President Donald Trump launched a fiery defense of his Alaska summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday night, August 17, dismissing media criticism as “fake news” while placing pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept a peace deal that would exclude NATO membership and the return of Crimea.
In a series of combative posts on Truth Social hours before his scheduled Monday, August 18 meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump rejected suggestions that hosting Putin on American soil represented a diplomatic defeat. “The Fake News has been saying for 3 days that I suffered a ‘major defeat’ by allowing President Vladimir Putin of Russia to have a major Summit in the United States,” Trump wrote, arguing that Putin would have preferred meeting elsewhere.
The president’s outburst came after Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut characterized Friday’s summit at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Alaska as a disaster on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” Trump fired back at Murphy, calling him “very unattractive (both inside and out!)” and a “lightweight,” while also targeting former National Security Adviser John Bolton as among the “stupid people” making peace more difficult to achieve.
The August 15 summit in Anchorage lasted nearly three hours but concluded without a ceasefire agreement or peace deal. Trump described the talks as “extremely productive,” though neither leader announced concrete deliverables during their brief public appearance. The meeting marked Putin’s first visit to American soil in over a decade and featured controversial red-carpet treatment for the Russian leader, who faces war crimes charges from the International Criminal Court.
Following his discussions with Putin, Trump shifted his diplomatic approach from seeking an immediate ceasefire to pursuing what he described as a comprehensive peace agreement. The president indicated that Putin had offered to freeze most front lines in Ukraine in exchange for Ukrainian withdrawal from the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, according to multiple diplomatic sources.
On Sunday night, Trump placed the burden of ending the conflict squarely on Zelenskyy’s shoulders, stating that the Ukrainian leader could “end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight.” The president made clear that any peace settlement would require significant Ukrainian concessions, ruling out both the return of Russian-occupied Crimea and Ukraine’s aspirations for NATO membership.
Zelenskyy, who arrived in Washington on Sunday evening, pushed back against territorial concessions in his own social media posts. The Ukrainian president emphasized that previous concessions to Moscow had only emboldened Putin to wage more war, referencing the 2014 annexation of Crimea as a springboard for Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
The Monday White House meeting will include an unprecedented gathering of European leaders, with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni among those traveling to support Zelenskyy. European officials expressed concerns that Trump might pressure Ukraine to accept unfavorable terms after excluding Zelenskyy from the Alaska summit.
US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff revealed Sunday that Putin had agreed to potential security guarantees resembling NATO’s Article 5 collective defense provision, describing the concession as “game-changing.” However, Secretary of State Marco Rubio tempered expectations, telling ABC News that reaching a peace agreement remained “a long ways off” despite identifying potential areas of agreement.
The diplomatic maneuvering occurred against the backdrop of continued Russian attacks on Ukrainian cities. Hours before the scheduled Washington talks, Russian strikes killed at least 10 people, including seven in Kharkiv where a drone hit an apartment building and three in Zaporizhzhia. Zelenskyy characterized these attacks as “demonstrative and cynical” efforts by Putin to maintain pressure during diplomatic efforts.
Monday’s meeting represents Zelenskyy’s second visit to the White House since February, when his previous encounter with Trump and Vice President JD Vance devolved into a heated confrontation that left Washington-Kyiv relations strained. European leaders have since worked to repair the relationship, coaching Zelenskyy to adopt deal-making language that resonates with Trump while Ukraine signed a minerals agreement giving the US financial stakes in the country.
The stakes for Monday’s discussions remain extraordinarily high, with Russian forces now occupying nearly one-fifth of Ukrainian territory since launching their full-scale invasion. French President Macron indicated that European leaders planned to “present a united front” in their discussions with Trump, emphasizing that showing weakness to Russia would lay the groundwork for future conflicts.