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Accounts of an impending American-Russian presidential summit have been greatly exaggerated, apparently.

Just days after President Trump announced he intended to confer with Russia's leader Putin in the Hungarian capital - "in approximately a fortnight" - the high-level talks has been put off without a new date.

A preliminary meeting by the two nations' leading diplomats has been cancelled, too.

"I don't want to have a wasted meeting," President Trump told reporters at the executive mansion on Tuesday afternoon. "I aim to avoid a waste of time, so I'll see what transpires."

• Donald Trump says he wished to avoid a 'unproductive session' after arrangement for Putin talks shelved
• Disappointment in Kyiv as President Zelensky departs Washington without results

The frequently changing meeting is another development in the president's attempts to mediate an end to war in the Eastern European nation – a subject of increased attention for the US president after he arranged a ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal in Gaza.

During a speech in the North African country recently to celebrate that ceasefire agreement, the president addressed Steve Witkoff, with a new request.

"We have to get the Russian situation done," he declared.

However, the conditions that converged to make a Gaza breakthrough possible for the negotiation team may be difficult to replicate in a conflict in Ukraine that has been raging for nearing four years.

Reduced Influence

According to the lead negotiator, the crucial element to unlocking a agreement was the Israeli government's decision to attack Hamas negotiators in Qatar. It was a move that angered US partners in the Arab world but provided the president bargaining power to compel Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into making a deal.

Trump gained from a long record of supporting Israel dating back to his first term, encompassing his choice to relocate the American embassy to Jerusalem, to change US policy on the lawfulness of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories and, more recently, his backing for Israeli defense operations against the Islamic Republic.

The American leader, in fact, is better regarded among Israelis than their prime minister – a situation that gave him unique influence over the Israeli leader.

Add in Trump's political and economic ties to influential Arab nations in the region, and he had a wealth of negotiating strength to force an agreement.

In the Ukraine war, on the other hand, Trump has much less leverage. Over the past nine months, he has swung between efforts to pressure the Russian president and then Zelensky, all with little seeming effect.

Trump has warned to enact additional penalties on Russian energy exports and to supply the Ukrainian forces with advanced missile systems. But he has also recognised that doing so could harm the world's financial stability and intensify the conflict.

Meanwhile, the president has publicly berated Ukraine's president, halting briefly information exchange with the country and suspending arms shipments to the nation - only to then back off in the face of worried European partners who warn a Ukrainian collapse could disrupt the entire region.

The president loves to tout his skill to sit down and hammer out deals, but his personal discussions with the Russian and Ukrainian leaders haven't seemed to advance the hostilities any closer to a peaceful end.

The Russian president may actually be using the US leader's wish for a deal – and faith in in-person deal-making - as a means of manipulating him.

During the summer, Russia's leader consented to a high-level meeting in the US state at the time when it seemed probable that the president would sign off on congressional sanctions package backed by GOP senators. That bill was afterwards delayed.

Recently, as news emerged that the US administration was seriously contemplating shipping Tomahawk cruise missiles and Patriot anti-air batteries to Kyiv, the Russian leader phoned Trump who then touted the possible meeting in Hungary.

The following day, Trump welcomed Ukraine's leader at the White House, but departed empty-handed after a allegedly tense meeting.

The US leader insisted that he was not being played by Putin.

"As you are aware, I have been manipulated throughout my career by the best of them, and I came out really well," he said.

However the president of Ukraine later made note of the sequence of events.

"As soon as the issue of long-range mobility became a little further away for us – for our nation – Russia almost automatically became less engaged in diplomacy," he said.

So, in a short period, Trump has bounced from entertaining the prospect of providing weapons to Ukraine to planning a Budapest summit with Putin and privately pressuring Zelensky to cede all of Donbas – even territory Russia has been unable to conquer.

He has ultimately settled on advocating a ceasefire along current battle lines – something the Russian government has refused to accept.

During his election campaign previously, the candidate vowed that he could end the Ukraine war in a matter of hours. He has since discarded that commitment, saying that ending the hostilities is turning out harder than he expected.

It has been a rare acknowledgement of the constraints of his power – and the challenge of finding a peace plan when neither side wants, or can afford to, cease hostilities.