As President Trump’s deadline expired Friday for Russia to agree to a ceasefire with Ukraine or face increased economic sanctions, the White House has signaled that a face-to-face meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin could happen as early as next week. Experts say chances are slim that the Russian autocrat will agree to pull his forces out of Ukraine.

Earlier in the week, U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff met with Putin for three hours, although no substantial breakthrough for a ceasefire was reported. As a result of the meeting, Secretary of State Marco Rubio remarked that “For the first time perhaps since this administration began, we have some concrete examples of the kinds of things that Russia would ask for in order to end the war.” For his part, Trump stated that “great progress” was made and that both parties agreed that the war “must come to a close, and we will work towards that in the days and weeks to come.”

But ongoing hostile actions by Russia even beyond the borders of Ukraine indicate that peace in the region may be a long way off. Fox News reported Thursday that a drone launched from Russian ally Belarus armed with explosives traveled approximately 62 miles and entered into NATO member Lithuania’s airspace and hovered for some time, before crashing into a military training zone. A second drone crashed near the Lithuanian border town of Šumskas last month, causing evacuations. In addition, a gas depot in Ukraine that was only yards away from the Romanian border (a NATO member) was struck by Russian forces, triggering a Romanian air force patrol.

Experts say the tactics may be Putin’s way of testing the resolve of NATO member countries to see if they will abide by Article 5, which states that an armed attack against one or more of its members is considered an attack against them all. So far, there have been no formal responses to the incidents near the Lithuanian and Romanian borders.

Meanwhile, the Russian assault on Ukraine has intensified in recent weeks. “The aerial bombardment of Ukraine’s cities over the last several weeks has been the most intense and deadliest of the war,” observed National Review. “In fact, Russian attacks on Ukraine’s cities have doubled since Trump took office.”

Trump’s openness to direct talks with Putin is likely an indication that the American president has grown weary of Russia’s continued refusal to budge in its relentless invasion of Ukraine. “We’re going to see what he has to say,” Trump told reporters of Putin Thursday. “That’s going to be up to him.” It remains to be seen whether the threat of stepped-up U.S. economic sanctions will sway Putin. So far, the Trump administration has levied a 25% tariff on India due to its continued purchase of Russian oil, and announced that the tariff will double in 20 days. It is unclear if the administration plans to expand tariffs against other major Russian oil importers like China.

The White House also wants to include Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Trump-Putin talks, but Putin is remaining evasive on the proposal, saying only that he is open “in principle” to meeting with Zelensky. “We are still far from creating such conditions,” the Russian strongman stated.

Experts like Lt. Col. (Ret.) Bob Maginnis, an author and senior fellow for National Security at Family Research Council, are not optimistic that the proposed Trump-Putin summit will yield any definitive ceasefire agreement based on Putin’s past behavior.

“We’re assuming this isn’t a ploy by Putin to agree to meet with Zelensky and Trump in order to delay what President Trump has put in place, and that is sanctions and tariffs,” he observed during “Washington Watch” Thursday. “We’ve already reached out and touched the Indians who have been buying a lot of Russian energy, and of course, that has kept the war machine in Moscow moving forward. And so, I think Putin wants to delay that or put it to an end.”

Maginnis further emphasized that an array of differences between the U.S. and Russia will have to be ironed out before a potential ceasefire could be agreed upon.

“Will [Putin] agree to peace? The conditions, according to Secretary Rubio, are pretty significant,” he pointed out. “They have to be overcome before President Trump will entertain the idea of sitting down with those two leaders. … [U]p to this point, Putin has said he wouldn’t meet with Zelensky, and yet that’s one of the conditions. So we’ll have to work those out. This is a quagmire itself that has lasted much longer than anybody expected, beginning in February 2022, and now here we are in August of 2025.”