We’ve covered the upcoming Trump/Putin Alaska Summit, currently scheduled for Friday, August 15th, at a to-be-named location here in the Great Land. Presumably, Ukraine is on the schedule for discussion, with President Trump anxious to broker a peace deal. 

In the latest wrinkle, the White House is reportedly considering inviting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to the meeting as well.

The White House is considering inviting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Alaska, where President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin next week, according to a senior U.S. official and three people briefed on the internal discussions.

“It’s being discussed,” one of the people briefed on the discussions said.

The senior U.S. official and people briefed on the discussions said no visit has been finalized and that it’s unclear if Zelenskyy would ultimately be in Alaska for meetings.

So, there’s a lot that’s unclear about this whole thing. The notion of President Zelensky attending (or not) may well not be decided until the day of the meeting, and even if he does attend, it’s not at all likely that all three leaders will be in the room at the same time. Having all three of them in one location would, one would think, be the best way to get them talking to each other, but the White House doesn’t seem to be sanguine about the notion. Nor does Ukraine.

Asked whether the U.S. had officially invited Zelenskyy to Alaska, a senior White House official said: “The President remains open to a trilateral summit with both leaders. Right now, the White House is focusing on planning the bilateral meeting requested by President Putin.”

The Ukrainian government did not respond to a request for comment.

President Putin seems open to some kind of a deal, but it’s a safe bet that any deal he would agree to, at least at this stage in the game, would involve Russia keeping the Ukrainian territory he has already conquered. Ukraine is unlikely to accept such a deal, at least not at this point in whatever negotiations may be taking place.

Putin has not agreed to a ceasefire but proposed the outlines of an agreement to end the war that would allow Russia to keep large swaths of Ukrainian territory. Zelenskyy said defiantly on Saturday that Ukrainians “will not give their land to occupiers.”

Trump said Friday that between Russia and Ukraine, “there’ll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both.”

We should note that all President Trump can do here is advise and cajole. Any cease-fire agreement will, in the end, have to be struck between Russia and Ukraine.