The big, glamorous summit that could easily have been just an email is over - and Ukraine is no closer to lasting peace.
If there is any result at all, it is rather optical: Russia's staged return from its long diplomatic isolation. The red carpet for Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska was shown in full force not only on Russian television and social networks, but also around the world, writes journalist Elena Davlikanova in her analysis for the Moscow Times.
In a brief interview with Fox News after the meeting, US President Donald Trump said that his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky "has to make a deal", adding: "If they don't want to do it, there will never be peace."
On Monday, Zelensky meets with the US president to clarify exactly what peace or reconciliation terms Trump discussed with Putin behind closed doors.
But why has the president, who boasts of ending five wars and previously promised to end this one in 24 hours, still failed to put his big words into practice?
Because Putin's obsession with spheres of influence, his insatiable ambitions and his domestic its problems cannot be solved with quick measures. From the very beginning, the Kremlin's strategic goal was not so much to annex Ukrainian land as to restore Russia as a global power and the dominant force in Europe.
However, it is difficult to play the role of a superpower when its country's economy, despite all its natural resources, is comparable to that of Italy. That is why Moscow relies on the projection of power and its nuclear arsenal.
That is why, on the eve of the meeting, analysts revealed that Russia was preparing to test a new cruise missile with a nuclear warhead and a nuclear engine. For a long time, Russians consoled themselves with the fact that, although they were internationally isolated, at least the powerful countries were afraid of them.
That is why Putin's warm welcome in Alaska and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's nostalgic T-shirt with symbols of the USSR served the Kremlin's main goal perfectly. Today, Russia’s presentation as a global power in a world shaped by great power competition has returned to the serious political agenda.
Another important factor in the war is the West’s reluctance to impose and strictly enforce severe sanctions against Russia after the annexation of Crimea in 2013, which gave the Kremlin time to restructure its trade.
Thus, today, despite global sanctions, Russian export revenues exceed 2015 levels.
The result is a war economy that has not collapsed, but has adapted. It is only now beginning to slow down after three years of unsustainable growth fueled by government spending, and it could still be holding out for some time before collapsing.
Currently, the last possible measures to achieve peace are secondary sanctions against countries trading with Russia and a reduction in oil prices.
Finance Minister Anton Siluanov’s sigh in response to a journalist’s question about economic negotiations may reflect the real state of Russian finances.
For 2025, Russia has set aside about 13.2 trillion rubles ($142 billion) for defense — about 6% of GDP and nearly a third of federal spending, the highest military spending since the Cold War.
Another obstacle to ending the war are the financial interests of those who are enriching themselves from the military-industrial complex and the restructuring of the economy, creating a new class profitable.
Since the beginning of the war, the number of Russian billionaires has increased, profiting from cheaply buying up foreign assets, import-substitution production, taking advantage of the collapse of European markets, and producing local substitutes for unavailable Western goods.
People in the armed forces have also benefited.
Corrupt officers are accustomed to massive abuses - they take the bank cards and PIN codes of soldiers before sending them to the front. By delaying the official notification of the deaths of soldiers for months, they enrich themselves to levels unthinkable in their civilian lives.
In addition to financial corruption, there are other problems - the psychological trauma and the difficult reintegration of people with combat experience into often impoverished communities. Crimes committed by Russian veterans are already on the rise.
Moscow’s information machine can present almost anything as a victory and turn yesterday’s enemies into today’s friends, dictating public attitudes. On the eve of the meeting, after years of demonizing America, Russian propaganda released a video praising US-Russian ties.
But when it comes to peace, the political problem is obvious: once the spectacle is over and the costs have increased, the "victory" could turn out to be endless financing for the occupied territories that cannot support themselves.
The Ukrainian territories illegally annexed in September 2022 are real financial abysses, in need of massive federal subsidies.
Ten years after the seizure of Crimea, the regional budget depends on state aid for more than half of its expenses. In the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, this share is 70%, and in the newly occupied Kherson region - 78%. And Russian taxpayers' money, instead of improving the standard of living, barely covers basic survival. In the once bustling Donetsk, for example, water runs only once every three days.
Furthermore, Russia has failed to reinvent itself and offer a national narrative beyond the imperial idea, so the search for enemies will continue.
Under the pressure of internal problems in a post-war society, a new war may seem like a solution to the ineffectiveness of dealing with them.
Most importantly, Russia is gaining experience in modern warfare that other armies currently lack - preserving its officer capacity while mass casualties fall on ordinary soldiers. The Kremlin plans to open 15 new military training institutions by 2025 to preserve and institutionalize this knowledge.
In parallel, Russia is accelerating the industrialization of autonomous and precision combat systems - the goal is to produce 2 million FPV drones and 30,000 long-range and decoy drones by 2025. Although Russia invests nine times less in real terms in its military power than the US and the EU, it is adapting to the new nature of war faster than many European countries realize and are able to rearm.
Western and Ukrainian intelligence services have repeatedly warned that Moscow plans to test NATO's resolve for a collective response to aggression by the end of the decade, preferably with minimal US involvement.
Therefore, when Russia claims that it wants to eliminate the "root causes" of the war, it actually means an independent, pro-European, pro-democratic and prosperous Ukraine, capable of defending Europe from a Russian invasion.
The goal is to erase Ukrainian identity, and when that is impossible, to destroy the Ukrainian people themselves, turning the country into a smaller version of Russia, which can be used to strengthen its army for greater goals.