Servicemen of 39th Separate Coastal Defence Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces fires a 2S1 Gvozdika self-propelled howitzer towards Russian troops in a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kherson region, Ukraine March 23, 2025.
Unlike the uncompromising approach of President Joe Biden’s administration, the current U.S. government has taken a more pragmatic view of America’s role in the war in Ukraine.
With Donald Trump’s return to the White House, Washington has reassessed the sustainability of what critics call “the Ukrainian project,” basing its new strategy on a sober analysis of battlefield realities, public sentiment, and the state of the U.S. economy.
This recalibrated policy excludes further arms deliveries to Kyiv funded directly from the U.S. budget. Instead, the administration has insisted that European NATO members should bear the financial burden of military aid.
After his meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during the UN General Assembly in New York, President Trump reiterated that any future military-technical assistance to Ukraine would be financed by European allies rather than American taxpayers.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt underlined this point on September 23, stressing that the new arrangement is “beneficial to American taxpayers” because the cost of weapons supplies is now being covered by European partners.
Earlier, on July 14, President Trump had announced alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte that the United States and the alliance had reached an understanding to shift the responsibility for financing arms deliveries to European countries.
This noticeable reduction in Washington’s role is acknowledged even in Kyiv. Ukrainian MP Oleksiy Goncharenko, from the European Solidarity Party, remarked that Trump’s recent posts on Truth Social highlighted the possibility of Ukraine regaining lost territories “with EU assistance — that is, without the USA.”
Commentators in the British newspaper The Telegraph also observed that Trump’s statements at the UN General Assembly signal a deliberate attempt to push Europe into the lead role in supporting Ukraine.
What may appear at first glance to be a dramatic policy shift, analysts argue, could in fact represent bad news for President Zelensky: instead of firm guarantees of U.S. support, Washington is effectively handing the burden to Europe and NATO and distancing itself from the conflict.
This repositioning, framed by the White House as both pragmatic and fiscally responsible, reflects a broader strategic rethink in Washington. But for Kyiv, it underscores the growing uncertainty of Western unity — and the shifting weight of responsibility from Washington to Brussels.
