While campaigning, Donald Trump promised the world he would end the war in Ukraine on his first day in office. Sometimes he even one-upped himself, suggesting he could probably end the war before he was even sworn in.

That, of course, didn't happen. Here we are more than 200 days in to Trump's second term, and the war rages on.

Donald Trump likes to see himself as a strongman -- a real "tough guy." But what we've seen is that he is at heart no more than a bully who immediately backs down when confronted with a truly strong opponent. Vladimir Putin is fully aware of this fact. Which all sets the stage for their summit meeting this Friday in Alaska.

Normally, in the history of summit meetings, two top leaders don't actually meet until a lot of groundwork has already been accomplished. That way, the two leaders can meet, exchange their views, and at the end still have something to sign or announce in front of the world's cameras. Trump, however, is supremely confident in his own mythical dealmaking prowess, and so he's just going to wing it and do all the negotiating himself.

The risks to such a strategy are pretty obvious. Trump could either fail to make any sort of deal whatsoever, or he could try to "give away the store" in a desperate effort to have something to present at the end of the meeting. People are already darkly warning of the possibility of this being another Munich -- where Neville Chamberlain gave Adolf Hitler a big chunk of Czechoslovakia and became forever associated with the word "appeasement." People are already worried Trump could agree to a similar "deal" with Putin. No Czech leader was at that Munich meeting, and there will be no Ukrainian leader in Alaska on Friday either.

Putin has been the driving force behind this meeting all along. He offered it to distract Trump from a deadline he had set (which worked) and it is a real diplomatic coup for Putin to meet with a U.S. President -- the first time it has happened since Putin began the war by invading Ukraine -- and it will even happen on American soil. Trump tried to invite Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the meeting, but Putin told him no, so Trump backed down. Trump has been parroting Putin's main objective all week (calling it a "land swap," even though it is going to be a one-sided land grab by Russia), and has said absolutely nothing about any red lines the United States might draw. Throughout it all, Trump has appeared weak, following Putin's lead in everything. Because that's exactly what happens when a bully meets a truly strong opponent.

Trump's goal in all of this is to get himself a Nobel Peace Prize. That sounds ludicrous to say, but it does appear to be his sole motivating factor. Barack Obama got one, so Trump won't be satisfied until he wins one too. Trump hasn't been able to even convince an ally (Israel) to end a war, but now he thinks that he'll be able to convince Putin to end his invasion. Trump does not care about the details, he just wants the war to somehow end so he can get his Nobel.

Putin's main objective in all of this is to stall. He knows that eventually Donald Trump won't be in office anymore, while he still will be. And Putin is all-in on conquering Ukraine. He is committed to this war. The United States has never been fully committed to helping Ukraine win the war, however, a problem that has only gotten worse under Trump.

For all of his second term so far, Trump has not increased sanctions against Russia and he hasn't even threatened huge tariffs against the country (which is notable, since it is his go-to tactic on all foreign policy issues). He half-heartedly slapped a tariff on India, which is one of the countries which buys a lot of oil from Russia, but hasn't even made a threat to do the same to China, which buys even more oil from Russia. Trump has also convinced the Republicans in Congress to sit on a bill which would impose crippling tariffs on both Russia and the countries which purchase its oil, which removes that leverage from the table as well.

Recently, Trump woke up and realized that Putin has been playing him for a fool all along. Trump had some tough talk about it all, seemingly amazed that his phone calls with Putin didn't somehow transform into a ceasefire. But even with all this bluster, Trump still refuses to threaten Putin with much of anything. Trump is comfortable either threatening steep tariffs or actually imposing them on all the other countries in the world, but has yet to issue any kind of concrete threat of this nature to Putin.

Which is probably why Trump and his administration are now trying to dial down expectations for the Friday summit. Today Trump told reporters: "There's a very good chance that we're going to have a second meeting, which will be more productive than the first." Yesterday, he said the first summit will be just to "feel out" the possibilities (rather than to come up with any sort of deal). He would also like a second meeting to include Zelenskyy, but Putin will likely balk at doing so once again.

The chances of anything productive happening on Friday were already pretty low, since Trump seems absolutely incapable of applying even a little pressure on Putin. And Putin is not going to change unless there is some sort of pressure applied. This seems like a recipe for either no ceasefire deal being announced whatsoever, or perhaps Trump agreeing to Putin's idea of a plan -- which would almost certainly be immediately rejected by the Ukrainians.

Putin is reportedly dangling one idea in front of Trump -- an "air truce" where both countries ceased launching long-range bombs and missiles into the other's territory. This is a shrewd move by Putin, because he knows that Trump's main complaint about the whole war is that it shows up on his television screen too much, often with shots of dying Ukrainians or burning apartment buildings (as a result of Russian strikes). Ending the air war would mean Trump would no longer have to see such images, and could therefore forget about the rest of the (non-televised) war. But Ukraine is also having success with their drone and missile launches, so they'll probably reject this partial truce idea (whether Trump agrees to it or not).

About the best thing that could happen on Friday would be if Putin agreed to actually sit down with both Trump and Zelenskyy, for a second summit meeting. At least that would be a little progress, of sorts. Donald Trump couldn't end the war on Day One, as he promised he'd do. And he's not likely to end it this Friday, either. This is what happens when a pretend "tough guy" meets a real strongman, folks.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant