Can Zelenskyy trust Trump? Ukraine's fate may depend on the answer

President Trump has offered only vague assurances of security guarantees for Ukraine if President Volodymyr Zelenskyy agrees to cut a deal with Russia

By Zolan Kanno-Youngs 

For President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, a lot is riding on how much he can trust President Trump.

 

Mr Trump offered only vague assurances on Monday that the United States would play a role in guaranteeing Ukraine’s safety if Mr Zelenskyy were to cut a deal with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to stop the fighting.

 

“We’re going to make sure it works,” Mr Trump said at the start of an hourslong meeting with Mr Zelenskyy and a delegation of European leaders at the White House. “And I think if we can get to peace, it’s going to work. I have no doubt about it.” 

 

The meeting ended with upbeat assessments by the Europeans and some progress toward a meeting between Mr Zelenskyy and Mr Putin, at a site to be determined. But the question of whether Mr Trump can be trusted to keep his word speaks to his history of ever-changing positions and mercurial feelings about Ukraine and other diplomatic crises, especially when it comes to high-stakes negotiations.  It is a lot for a wartime leader like Mr Zelenskyy to bet on, especially with his country three and a half years into a war instigated by Russia. 

“They’re not just interested in any such assurances. They’re not interested in President Trump saying, ‘You can count on me,’” said William B. Taylor Jr., a former US ambassador to Ukraine. “They’re not going to agree or accept an assurance, a political assurance. That doesn’t give them the security they need.”

 

After the meeting on Monday, Mr Zelenskyy said the discussion about security guarantees called for Ukraine to buy $90 billion of American weapons through Europe and for the United States to buy drones from Ukraine. He said that a formal agreement still needed to be made.

 

Still, Mr Trump’s talk of security guarantees was a shift from his earlier position that the protection of Ukraine should be left solely to those in Europe. 

 

That was far from the only flip-flop. Just days ago, Mr Trump threatened “severe consequences” if Mr Putin did not agree to a swift cease-fire, which Ukraine has demanded before any negotiations over a permanent peace begin.  He changed course after meeting last Friday in Alaska with Mr Putin, at which point he adopted Mr Putin’s preference for pursuing a more sweeping peace agreement — no immediate cease-fire necessary. 

Mr Trump then turned his pressure campaign to Mr Zelenskyy, saying over the weekend that the Ukrainian leader could end the war with Russia “almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue the fight.”

 

Mr Trump’s aides have cast both his Alaska summit with Mr Putin and his meetings at the White House on Monday as critical steps toward peace. The European leaders commended Mr Trump’s efforts to get Mr Putin and Mr Zelenskyy to the negotiating table, even if any potential peace proposal has been absent critical details.

 

“I’m really excited,” Mark Rutte, the secretary general of Nato, told Mr Trump during a televised portion of the meeting. “The fact that you have said I’m willing to participate in security guarantees is a big step. It’s really a breakthrough.” 

 

But there was little clarity on how involved the United States would be in such a plan.

 

Daniel Fried, a former US ambassador to Poland, said one option that would probably win the backing of Ukrainians was if European nations agreed to provide military assets inside Ukraine in the case of a future attack, while Mr Trump agreed to back them up with defense assets stationed in neighboring countries.

 

“I don’t think Zelenskyy will stop with a simple verbal assurance from the president,” Mr Fried said. “If Zelenskyy, you say to Trump that what you said is important and great and then you find out what the mechanisms are.”

 

Beyond the war in Ukraine, Mr Trump has given world leaders reason to doubt his assurances. He threatened to bring hell to Hamas if all hostages held by the terrorist group in Gaza were not released. He has, however, distanced himself from the human catastrophe in Gaza in recent weeks. 

 

He has made repeated threats on tariffs throughout his time in office, only to back off at the last minute on multiple occasions. He once floated the idea of forcibly displacing Gazans from the Palestinian territory, only to back away from the idea when he faced pushback from Arab nations.

 

He has also repeatedly shifted his approach to Mr Putin, at times saying he can work with the Russian leader to secure peace and at other times threatening him with sweeping economic penalties.

 

In a moment of candor on Monday, Mr Trump acknowledged that the war in Ukraine — which he once promised to end in 24 hours — was more challenging than he had once anticipated.

 

“I thought this was going to be one of the easier ones,” Mr Trump said as he described his administration’s work trying to end global conflicts. “It’s actually one of the most difficult and very complex.”