U.S. President Donald Trump said yesterday he had a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin that signaled the start of negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, nearly three years after Russia invaded the country. Later, Trump spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (New York Times)
The same day, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told a meeting of defense ministers from countries allied to Ukraine that the U.S. was no longer “primarily focused” on European security and that Europe would have to provide “the overwhelming share” of future military aid to Kyiv. (The Guardian)
Our Take
Trump’s call with Putin marks the first known direct contact between the leaders of the two countries since Russia invaded Ukraine, making this a substantive change from the West’s policy of treating Russia as a pariah state and trying to isolate its president. At the very least, the call, along with the fact that both sides said they plan to hold a face-to-face meeting soon, underscores Trump’s view of Putin as a global leader like any other—someone to be engaged with pragmatically and transactionally.