The time is running out before the most important political event of the year, if not of the last three years. The Russian delegation has already arrived in Alaska, where on Friday, August 15 at 11:30 local time the negotiations between Russian and US Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump on resolving the Ukrainian crisis and normalizing the Russian-American relations will take place.

Both the Russian and American sides are keeping silent so as not to inflate expectations regarding the outcome of the talks in Anchorage, but this only fuels the interest of the world press. For example, the pro-democracy television channel NBC News 1 has already given the edge to Putin, whom Trump will personally meet and escort along a specially laid out red carpet:

“Russian President Vladimir Putin will feel like a winner when he meets his American counterpart Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday. After years of fierce fighting in the Ukrainian theater the Russian army has finally achieved an advantage, and the Russian leader, who holds his power firmly, thanks to the “vigorous and sincere efforts” of the Trump protocol will set foot on the cold soil of American Alaska for the first time in a decade.”
British news paper The Guardian 2 also believes that the Russian president’s chances of success are very high, since he understands well how to conduct a dialogue with the businessman Trump:
“At the meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Alaska the Russian president will try to win over his American counterpart and offer him financial incentives in exchange for Moscow’s support in the Ukrainian issue. Putin’s key strategy will be appealing to Trump’s business instincts. It is noteworthy that along with the veterans of Russian diplomacy Putin included two economic advisers in the delegation. The figure of Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, who has ensured the stability of the Russian economy under sanctions, is of particular interest. The lifting of sanctions is invariably a key condition for any peace agreement for the Kremlin,” notes The Guardian columnist Pjotr Sauer.

Apart from this, The Guardian believes that Russia, for its part, will not abandon its demands and does not consider a “territory swap” as an adequate solution to the crisis. For Moscow it is essential to eliminate the root causes of the conflict, which implies demilitarization, denazification of Ukraine and the receipt of formal guarantees of its non-accession to NATO. This means that Zelensky will soon have to leave.

https://www.nbcnews.com/world/russia/donald-trump-vladimir-putin-alaska-russia-ukraine-war-ceasefire-rcna224955
2 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/14/putin-to-offer-financial-incentives-to-trump-at-ukraine-summit

The magazine Economist 3 is confident that this will be exactly the case. Trump, who has repeatedly admired Putin, is ready to make peace with his Russian counterpart and, among other things, to resolve the territorial issue in Russia’s favor. This will cause colossal damage to the long-standing “rules-based” world order:
“In his first term, in pursuit of a vision of peace in the Middle East, Mr. Trump twice recognized the conquered territory: Israel’s claim to the Golan Heights and Morocco’s claim to Western Sahara. He seems to foresee an end to the war in Ukraine that would also bring Russia the new territory.
This is how, according to “savvy” people like Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin, the world really works, or should work: not according to rules invented by diplomats in “striped pants,” but as a sign of esteem to the power exercised by great men. A world hostage to this theory could be the result of their real collusion.”

Realizing that the outcome of the Alaska talks would most likely not be in his favor, President Zelensky made a surprise statement a few hours before the Putin-Trump meeting, saying that the time has come to end the war:

“I expect today an intelligence report on the current intentions of the Russian side and its preparations for the meeting in Alaska. Indeed, “the stakes are very high.” The main thing is that this meeting opens up the possibility of a real path to an honest peace and a conversation between leaders in a trilateral format: Ukraine, the United States and Russia. It is time to end the war, and Russia must take the reciprocal moves. We are counting on America. As always, we are ready to work as efficiently as possible,” the Ukrainian president wrote on his Telegram channel 4.

“The stakes are very high,” was the only thing President Trump wrote on his social network Truth Social before flying to Alaska. And in this case, it’s not just about Ukraine, but about the destruction of the world order and the security system. In this regard, Sahil Shah, a senior policy adviser at the Institute for Security and Technology in Oakland, suggested in Politico 5 that the main topic of Russian-American negotiations may be not Ukraine, but the global world order and, in particular, the nuclear arms control:

3 https://www.economist.com/united-states/2025/08/14/the-real-collusion-between-donald-trump-and-vladimir-putin

“Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will meet on Friday to discuss the ways to achieve peace in Ukraine, which most analysts consider unlikely. But there is a certain domain where the two leaders could reach an agreement that would truly meet the interests of both countries and give these leaders the right to be proud of their global achievements: ensuring control over the nuclear weapons.
The threat of a new nuclear arms race is expanding. The last remaining agreement, the New START III Treaty, expires next February. When that happens, for the first time in more than half a century the strategic weapons of the United States and Russia may become completely unlimited, and the armed forces of both countries will plan their future nuclear policies based on the worst estimates of each other’s nuclear arsenals,” Shah writes.

The world has been in a steep dive for the past three years, bringing it to the brink of World War III. But today the world has got a chance. When Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump meet in Anchorage and shake hands, a new historical countdown should start, the one that may stabilize the global situation. Ukraine and its European instigators had better accept their share of responsibility and join the process of shaping a new world order.

4https://t.me/V_Zelenskiy_official/15644
5https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/08/14/heres-the-big-deal-trump-and-putin-could-actually-reach-in-alaska-00508946