The great Putin-Trump mid-August circus in Anchorage, Alaska, is not to have a reprise in Budapest next week, after all. The plan has fallen apart even before the festivities began – and it has fallen apart for the same reason that the Alaska summit turned out to be a dud for Donald Trump .

Russia is not giving up on its maximalist demands for a peace deal on Ukraine – surrender by Ukraine, demilitarisation – plus “de-Nazification”, whatever that means, and a pro-Russian puppet running Kyiv. After “a very positive” two-hour phone call with Putin last week, Trump set Marco Rubio, Secretary of State, to arrange with his opposite number Sergei Lavrov the meet in Budapest on 28 October.

Trump and Rubio proposed a ceasefire on the present battlelines in Ukraine, with some swap of territ

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