What Trump and Putin Want From the Alaska Summit

Welcome back to Foreign Policy’s Situation Report, where we’re looking forward to the big event happening on Friday: the start of the English Premier League season. (Did you think we meant something else?)

Alright, here’s what’s on tap for the day: what’s expected at the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska, Israel’s killing of journalists in Gaza, and the deployment of federal troops in Washington.

Can Trump and Putin Make a Deal?

U.S. President Donald Trump is poised to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday for a highly anticipated summit on the Ukraine war. The meeting, which is being held at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, is set to begin at 11:30 a.m. local time (3:30 p.m. ET).

The two world leaders will first meet one-on-one with only their translators present, followed by a bilateral working lunch with the delegations from both countries, according to the Kremlin. At the end of the summit, the two leaders will hold a joint press conference. Trump has also indicated he could do a solo press conference if the meeting goes poorly.

It’s unclear precisely who will attend as part of the U.S. delegation, but Putin aide Yuri Ushakov on Thursday said that, in addition to himself, the Russian delegation will include Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, and special economic envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

The stakes are high, and the White House has played down expectations for the meeting. Trump on Thursday told Fox News Radio that he believes Putin will “make a deal,” but he also said there’s a 25 percent chance the meeting will be unsuccessful.

Here’s what else you need to know ahead of the meeting.

What Putin wants. Moscow seemingly views the summit as a big diplomatic win and an opportunity to reset relations with Washington, and has signaled that trade and nuclear arms control could also be on the agenda. Putin on Thursday praised the Trump administration for making “quite energetic and sincere efforts” to end the war in Ukraine.

But the Kremlin on Thursday also said that it would be a mistake to predict the outcome of the summit and that there are no plans to sign any documents.

“Putin actually doesn’t need to achieve much from this meeting, other than the meeting itself and not having to make any concessions,” Celeste Wallander, an adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security who led U.S. defense policy in support of Ukraine under the Biden administration, told reporters in a briefing on Thursday. “What he wants out of this meeting is simply the meeting—the optics of being invited to the United States while he is under an international warrant for accusations of war crimes.”

Meanwhile, Russia has stepped up attacks on Ukrainian civilians and continues to push for control of more Ukrainian territory. According to the United Nations, July saw the highest civilian casualties from the war since May 2022, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned this week that Russia is preparing to conduct further operations on the front line, preparing tens of thousands of troops for a fresh offensive. Russia’s military made gains near the northern city of Sumy this week, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Institute for the Study of War.

What Trump wants. Trump has described the summit as a “feel-out” meeting, raising questions as to why it couldn’t have just been a phone call—particularly given how controversial it is to invite Putin to the United States. However, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio this week said that Trump has spoken to Putin by phone several times but nothing came of it, so the president felt a face-to-face sit-down was necessary.

The summit comes after months of failed efforts by Trump to secure a deal to end the fighting in Ukraine. Trump has signaled that if the Alaska summit goes well, he hopes to set up a subsequent meeting between Putin and Zelensky that Trump may also attend. He’s also warned Putin there will be “severe consequences” if the war doesn’t end after the summit.

Though Trump has grown impatient with Putin as the war in Ukraine rages on, he also has a history of taking the Russian leader’s side. Trump also did not follow through on a threat to impose a slew of new economic penalties on Russia if it did not end the war by Aug. 8.

What Ukraine and Europe want. Zelensky, who does not believe Putin genuinely desires peace, is not attending the summit, and Ukraine and its allies are anxious that Putin could convince Trump to support a framework for a deal with bad terms for Kyiv—such as major territorial concessions to Moscow. Russia currently occupies around one-fifth of Ukraine, and Zelensky does not want to cede territory as part of a peace deal.

European leaders, including Zelensky, have scrambled to draw out clear red lines ahead of the summit, and held a virtual meeting with Trump on Wednesday that was apparently fruitful. Attendees said Trump agreed that he would not negotiate over territory on Ukraine’s behalf while supporting the notion of security guarantees for Kyiv. But it remains to be seen whether Trump, who in recent days discussed the need for a land swap between the warring parties, will stick to the script.

Let’s Get Personnel

U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce conducted her final press briefing on Tuesday, having been nominated by Trump (via Truth Social post) as the new U.S. deputy representative to the United Nations. “His intention was a surprise, as was his request last Christmas asking me to become the spokesperson at the State Department,” Bruce, a former Fox News host, told reporters. “I was astounded then and remain deeply honored and grateful for the president’s trust in me.”

Dean Ball, who served as a senior policy advisor on artificial intelligence at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, announced he would depart the White House and join the Foundation for American Innovation, a think tank. Ball played a key role in putting together the Trump administration’s AI Action Plan, which was released last month.

On the Button

What should be high on your radar, if it isn’t already.

Israel kills journalists. The Israel Defense Forces killed four Al Jazeera journalists in Gaza on Sunday, including prominent correspondents Anas al-Sharif and Mohammed Qraiqea. In a statement, the network, which is partially funded by the Qatari government, described their deaths as “assassination[s]” and “yet another blatant and premeditated attack on press freedom.” Photographers Ibrahim al-Thaher and Mohamed Nofal were also killed, as were two freelance journalists, Moamen Aliwa and Mohammad al-Khaldi.

Israel said the strike, which hit a tent next to Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital where the journalists were sheltered, targeted Sharif specifically and claimed that he was “a jihadi terrorist on Hamas’s payroll.” Al Jazeera refuted that claim, as Sharif himself had before his death. The conflict in Gaza has been one of the deadliest in history for the press, with the Committee to Protect Journalists estimating that more than 190 journalists have been killed since it began two years ago. Brown University’s Costs of War project put that number even higher, estimating in March that at least 232 journalists and media workers had been killed. That’s all despite Israel largely barring foreign journalists from reporting within Gaza. Hundreds of journalists from around the world have signed a petition calling on Israel to reverse that policy.

Sudan’s cholera outbreak. More than two years into a civil war that has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions more, Sudan is now suffering from an outbreak of cholera that threatens its population further. The disease has afflicted 100,000 people over the past year and killed nearly 3,000, according to the nonprofit Médecins Sans Frontières, which described it as “the worst cholera outbreak the country has seen in years.”

Sudanese health officials have reportedly launched a 10-day vaccination campaign in the capital, Khartoum, this week to try to curb the spread of the disease, which is being exacerbated by water shortages and unhygienic conditions in the country’s many refugee camps.

Troops in D.C. U.S. National Guard troops arrived in Washington, D.C., this week after Trump deployed them to deal with what he described as “violent, menacing street crime” in the country’s capital. Trump has been undeterred by figures that indicate crime in the city is at its lowest level in 30 years.

Widespread indignation among D.C. residents at the president’s move exploded into view on Wednesday evening when federal agents set up a checkpoint in the middle of one of the city’s most popular nightlife areas on 14th Street to stop vehicles and question their drivers. Dozens of onlookers gathered to heckle the agents, with many shouting: “Go home, fascists.”

Snapshot

Firefighters leave an area on a scooter as flames approach during a wildfire near the city of Patras, western Greece, on Aug. 13. The country has battled to contain more than 20 wildfires including one menacing its third-largest city, Patras, as a heat wave stoked blazes and forced the evacuation of thousands in southern Europe. Aris Messinis/AFP via Getty Images

Put on Your Radar

Sunday, Aug. 17: General elections are scheduled to take place in Bolivia.

Monday, Aug. 18: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is expected to visit New Delhi.

Thursday, Aug. 21: Indian Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar is due to meet Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow.

Quote of the Week

“I’d be afraid Putin would take me back to Russia.”

—Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, after telling reporters that he would not be attending the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska.

This Week’s Most Read

• The Next Israel-Iran War Is Coming by Trita Parsi
• Why Everyone in Washington Is a ‘Realist’ Now by Michael Hirsh
• Meet the New Middle East, Same as the Old Middle East by Stephen M. Walt

What Else We Wrote

John wrote a helpful piece last week laying out what we know—and don’t know—about the Gaza hunger crisis, with an aid worker on the ground describing the situation to him as “apocalyptic” and “engineered chaos.” Meanwhile, Rishi and FP reporter Keith Johnson dug into Trump’s controversial approach to revitalizing the U.S. semiconductor industry.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

A “massive and unforeseeable” swarm of jellyfish caused a major nuclear power plant in France to temporarily shut down this week. Jellyfish entering the Gravelines nuclear power plant’s filtration drums apparently led four reactors to automatically switch off. Luckily, this did not cause any safety issues at the plant. Many species of jellyfish prefer warmer water, and experts say the swarm that invaded the plant could be linked to a recent heat wave in Europe, which may have created the perfect conditions for certain types of the gelatinous animals to reproduce faster and in greater numbers.