They squared off in the Oval Office. After a heated exchange with President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance in front of the press corps, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy left the White House on Friday without signing a promised minerals deal and with the future of negotiations to end Russia’s war against his country in doubt. Zelenskyy “can come back when he is ready for Peace,” Trump wrote in a social media post. Where does the blow-up leave US-Ukraine relations? What does Moscow make of all this? What’s the way forward for Europe? Our experts offer their even-keeled views below.

• Daniel Fried (@AmbDanFried): Weiser Family distinguished fellow and former US assistant secretary of state for Europe
• Leslie Shedd (@leslieshedd): Nonresident fellow at the Eurasia Center and former senior advisor to members of the US Congress, and US senatorial and presidential candidates.
• Brian Whitmore (@PowerVertical): Nonresident senior fellow at the Eurasia Center and former Moscow-based foreign correspondent
• Rachel Rizzo (@RachelRizzo): Nonresident senior fellow at the Europe Center

No deal—for now

• Friday’s meeting was meant to cement a deal over US access to Ukraine’s minerals, with proceeds contributing to Ukraine’s reconstruction. But a nearly hour-long Oval Office media availability devolved into an argument over Russian President Vladimir Putin’s history of breaking deals and whether Zelenskyy was being respectful and thankful enough to his hosts. 
• “The problem with the Oval Office blow-up is not the lack of decorum,” Dan tells us. “The problem is that there seems to be no US national interest advanced by a rupture with Ukraine” and “little consistency” in US positions on the minerals deal, support for Ukraine, and European contributions to the defense of Ukraine and Europe as a whole. 
• Regardless of who’s to blame for the blow-up, Leslie advises a quick apology from Zelenskyy and a media tour “focused on changing hearts and minds” with a variety of conservative outlets, including the New York Post and Washington Examiner. But Leslie says Zelenskyy’s refusal to directly apologize to Trump in a Friday evening Fox News interview “makes restoring his relationship with Trump much harder.”
• Leslie adds that Zelenskyy should still try to revive the minerals deal, in part because it “further incentivizes US support for Ukraine,” given that the United States “can’t access the minerals until Ukraine is free from war and from further Russian aggression.”

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Merry Moscow

• Officials in Moscow will be “delighted” with Friday’s developments, Brian tells us, noting that Russian state media called the meeting a “public flagellation” and a “dressing down.” “This all brings the Kremlin closer to what it wants most of all: Russia and the United States negotiating about Ukraine’s future over the heads of the Ukrainians,” in a twenty-first century version of the Yalta agreement at the end of World War II.
• It also makes Putin’s goal of the United States relieving sanctions on Russia more likely, Brian adds. “This is deeply unfortunate, because with the front line in eastern Ukraine largely static, the key variable in the war is the Russian economy, which experts say is largely on life support and headed for a crisis in the next year. That would hamper Moscow’s ability to prosecute its war of aggression.”
• “Putin gains from each US-Ukraine quarrel,” Dan says. “As long as the West negotiates or fights with itself, Putin grows more arrogant in his demands. Trump risks playing Putin’s game.”

On the Hill

• Leslie, a former top aide to Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), notes that Ukraine has lots of support among Republicans in Congress, but that could ebb quickly. “Many have already taken a political hit with the Republican base over their support for Ukraine, and today’s disastrous meeting only makes that situation worse by putting them squarely in the crosshairs of the White House,” she says.
• Zelenskyy, Leslie says, needs to reassure his GOP backers on Capitol Hill “that he is willing to do what is necessary to ensure further US support for his country.”
• One worrying signal came from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who was highly critical of Zelenskyy on Friday and suggested he should step down. “That alone is a huge blow to Ukraine,” Leslie says. “If Zelenskyy continues to bleed support from the Republican Conference on Capitol Hill, it could doom his country.”

The way ahead

• After the Trump meeting, Zelenskyy quickly spoke with European leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron (who met with Trump earlier this week) and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. There is talk of further European summitry in the coming days. But, Rachel notes, “Europe has been iced out of potential talks because Trump doesn’t see them as able to meaningfully shape a solution.”
• “Now is the time to really see what Europe has on offer,” Rachel adds. “Will they be able to step up to the plate in a meaningful way, provide Ukraine the long-term security guarantees it so desperately needs, and potentially be ready to put boots on the ground to help secure a lasting peace? Or will Brussels bureaucracy and differences of opinion among member states destroy its ability to play the leadership role it should be playing?”
• There are big questions for Washington at play, too. Stepping back, Dan worries that “today’s blow-up felt like a deeper rupture, not just with Ukraine, but with the US ‘free world’ strategy from Truman through Reagan.”
• But Trump “loves twists and turns,” and there could be more twists yet in this story, Dan adds. In addition to publicly expressing his appreciation for US support (as he did in an X post on Friday), Zelenskyy could make clear that Ukraine stands by Trump’s efforts to achieve “a ceasefire in place and security for Ukraine,” he advises, while Trump and his team could explain that they “pushed Zelenskyy not to advantage Putin but to advance a settlement, including security for Ukraine.”

Further reading

Thu, Feb 20, 2025

What Europeans think of Trump’s approach to Ukraine (and what they might do next)

New Atlanticist By Atlantic Council experts

European leaders are waking up to calls from the Trump administration to take the lead on security for Ukraine. Atlantic Council experts share what that might look like from Berlin to Vilnius.

Conflict Europe & Eurasia

Fri, Feb 28, 2025

Starmer looks for his ‘Falklands moment’ during his first White House visit with Trump

New Atlanticist By Philippe Dickinson

The British prime minister’s visit to the White House this week went well, but Europe’s security challenges at this pivotal moment require success on several other fronts as well.

Europe & Eurasia Politics & Diplomacy

Wed, Feb 26, 2025

Digging into the US-Ukraine minerals deal

Fast Thinking By Atlantic Council

Everything you need to know about the reported Trump-Zelenskyy economic pact on Ukraine’s natural resources.

Conflict Economy & Business

Related Experts: Daniel Fried, Leslie Shedd, Brian Whitmore, and Rachel Rizzo

Image: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (L) talks with US President Donald Trump (R) in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, USA, 28 February 2025. Zelensky is in Washington to sign the framework of a deal, pushed by President Trump, to share Ukrainesís mineral wealth with the US.