Diplomacy has a vocabulary for talks that produce little. “Constructive.” “Useful.” “Productive.” Almost any meeting can be wrapped up with one of them.
Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner spent more than three hours with Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin called the conversation useful. From Moscow, the Americans traveled to Kyiv for several more meetings — first with Volodymyr Zelensky, then with the Ukrainian delegation and European advisers. Zelensky later said the Americans had brought back some ideas he considered worthwhile.
It sounds encouraging — until you ask the simplest question: what changed?
There is no ceasefire. No Putin-Zelensky meeting has been scheduled. There is no date for the next round of talks. On territory, both sides remain exactly where they were before the Americans arrived. There are no agreed security guarantees for Ukraine. And there is no sign that Putin has abandoned even one of his core demands.
The Americans did bring something back, and we will get to that. But focusing only on this trip risks missing the most interesting part of the story. Eleven days before Witkoff and Kushner arrived in Moscow, CIA Director John Ratcliffe had been there.
Ratcliffe Came First
On August 25, the CIA director spent roughly eight hours in Moscow. A visit like that is unusual in itself: the last publicly known trip by a CIA director to the Russian capital was in November 2021, when William Burns went there to warn the Kremlin about the consequences of invading Ukraine.
Ratcliffe met with the heads of Russia’s intelligence services, but the discussions went beyond the usual intelligence-agency business of preventing escalation. According to Axios, they included restarting U.S.-mediated negotiations and the possibility of a three-way meeting between Trump, Putin and Zelensky. The Financial Times and other sources describe another side of Ratcliffe’s mission: he sought to persuade Moscow that the Kremlin was overestimating the strength of its position and that prolonging the war would not necessarily work in Russia’s favor.
In other words, this was not another diplomat arriving in Moscow with another peace plan. It was the CIA director, bringing a much less pleasant message.
The message produced no breakthrough. Eleven days later, Trump sent Witkoff and Kushner to Moscow.
It is hard not to see a familiar negotiating pattern: the bad cop had already been there; now came the good cops.
There is no public evidence that the White House deliberately designed it that way, so it would be wrong to present this as established fact. But the sequence certainly looks like it. Ratcliffe talked about the risks of continuing the war. Witkoff and Kushner came to discuss what Russia might gain from peace. Their delegation included a Treasury official involved in sanctions policy, and the talks touched on prospects for U.S.-Russian economic cooperation.
Neither approach moved Putin.
The Weak Point in Trump’s Diplomacy
Trump, Witkoff and Kushner think in terms of deals. Every conflict has a price; every position has a point at which it becomes negotiable. If the other side refuses, change the terms: increase the incentives or raise the cost of saying no.
That often works in business. In a major war, it does not always work.
Washington is looking for the price at which Putin will agree to stop. The problem is that such a price may not exist — in which case the size of the offer is beside the point.
If Putin genuinely sees the subjugation of Ukraine as part of a historic mission, economic incentives are secondary: money cannot buy something that, in his worldview, has no monetary value.
If he believes time is on Russia’s side, making concessions today simply makes no sense. Tomorrow’s offer will be better than today’s because Russia’s position itself will be stronger.
And if the Kremlin expects Ukraine’s military, Western assistance or the political resolve of Kyiv’s allies to weaken over time, continuing the war looks more rational than compromising.
We do not know which of these calculations drives Putin. But all three produce the same behavior at the negotiating table — and that is exactly the behavior we are seeing now.
You can keep improving the offer indefinitely. You cannot make a deal with someone who believes he will get more tomorrow than you are offering today.
There Is Another Way to Read It
To be fair, the same facts support a different interpretation — and it is worth keeping in mind.
Refusal may not mean the absence of bargaining. It may be part of the bargain.
An experienced negotiator who knows the other side badly wants a deal has every reason to wait and drive up the price. In that logic, the price rises not because the arguments improve, but because time passes. Putin is not refusing to bargain; he is bargaining at a different speed, with a very different idea of who is in a hurry.
One trip cannot tell us which interpretation is correct.
The distinction will emerge later. A negotiator holding out for a higher price will eventually name that price — at least approximately. Someone for whom no acceptable price exists never will.
Moscow has yet to show any point at which it would back off its original demands.
Three Hours With Putin
On September 5, Witkoff and Kushner spent more than three hours with Putin in the Kremlin. Afterward, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov described the conversation as useful and timely.
Strip away the language, however, and there is little tangible progress to point to.
Russia’s position on the central issues remains unchanged. Moscow continues to demand recognition of the “realities on the ground,” insists on territorial concessions and rejects a ceasefire as a preliminary step.
Particularly sensitive is the part of Donbas still controlled by Ukraine. Russia claims the territory as its own despite having failed to capture all of it after years of war.
Washington offered Putin a path toward a deal. Moscow responded by making clear that one of the conditions it sees for such a peace is an end to U.S. support for Ukraine.
That appears to be the main takeaway from more than three hours of talks.
Then Came Kyiv
From Moscow, Witkoff and Kushner traveled to meet Zelensky. Several rounds of talks followed in Kyiv — first with the Ukrainian president, then in a larger group, and later with European advisers.
And there they discovered what was already known before the trip: Zelensky cannot accept the terms on which Putin is prepared to end the war, while Putin has no intention of accepting the terms on which Ukraine is prepared to end it.
Ukraine rejects Russia’s territorial demands and insists on meaningful security guarantees. Zelensky maintains that territorial questions must be discussed at the leaders’ level. Russia, meanwhile, has shown no willingness to abandon demands Kyiv regards as incompatible with Ukrainian sovereignty.
This is not a communication problem.
The two sides appear to understand each other perfectly well. That is precisely why they still cannot agree.
And Back to Ratcliffe
The most interesting development came after the trip.
The Financial Times reported that the Trump administration is considering giving CIA Director John Ratcliffe a larger role in Russia-Ukraine negotiations while reducing the involvement of Witkoff and Kushner. The White House disputes that account and says Trump has full confidence in his negotiators; the FT reports that no final decision has been made.
But the fact that such a discussion is taking place is revealing.
First Washington sent Ratcliffe to Moscow. Then it sent Witkoff and Kushner, who tried to get a deal moving. No deal emerged. Now Washington is discussing Ratcliffe again.
The negotiating track Trump entrusted to dealmakers is once again bringing the CIA director to the foreground.
The Problem May Not Be the Negotiators
It is easy to read this story as a failure by Witkoff and Kushner. But they may not be the problem.
Deals happen when both sides believe an agreement is preferable to continuing the conflict. Ukraine wants the war to end, but not on terms it considers capitulation. Putin is behaving as though continuing the war promises him more than compromise does.
The Americans tried pressure first, then incentives. Ratcliffe warned; Witkoff and Kushner offered. After Moscow, they went to Kyiv and found the same red lines that existed before they arrived.
They did not, however, come home empty-handed. The negotiating channel is active again. A U.S.-Russia-Ukraine format is once more under discussion. And Zelensky said some of the ideas brought back from Moscow were worthwhile.
Everything else remains where it was: the war continues, Russia’s demands have not changed, and neither have Ukraine’s conditions.
Washington managed to restart the talks. It has not yet managed to bring the two sides closer to a deal.