As allies of US president Donald Trump try to reassure Kyiv and other European capitals that he will not do anything rash at Friday’s summit in Alaska, Russia wants the talks to mark a dramatic – even historic – shift in relations between the nuclear powers.
US secretary of state Marco Rubio has said it will be just a “feel-out meeting”, and White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt has called it a “listening exercise,” amid concerns that Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin could make sweeping decisions about the war in Ukraine and the continent’s security without Kyiv or Europe being at the table.
The rhetoric in Russia is very different. The Kremlin often says that Putin sees no point in talks for the sake of talks, and Moscow expects the summit to deliver concrete benefits that were unimaginable before Trump returned to power in January.
“The Alaska summit could be historic in terms of delivering complex solutions to key problems. Including in Russian-American relations,” said Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the foreign relations committee in Russia’s lower house of parliament.
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“Most constructive politicians in the world are hoping for this ... At the same time, putting pressure on our country or speaking in the language of ultimatums is useless.”
Politicians and state media in Moscow say the summit could deliver not only a favourable outcome to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but set the stage for grand US-Russia agreements on everything from arms control to co-operation in the Arctic.
Kirill Dmitriev, the senior Russian finance official and former Goldman Sachs banker who has become a key point man in Moscow for Trump’s team, said the choice of Alaska as the summit venue had particular significance.
“Born as Russian America – Orthodox roots, forts, fur trade – Alaska echoes those ties and makes the US an Arctic nation. Let Russia and the US partner on environment, infrastructure and energy in Arctic and beyond,” he wrote on social media.
Dmitriev described Alaska – a Russian colony from 1799 to 1867 – as the “perfect stage” for the summit, because of its history and its location as the closest US point to Russia, where they are separated by the Bering Strait and the international date line.
“Let us go from yesterday to tomorrow in peace,” he said.
[ Why Putin has good reasons to be hopeful for Friday’s summit meeting with TrumpOpens in new window ]
Dmitriev’s posts on X relentlessly amplify Maga talking points: that Trump and Putin want peace and their critics are warmongers; media that question Trump’s attitude to Russia are the same ones that pushed the “Russia hoax” about alleged collusion between the Trump camp and Moscow in 2016; advocates of tougher action against Russia are repeating the “failed” policy of Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden.
“Neocons and other warmongers won’t be smiling on Aug 15, 2025. Putin-Trump dialogue will bring hope, peace and global security,” he wrote. In a subsequent post, referring to one of Trump’s books, he said: “The Art of the Deal on Friday August 15.”
Russia has been assiduously preparing the ground for the sort of deal, or deals, that it desires from the summit.
Over several months this year, Kyiv and Europe strengthened co-ordination with the White House over the war in Ukraine, as Trump become increasingly annoyed by what he called Putin’s “bullshit” on the issue.
Putin changed the mood music simply by agreeing to meet. It prompted Trump to quietly shelve plans to impose sanctions on all countries that buy Russian oil, and pitched Ukraine and Europe back into the position of trying to rein in Trump – a dynamic that is only likely to renew friction between the US and its erstwhile allies.
Putin has also brought Trump to the table without agreeing to a ceasefire or any concessions.
Russia still demands permanent control of five regions of Ukraine and limits on its future sovereignty, including a ban on joining Nato. Kyiv says that would be a capitulation, and European states insist borders cannot be changed by force – leaving them vulnerable to allegations from Moscow and some US politicians that they are blocking a deal and should be ignored by America’s self-declared “president of peace”.
Moscow also knows that Trump wants a bigger US role in the resource-rich and strategic far north – having threatened to take over Greenland – and more than half the entire coastline of the Arctic Ocean is Russian territory.
“It is in Alaska and in the Arctic that the economic interests of our countries converge and prospects for implementing large-scale mutually beneficial projects arise,” said senior Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov.
Trump said last month that he wanted to begin work on arms control with Moscow before the expiry next February of the 2010 New Start agreement, which is the last remaining US-Russia nuclear arms pact.
The Kremlin flagged the issue last week by saying it had scrapped a self-imposed moratorium on deployment of short- and mid-range missiles and would now place them wherever it liked, in response to alleged US threats in Europe and Asia.
On the battlefield too, Moscow is trying to strengthen its position before the summit.
In recent days, Russian troops have pierced a section of the front line in eastern Ukraine and advanced about 10km near the mining town of Dobropillia, as they try to encircle the nearby small cities of Pokrovsk and Kostyantynivka and put more pressure on Kyiv’s two main strongholds in Donetsk region – the cities of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk.
Kyiv says these are very small groups, moving on foot or in light vehicles, who cannot hold territory but aim to sow chaos behind the front line and – above all – give the impression that Ukraine’s defences are collapsing on the eve of the summit.
Russian media claim Ukrainian troops are nearly surrounded in some areas, which Kyiv denies. It recalls how Trump said in March that he had asked Putin to spare the lives of “thousands” of Ukrainian soldiers who were supposedly encircled in Russia’s Kursk region. The claim was false, but no one in Trump’s administration acknowledged that fact or explained why Trump was unquestioningly repeating Kremlin propaganda.
While Moscow’s preparations for the summit have been meticulous, Washington’s look haphazard, even amateurish.
The meeting was agreed when Steve Witkoff, one of Trump’s special envoys, visited Moscow last week. US and European media reports say Witkoff – a real-estate developer and donor to Trump’s re-election campaign – may have misunderstood Putin’s position on Ukraine. He has also been accused of parroting positions espoused by the Kremlin.
To compound the sense of chaos, Trump has placed inexperienced loyalists in important intelligence and foreign policy roles, and approved massive cuts at the state department that have culled many of its analysts on Ukraine and Russia.
With so many factors in its favour, Russia wants to strike a deal now, not least to gain relief from western sanctions that are combining with high inflation and labour shortages to slowly strangle its economy. Ukrainian drone strikes on oil facilities are also taking their toll, and petrol prices in Russia are now at record highs despite an export ban.
Russia’s main stock market reflects the national mood, having surged by more than 8 per cent since the summit was announced.
“Everyone is expecting a breakthrough in Russia-US relations,” said Alexei Antonov at Moscow investment firm Alor Broker, “and also the beginning of a resolution to the Ukrainian problem.”
