In the space of a few hours on February 12, U.S. President Donald Trump took his first major public steps toward keeping his promise to end the war in Ukraine, phoning Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy days ahead of a prominent international conference in Germany.
So far, it looks like Putin got what he wanted, while Zelenskyy did not. And Europe didn’t, either.
For Putin, the call itself ticked what is always a big box on his wish list: direct talks with the leader of the United States. All the more so in the context of the war in Ukraine, where U.S. military and financial support for Kyiv is crucial for its defense against the full-scale Russian invasion, which will reach its three-year mark on February 24.
Moreover, Trump said that he and Putin agreed their teams would “start negotiations immediately” on ending the war. Putin has repeatedly suggested that Russia and the United States should be the main interlocutors on the matter and has sought to discredit Zelenskyy, falsely claiming he is illegitimate, so he is likely pleased with the framing of the talks as bilateral.
Trump stressed that he phoned Zelenskyy soon after a “highly productive” conversation with Putin, but he was noncommittal about whether Ukraine would be an equal participant in negotiations with Russia.
That will aggravate existing worries in Kyiv that it could be sidelined in a push to end the war on its own territory and pressured to accept a lopsided peace or cease-fire deal that favors Moscow and leaves Ukraine vulnerable to further Russian aggression.
Those concerns cannot have been alleviated by a remark Trump made later in the day about Ukraine: “I think they have to make peace. Their people are being killed.”
What will happen in practice is unclear, but the readouts of the two calls suggested a tack away from the Biden administration’s mantra that there can be no big decisions on Ukraine without Ukraine.
Following his talk with Trump, Zelenskyy stressed the idea of joint action, voicing “our readiness to work together at the team level” and saying Ukraine would “determine our common steps with America to stop the Russian aggression and guarantee a reliable, prolonged peace.”
“Nothing can be discussed on Ukraine without Ukraine or on Europe without Europe,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha told the French newspaper Le Monde in an interview published February 13.
But a warning from the foreign ministers of key EU members and NATO allies — including Germany, France, Poland, and Britain — pointed to concerns about the focus on the United States and Russia. “Ukraine and Europe must be part of any negotiations,” they said in a statement.
“The next task is to ensure that there is no imposed peace,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz added in an interview published by Politico on February 13.
“Two tough guys, Putin and Trump, just talked. And the ones who should be worried are in the EU,” Alexandra Prokopenko, a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin, wrote on X. “A chance to negotiate directly with the U.S. suits Putin perfectly. From the Kremlin’s perspective, the Western coalition would fail if its biggest player stepped out.”
Munich Security Conference
The outlines of efforts to end the war may become clearer at the February 14-16 Munich Security Conference, where Zelenskyy and many senior European officials are expected along with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Keith Kellogg.
On the sidelines of a NATO defense ministers’ meeting in Brussels, Hegseth said Trump’s plan to negotiate with Russia was “certainly not a betrayal” of Kyiv, and that a negotiated peace “will require both sides recognizing things they don’t want to.”
U.S. officials have repeatedly said both sides will have to make compromises and have used tough language in relation to Russia in recent weeks, warning that Moscow could face additional sanctions, oil-price pressure, and other problems if it resists the push for peace.
Following the February 12 calls, however, there was no public indication that Russia, which controls about one-fifth of Ukrainian territory while Kyiv holds a much smaller piece of Russian land, was currently under pressure to make any specific concession.
Ukraine, on the other hand, heard U.S. officials state clearly that it would have to abandon some of its main goals, at least for the time being.
In a blow to Kyiv’s hopes of regaining all its territory, Hegseth said it is “unrealistic” to expect Ukraine’s borders to return to their positions before 2014, when Russia seized the Crimean Peninsula and fomented war in the Donbas. In other words, to its national borders.
Hegseth also said that Washington would not deploy troops to Ukraine in any agreed peace deal; that NATO membership is not seen by the White House as part of the solution to the conflict; and that U.S. forces would not be part of any security guarantee in a peace settlement.
At a summit last July, when Joe Biden was the U.S. president, NATO vowed to “continue to support [Ukraine] on its irreversible path to full Euro-Atlantic integration, including NATO membership.”
Trump also said on February 12 that giving Ukraine NATO membership would not be “practical.”
‘Putin’s Patience Has Paid Off’
None of the U.S. statements was particularly surprising, but Ukraine is seeking swift NATO membership. Kyiv has also said that strong Western security guarantees are a crucial part of any cease-fire or peace deal, and has argued for U.S. involvement if Western forces are deployed to safeguard any truce.
“Putin’s patience has paid off,” Tatyana Stanovaya, founder of the analysis firm R.Politik, wrote on X. “Many high-level figures within Russia’s diplomatic and security circles were increasingly frustrated with the initial statements and approaches of Trump and his team on Ukraine. Trump’s ‘plans’ appeared not just unacceptable but outright hostile…. Nevertheless, Putin chose patience, working steadily to ingratiate himself with Trump — being accommodating, showing flexibility, and projecting a willingness to compromise. Now, he has secured the first step: the launch of substantial negotiations.”
Stanovaya said she is “highly skeptical about the prospects of these talks.”
“Trump wants a cease-fire and some kind of arrangement that would sideline the Ukraine issue for a while. But his vision still differs radically from Putin’s,” she wrote. “For Putin, a real solution means a Ukraine that is ‘friendly’ to Russia — deprived of military capability, has a rewritten constitution, and guarantees non-membership in NATO.”
“Make no mistake — Putin is fully prepared for these talks to fail,” Stanovaya added. “From the Kremlin’s perspective, there is nothing the West can do that would reverse Russia’s territorial gains and prevent Ukraine’s collapse in the long run.”
