like to leave a meeting soon exclaiming peace, and he would hope for a Nobel peace prize in return! The American position has been hard to track, we assume that they will likely put pressure on Ukraine to sign a peace deal as soon as possible and will be harder on the Ukrainians than the Europeans will. However, on Wednesday Trump attended a meeting arranged by German Chancellor Merz attended by many European leaders. After this meeting Trump threatened “severe consequences” on Putin if he does not realistically strive for peace in Ukraine. Additionally, French President Macron stated that ‘as expressed by President Trump... territories belonging to Ukraine cannot be negotiated (without Ukraine's participation) and will only be negotiated by the Ukrainian president.’ Finally, Trump also states after this summit between the Americans and the Russians that he wished for a secondary meeting involving the Ukrainians, while also stating on Fox on Thursday that he wasn’t sure that Friday's meeting would lead to an immediate ceasefire. While Trump's

position on anything is always unreliable, this meeting on Wednesday was a positive one bringing some reassurance to the Europeans who, wary of the need for American continental security, have been nervous about potentially opposing America on these talks.

Looking toward Alaska, possible outcomes should be discussed. However, theunhelpful truth is that it's hard to predict what will happen. Trump could come out of the meeting outraged at Putin and start sanctions, or he could come out happy with their offer and start threatening Ukraine. The recent comments this week about a second meeting, as well as Trump’s statement of doubt on a ceasefire coming from Friday’s talk, suggest that there is more to come, that the meeting on Friday may be slightly less pivotal and there may be a further process following it. While it is hard to be certain on the outcome of this meeting, we can be certain on one thing, this meeting (as well as its possible follow up meeting and process) will be crucial for the outcome of Ukraine and its people, as well as for the future of Europe’s defence against Russia.

Image: Wikipedia Commons