Trump-Putin Summit II. The Winner Is? Not Trump, Putin, Zelensky. It is Orban. US And Russian Officials Advice To Orban. Zelensky To Budapest? Antacids In EU. Erdogan Role? Mrs. Trump Influence?
And The Winner Is?... Not Trump, Not Putin, Not Zelensky. It is Orban
U.S. And Russian Federation Officials Advice To Prime Minister Orban
Zelensky Can Travel By Train From Kyiv To Budapest- Or To Hungary Border And Then By NATO-Provided Transportation
Since December 2024, There Is A Regularly-Scheduled Ukrainian Railways Route From Kyiv To Budapest
Many EU And NATO Leaders Will Need Antacids, Lots Of Them
Do Not Be Shocked If Guest Is Turkiye President Erdogan
There Are Potential Outcomes- Including Mrs. Trump’s Role
The winner of the Trump-Putin Summit II in Budapest, Hungary, will be Viktor Orban, Prime Minister of Hungary (1998-2002 and 2010- ).
Anecdote: In 1994, the government of Ukraine signed the Budapest Memorandum that included provisions for the removal of its nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees from countries including the Russian Federation.
Comments from an official in the Trump-Vance Administration (2025-2029) and an official of the government of the Russian Federation: Optics for the Trump-Putin Summit II would be improved if Prime Minister Orban would a) use the weight-loss products Ozempic or Wegovy manufactured by Bagsvaerd, Denmark-based Novo Nordisk A/S (2024 revenue approximately US$43 billion), b) “find a new tailor as his suits are horrible” c) make a “sustained and concerted effort” to “improve his bilateral relationships with regional” heads of state and heads of government as he is at risk “not prevailing” in elections scheduled for April 2026 and d) Prime Minister Orban is not “necessarily respected” rather he is “useful” by his “obstinance” but important for him to “adjust to realities” or risk “being overtaken by domestic events.”
Prime Minister Orban’s decision to maintain support for Donald Trump, President of the United States (2017-2021 and 2025-2029); his refusal to disconnect from Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation (2000-2008 and 2012-2030); and his questioning commercial, economic, financial, political, and military support to Volodymyr Zelensky, President of Ukraine (2019-2024; term extended due to imposition of martial law in 2022), were the primary reasons for the Trump-Putin Summit II location.
There will be protests in Budapest prior to and during the Trump-Putin Summit II. Organizers and participants will have multiple and overlapping issues- condemning and supporting the Russian Federation, Ukraine, United States; condemning and supporting Orban, Zelensky, and Trump. How the government of Hungary implements its response will potentially absorb considerable media and political oxygen- and create optics that President Trump will find distracting- and he may deliver comments which then distracts from the purpose of Trump-Putin Summit II.
For President Trump, he takes pleasure in rewarding the “bad boy” of the EU and NATO, so Prime Minister Orban is the perfect host.
Not out of Trumpian-natural realm of possibility for President Trump to also meet with Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of the Republic of Turkiye (2014-2028), given comments by President Trump about role for President Erdogan in ending the military conflict in the internationally-recognized territory of Ukraine initiated first in 2014 and again in 2022 by the armed forces of the Russian Federation.
For President Zelensky, the selection of Hungary is a bitter pill- Hungary borders Ukraine. However, if President Trump can arrange a Putin-Zelensky Summit, then for President Zelensky traveling from Ukraine to Hungary will be an easy reach- and a required reach.
For President Putin, the first considerations are avoiding travel-related issues and host-related domestics political issues from a 17 March 2023 warrant for his arrest issued by The Hague, Netherlands-based International Criminal Court (ICC). Hungary is a signer of the 1998 Rome Statute of the ICC which created the ICC. The government of Hungary has withdrawn effective 2026.
That means Hungary should be problematic, but it will not be problematic. Prime Minister Orban will ignore the interests of the ICC. He will be criticized, but will not care. His position will be “how can members of the EU and NATO want to end the war without having those making the decisions meet with one another?”
Hungary is a member of the twenty-seven (27) country Brussels, Belgium-based European Union (EU) which has imposed since 24 February 2022 eighteen (18+) sanctions packages impacting the Russian Federation.
EU: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden.
Hungary is a member of the thirty-two (32) country Brussels, Belgium-based North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
NATO: United States, United Kingdom, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Albania, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Croatia, Czech Republic, Poland, Estonia, Romania, Germany, Slovakia, Greece, Slovenia, Hungary, Spain, Turkiye, Latvia, and North Macedonia, Sweden.
For President Putin to reach Hungary, he will need traverse the airspace of countries who are members of the EU, who are members of NATO, countries who want to be members of the EU and/or NATO, and countries who are signers of the 1998 Rome Statute of the ICC.
Candidate countries for EU membership: Albania (2014), Bosnia and Herzegovina (2022), Georgia (2023), Moldova (2022), Montenegro (2010), North Macedonia (2005), Serbia (2012), Turkiye 1999), Ukraine (2022). Kosovo submitted an application for membership in 2022.
For the heads of state and heads of government of those fly-over countries, they will look to the sky and be angry about the inability to force the aircraft carrying President Putin to land on their territory so he may be arrested.
Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission (2019-2029), will find painful to digest that Prime Minister Orban, with whom there are EU-related governance issues not solely relating to Ukraine, will be the recipient of political largess from President Trump.
The principals of the “coalition of the willing” in support of the government of Ukraine, Emmanuel Macron, President of the Republic of France (2017-2027); Alexander Stubb, President of the Republic of Finland (2024-2030); Friedrich Merz, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany (2025- ); Giorgia Meloni, Prime Minister of the Republic of Italy (2022- ); Sir Keir Starmer, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland) (2024- ); and Mark Rutte, Secretary-General of the thirty-two-country member Brussels, Belgium-based North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) (2024- ), again find themselves as bystanders looking from the street through the windows.
Potential outcomes from Trump-Putin Summit II An agreement for a ceasefire (limited in duration, limited in targeting). Continuing exchanges of prisoners. Continuing return of children (something for President Trump and President Putin to deliver to Melania Trump, the First Lady, who wrote a letter to President Putin and who has confirmed as a result of that outreach children have been returned from the Russian Federation to Ukraine). Announcements about extending nuclear arms agreements.
