There has been a war in Ukraine since February 24, 2022, after Russia planned a full-on invasion. However, the two countries have had rising tensions since before the war started in 2014. The war has resulted in multitudes of mass casualties. As of late 2025, the estimated number of casualties from Russia is around 790,000 killed and 50,000 missing. Ukraine has an estimated number of 400,000 killed and 35,000 missing.
President Donald J. Trump has met multiple times with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In 2018, Trump and Putin met in Helsinki, Finland. During a post-joint pre-conference, Putin offered Trump Russian interference.
However, Trump did not accept the offer, which caused provocation in the political spectrum, including leaders he called his allies. One day later, Trump said that he had “misspoken” due to an incorrectly perceived “double-negative.” Despite this apology, it caused slight tensions between Trump and Putin.
Yet, they continued to meet repeatedly. The most recent conference between the two leaders was on August 15th, 2025, at an Air Force base in Alaska, which was their seventh meeting.
This meeting struck questions and curiosity on the leaders in particular, due to their said “friendly nature of their relationship.” However, the meeting was heavily criticized for not making any progress towards the end of the war.
On October 16, 2025, Trump was said to meet with Putin yet again. This meeting was decided to be in Hungary after a productive phone call. The phone call was said to have made great progress in ending the war.
Trump then said, “President Putin and I will then meet in an agreed-upon location, Budapest, Hungary, to see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ War between Russia and Ukraine to an end.”
The most likely outcome of the war is a “prolonged war,” due to neither side achieving its goals. The fighting is said to continue at a sustainable level, at a lower intensity, or commonly referred to as a frozen conflict, which is when an active war/conflict has come to an end, but there is no peace treaty signed.
This is very similar to the situation in North and South Korea, a prime example of a frozen conflict. So, as we await the date of the meeting, we have yet to see the outcome.
