The art of the con in Alaska
Alaska was cringe - but, it's just round one.
Donald Trump walked into that Alaska meeting ready to channel his inner Madeleine Albright and find what she famously called his "cahones." He was going to stand his ground, call out Putin's "bullshit," and demand the ceasefire he'd promised. What emerged from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson was a masterclass in why former KGB operatives don't lose influence operations to reality TV stars—no matter how confident those reality TV stars might be.
Within hours of the summit's conclusion, Trump had not only abandoned his demand for an immediate ceasefire but embraced Putin's preferred timeline for a "sweeping peace agreement"—essentially giving Russia a green light to keep bombing Ukrainian civilians while they negotiate. It was a diplomatic 180 so swift it left European leaders wondering if they'd witnessed a seduction or a hostage situation.
The optics told the story. Trump waited 30 minutes on Air Force One for Putin's plane to land, then rolled out the red carpet treatment complete with a B-2 bomber flyover and a cozy ride in "the Beast." By meeting's end, Trump had offered Putin what he'd been seeking for three years: rehabilitation as a legitimate world leader worthy of sitting across from American presidents.
What Putin offered in return was essentially nothing. No territorial concessions, no meaningful commitments. Instead, he dangled vague promises about "security guarantees" for Ukraine and legislative commitments not to attack other European countries—the kind of assurances he's given and broken repeatedly over the past two decades.
The metrics were refreshingly simple. Trump went in seeking an immediate ceasefire and threatening "severe consequences" if he didn't get one. Putin went in trying to avoid both. Given there is no ceasefire and there are no consequences, it's pretty easy to judge the winner. But let’s remember it’s only round one.
The art of the con
Putin's approach was textbook manipulation: lavish Trump with personal flattery, validate his grievances about the 2020 election, and make him feel like the only person capable of solving this crisis.
The most telling moment came in Trump's Fox News interview, where he gushed that Putin had told him "you can't have a great democracy with mail-in voting," talked about him winning the 2016 election, and confirmed Trump's claim that the war "would never have happened" if he'd been president.
This wasn't just about stroking Trump's ego. Fiona Hill, Trump's former top Russia adviser on the National Security Council who has watched Putin up close for years, recognized the Russian leader's longer game. Putin, she told CBS' Face the Nation, "wants to sow chaos in the American electoral system ahead of the midterms." Which is why he offered Trump red meat for domestic consumption—validation on mail-in voting and the war's origins that Hill called "a pure, blatant piece of manipulation, and that's the kind of thing that Putin likes to do."
And it worked. Here was an American president taking validation from a totalitarian strongman about American democracy—and being "so happy" about it. Putin, who literally allows mail-in voting in Russia, had just fed Trump exactly what he wanted to hear, and Trump swallowed it whole.
European scramble
European leaders watched this unfold with the horror of people who've seen this movie before. They'd spent the week carefully coordinating with Trump, establishing five clear principles: Ukraine must be at the table, ceasefire first, then territorial discussions, real security guarantees, and continued pressure on Russia if talks fail. Within 24 hours, Trump had abandoned nearly all of them.
The emergency response was swift and telling. By Sunday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz were planning to accompany Ukrainian President Zelensky to Washington to meet with Trump on Monday. It was diplomatic damage control on steroids—the kind of all-hands-on-deck response you deploy when you realize your most important ally has just been played.
What makes this particularly galling is that Trump actually held significant leverage going into the Alaska meeting. There are reports that Russian cash reserves are way down and Moscow is having difficulty recruiting soldiers. Trump had hundreds of billions in frozen Russian assets, secondary sanctions that could devastate Russian energy sales, and military aid that could shift the battlefield balance. Instead, he chose to rely on personal chemistry with a man who has spent decades perfecting the art of manipulating American presidents.
Rubio shuffle
Watching Secretary of State Marco Rubio defend the administration's sudden pivot was a masterclass in political contortion. The man who once called Putin "a gangster with a black heart" who "makes Jeffrey Dahmer look like Mother Teresa" was suddenly explaining why threatening sanctions might be counterproductive. "The minute you issue new sanctions, your ability to get them to the table, our ability to get them to table will be severely diminished," he told NBC's Meet the Press.
That may be true, but remember—this is coming from the same administration that had threatened "severe consequences" if Putin didn't agree to stop the war, then walked away from those threats the moment Putin smiled and said nice things about Trump.
A silver lining
There are some modest consolations in this diplomatic debacle. Trump didn't completely give away the store—he didn't make a unilateral deal ceding Ukrainian territory or accept Russian sovereignty over occupied lands without Ukraine's consent. As Trump himself noted, "there's no deal until there's a deal," leaving room for course correction.
Recent polling shows Republicans moving to the side of Ukraine, in part because of President Trump's comments against Russia and Putin. While the optics of the Alaska summit were, admittedly, as Fareed Zakaria said, "cringeworthy," this is the first inning of a long process. What matters is not one meeting, but the ultimate results.
Monday’s reckoning
Trump's advice to Ukraine after the meeting was brutally simple: "Make a deal. Russia is a very big power, and they're not." Never mind that Ukraine's constitution prohibits ceding territory against the will of the people—something Trump has dismissed as bureaucratic nonsense.
For Zelensky, Monday's White House meeting presents an impossible challenge—and it's his first trip back since that explosive February encounter where Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated him in the Oval Office. The Ukrainian president now finds himself in the position of having to explain to Trump why Putin's promises are worthless—a conversation that requires acknowledging that Trump was just manipulated by a master practitioner. That's not typically a message that goes over well with someone who thinks he has built an entire brand on being the world's greatest dealmaker.
As European leaders prepare to descend on Washington, they face a delicate balancing act: how do you help Trump save face while preventing him from making Ukraine pay the price for his Alaska miscalculation?
The leaders will need to convince Trump that Putin's promises are tactical deceptions designed to buy time for military advances, not genuine peace overtures. They understand all too well that Putin may be running the North Korea playbook—endless negotiations with no real intent to reach a deal, using talks as cover to create new facts on the ground.
The irony is that Trump abandoned his nuclear negotiations with North Korea's Kim Jong Un despite their "love letters" and personal chemistry when it became clear no real deal was possible. The question is whether his ego can survive doing the same with Putin—especially after publicly praising their Alaska meeting as a "10 out of 10."
The next 48 hours will determine whether Trump's Alaska adventure was a momentary lapse in judgment or the beginning of a more dangerous drift toward accommodating Russian aggression. European leaders will be hoping they can help Trump rediscover his "cahones." Because right now, it looks like Putin has convinced him that appeasement is actually dealmaking, and that's a lesson that won't stop with Ukraine.
I suppose Ms. Labott that today or tomorrow will be important. A united stand against the aggression of Putin will be the most effective way to a lasting peace and not some transitory cease-fire. Trump's big show was the Iran bombing. The big show in Alaska may have been unnecessary. Take care.