Calculated flattery and three big signals about the future of the Ukraine war and of Europe, analysis

The most telling image of the day was the photograph of the talks in the Oval Office after the public remarks for the TV cameras. It showed Trump at his desk as he faced the eight leaders – the potentate and the supplicants. He could help them if he wanted. Or not.

For some, the outcome of the meeting was Trump’s idea that Zelensky and Putin would meet to negotiate terms before he joined them for trilateral talks. For others, it was Trump’s signal that he would help Europe with security guarantees. Others focused on Zelensky’s promise to buy huge sums of American weapons, funded by European allies.

Big signals

This conveyed a sense of confusion about the results. So did the plan for a meeting between Zelensky and Putin: is it Trump thinking aloud, or will it really happen? All of these were potential steps, not hard decisions. They were not actually outcomes.

Even so, there were three big signals from this meeting.

First, the security guarantees to protect Ukraine against further aggression. These are problematic because Trump will not sign up to something like Article 5 of the NATO treaty – the provision that suggests an attack on one member is an attack on all. Signing this would require the US to mobilise if Putin broke a peace deal and started another conflict with Ukraine.

Who could trust Trump to honour such an agreement even if he signed it? The security guarantees are meant to give Ukraine confidence it will not be invaded by Russia again, but they remain a vague concept.

The key word came after the meeting, when Trump said the guarantees would be provided by European countries with “co-ordination” from the US. This does not place any great obligation on the US and is a far weaker signal than the Europeans wanted.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have a “coalition of the willing” agreement to send peacekeepers into Ukraine if the war ends – with Australia willing to consider helping – but this is uncertain. It is useful as a message to Trump that Europe will step up. The details depend on any settlement with Putin.

With Trump so clearly reluctant to offer security guarantees with real power, the onus is on Starmer and Macron to give the coalition of the willing real meaning.

Second, the plan for Ukraine to buy more weapons. This is essential but requires Trump to depart from the hesitancy of the Biden years. At every stage of this war, Ukraine has been shackled by the conditions placed on the American weapons it can use – for instance, whether it can strike Russian targets with rocket artillery like the HIMARS and ATACMS.

Trump will stop donating weapons to Ukraine and will expect Europe to pay for every shipment. The US defence industry will make money. But will Trump put limits on the weapons if Putin calls to complain?

Third, the question of territory. Zelensky has rejected “land swaps” with Russia in the past, but did not do so vehemently at the White House. There appears to be some acceptance that Ukraine cannot hope to recover all the land seized by Russia. Trump is trying to wear the Europeans down on this point.

A settlement that gives up Ukrainian land represents a handsome victory for Putin, of course. It is the Munich scenario: that giving a strongman the land he covets only makes him hungry for more.

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It seems incredible that America would ask Europe to walk into this nightmare again, but it should not be a surprise after seven months of the second Trump administration. Trump is broadly aligned with the Russian leader on keeping the US out of a binding obligation to Ukraine and giving up Ukrainian land to settle the war.

Europe is on its own. The only security guarantee that counts will be the volume of weaponry it can make or buy.