Over the past three years, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not shied away from using moral suasion and even guilt trips to prod the U.S. and Europe to deliver the military support Kyiv needs to fight off Russia’s all-out invasion of his country. With U.S. President Donald Trump back in the White House, however, it seems that Zelenskyy is now mastering the art of the deal.
In his latest attempt to shore up financial and military support from Washington, Zelenskyy has put Ukraine’s vast rare earth reserves on the table, hoping the move would whet Trump’s known appetite for a transactional foreign policy. “If we are talking about a deal, then let’s do a deal,” Zelenskyy told reporters who had gathered in Kyiv this month for the upcoming third anniversary of the Russian invasion. “We are only for it.”
Zelenskyy’s desire to broach the issue of Ukraine’s vast reserves is not new. He included rare earth investment in the “victory plan” he presented to Kyiv’s Western backers last autumn. But given Trump’s skepticism of the cost of U.S. military aid to Kyiv and his known eagerness to strike a deal to end the war, even if it means leaving large swaths of Ukrainian territory in Moscow’s hands, framing the loss of that territory as ceding valuable minerals to Russia heralds a new chapter in Zelenskyy’s war-time rhetoric.