Zelenskyy 'realistic' on Tomahawk missiles as Trump signals caution

Volodymyr Zelenskyy walked out of his White House meeting with Donald Trump on Friday carrying neither a yes nor a no—and he seemed prepared to call that progress. The Ukrainian president had come asking for Tomahawk missiles, the long-range American weapons his forces need to strike Russian targets deep inside enemy territory. Trump, characteristically, had kept his cards close. But in an appearance on NBC's Meet the Press afterward, Zelenskyy struck a tone of measured realism. "It's good that President Trump didn't say 'no,' but for today, didn't say 'yes,'" he said. The door, he suggested, remained slightly ajar.

The calculus behind that careful optimism became clearer when Trump spoke to reporters after arriving in Florida. The American president was pushing hard for something else entirely: an immediate ceasefire, regardless of the territorial cost to Ukraine. "Stop the war immediately," he said. "Stop the killing. And that should be it." On social media, he was more blunt, suggesting both sides freeze in place and "let both claim Victory, let History decide." When Zelenskyy was asked about the post—which he said he hadn't yet seen—he offered a diplomatic response: the president was right that they should stop where they are, and then talk. It was the kind of answer a leader gives when he's trying not to close any doors while his country is still fighting.

What happened next suggested Zelenskyy understood the stakes of the moment. Hours after leaving Trump's office, he convened a call with European leaders—the British prime minister Keir Starmer, the heads of Germany, Finland, Italy, Norway, and Poland, along with the European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, and the European Council president Antonio Costa. It was a show of coordination, a signal that Ukraine was not negotiating alone. Starmer described the conversation as productive and reiterated Britain's commitment to send both humanitarian and military aid. Zelenskyy, in a post on X, said he had shared details of his Trump meeting and that the group was working to protect lives, guarantee Ukrainian security, and strengthen Europe. "We are coordinating our positions," he wrote.

Meanwhile, the diplomatic theater was expanding in unexpected directions. A Kremlin envoy named Kirill Dmitriev, who heads Russia's sovereign wealth fund, had floated an audacious idea: a rail tunnel under the Bering Strait linking Russia and the United States, costing eight billion dollars, to be built in under eight years. The proposal came after Putin and Trump had spoken by phone and agreed to meet in Budapest to discuss ending the war. It was the kind of grand infrastructure fantasy that sometimes emerges when two leaders are imagining a future together—a symbol of unity, Dmitriev called it, and a way to unlock joint exploration of natural resources.

Back on the ground in eastern Ukraine, the war continued its grinding logic. Russia's Defence Ministry announced on Friday that its forces had taken control of three more villages: Pryvillia in the Dnipropetrovsk region, and Pishchane and Tykhe in the Kharkiv region, closer to the Russian border. Ukraine acknowledged fighting around at least two of the settlements but stopped short of confirming they had changed hands. The territorial claims remained disputed, as they so often do in this war, but the pattern was clear: Russian forces were advancing in the east, and the diplomatic conversations happening in Washington and Brussels were happening against a backdrop of continued military pressure.

What Zelenskyy faced was a narrowing window. Trump wanted a deal—any deal—that would end the fighting. Europe was coordinating but ultimately dependent on American military support. And Russia, sensing an opening, was both advancing militarily and dangling visions of grand cooperation with the incoming American administration. The Tomahawk missiles Zelenskyy had asked for remained in limbo, a symbol of everything that hung in the balance: whether Ukraine would have the weapons to fight on its own terms, or whether the shape of any settlement would be determined by the speed at which Trump could broker a ceasefire.