By Andrea Shalal and Max Hunder
WASHINGTON/KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine said on Tuesday its forces could hold their own on the battlefield as they fight Russian troops after U.S. President Donald Trump paused military aid to Kyiv in the most dramatic step yet in his pivot towards closer ties with Russia.
Trump has upended U.S. policy on Ukraine and Russia, culminating in an explosive confrontation at the White House on Friday, when Trump upbraided President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for being insufficiently grateful for Washington’s backing.
“President Trump has been clear that he is focused on peace. We need our partners to be committed to that goal as well. We are pausing and reviewing our aid to ensure that it is contributing to a solution,” a U.S. official said on Monday.
Ukraine’s Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Kyiv still had the wherewithal to supply its troops. “Our military and the government have the capabilities, the tools, let’s say, to maintain the situation on the front line,” he said.
Shmyhal thanked the U.S. and emphasised that Kyiv wanted mutually-beneficial cooperation.
“We will continue to work with the U.S. through all available channels in a calm manner,” he told a press conference. “We only have one plan – to win and to survive. Either we win, or the Plan B will be written by someone else.”
Zelenskiy himself stayed silent over the aid freeze. By mid-afternoon in Kyiv on Tuesday his only public statement was to say he had spoken with Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz, emphasising Berlin’s military and financial aid.
“We remember that Germany is the leader in supplying air defense systems to Ukraine and plays a crucial role in ensuring our financial stability,” he said on X after the call.
The Kremlin, for its part, said cutting off military aid to Ukraine was the best possible step towards peace, although it was still waiting to confirm Trump’s move.
Ukraine has relied on U.S. and European military aid to hold off a bigger and better-armed foe throughout three years of warfare that has killed and injured hundreds of thousands of soldiers on both sides and flattened Ukrainian cities.
Military experts say it could take time for the impact of missing U.S. aid to be felt. When U.S. assistance was held up for several months last year by Republicans in Congress, the most notable initial impact was shortages of air defences to shoot down Russian missiles and drones, though later Ukrainian forces complained of ammunition running low at the front.
“It’s pretty significant, but not nearly as impactful as it would have been earlier in the war because Ukraine is far less dependent on direct U.S. military assistance now,” said Michael Kofman, a senior fellow at Carnegie Endowment.
The pause puts more pressure on European allies who have publicly embraced Zelenskiy since the Oval Office blow-up, led by Britain and France whose leaders both visited the White House last week.
Europeans are racing to boost their own military spending and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday unveiled proposals to boost spending on defence in the EU, which she said could mobilise up to 800 billion euros ($840 billion). The EU is holding an emergency summit on Thursday.
France condemned the aid halt. It made peace “more distant, because it only strengthens the hand of the aggressor …which is Russia,” said French junior minister for Europe, Benjamin Haddad.
Britain, which has sought to keep the Trump administration on side, was more circumspect. Prime Minister Keir Starmer had spoken to Trump on Monday evening, a spokesperson said, without commenting on whether Trump had mentioned the aid freeze.
“The prime minister and President Trump are focused on the same outcome, which is delivering a secure and lasting peace in Ukraine,” the spokesperson said.
Ukrainians, who have endured three years of war against a more powerful foe, were stunned by a move many described as a betrayal. Oleksandr Merezhko, head of the Ukrainian parliament’s foreign affairs committee, said it looked like Trump was “pushing us towards capitulation”.
“Yes, it is betrayal, let’s call it like it is,” said lawyer Olena Bilova, 47 in Kyiv. “But let’s hope that American civil society and the elites of the European Union will not leave us alone.”
‘KICKED THE DOOR WIDE OPEN FOR PUTIN’
Since Russia’s invasion three years ago, the U.S. Congress has approved $175 billion in total assistance for Ukraine, according to the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Trump’s move suspends any further drawdown from $3.85 billion of military aid approved by Congress that he inherited from his predecessor, Joe Biden. It also appears to halt deliveries of military equipment already approved by Biden.
Washington’s abrupt pivot towards Russia may be the most dramatic U.S. geopolitical shift in generations. Defending Europe from a hostile Kremlin has been the lodestar of U.S. foreign policy under both parties since the 1940s. The move has appalled Democrats and some Republicans, although there has been little pushback from Republican leaders in Congress, including those who were once strong backers of Ukraine.
“By freezing military aid to Ukraine, President Trump has kicked the door wide open for Putin to escalate his violent aggression against innocent Ukrainians,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Trump suggested on Monday that a deal to open up Ukraine’s minerals to U.S. investment could still be agreed, and Shmyhal said Ukraine could still sign it. The deal was meant to be signed in Washington on Friday before Zelenskiy departed after the Oval Office bust-up.
In an interview on Fox News, Vice President JD Vance called on Zelenskiy to accept it.
“If you want real security guarantees, if you want to actually ensure that Vladimir Putin does not invade Ukraine again, the very best security guarantee is to give Americans economic upside in the future of Ukraine,” Vance said.
(Reporting by Olena Harmash and Yuliia Dysa, Andrea Shalal, Gram SlatteryAdditional reporting by Idrees Ali, Erin Banco, Steve Holland, Lidia Kelly, Mike Stone, Jasper Ward, Patricia Zengerle, Krisztina Than, Pavel PolityukWriting by James Oliphant and Peter GraffEditing by Michael Perry, Bernadette Baum and Ros Russell)
