Europeans reacted with relief to the announcement on Tuesday that Ukraine had agreed with the United States on a 30-day cease-fire in its war with Russia and anxiously awaited Moscow’s response.
They were relieved because Washington announced simultaneously that it would immediately restore military and intelligence support for Ukraine. And there was expectation that Russia must now respond in kind, or presumably President Trump would put some kind of pressure on Moscow analogous at least to the blunt instruments he used against Ukraine.
“The ball is now in Russia’s court,” said the two European Union leaders, António Costa and Ursula von der Leyen, in coordinated messages on social media welcoming the deal and echoing the statement of Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
But in the same sentence the European leaders also welcomed the resumption of U.S. security support to Ukraine, giving it equal emphasis.
“We welcome today’s news from Jeddah on the U.S.-Ukraine talks, including the proposal for a cease-fire agreement and the resumption of U.S. intelligence sharing and security assistance,” the message said on Tuesday. “This is a positive development that can be a step toward a comprehensive, just and lasting peace for Ukraine.”
They also tried to remind Mr. Trump and his team that if Washington wants Europe to guarantee any peace deal in Ukraine, Europe wants to be at the negotiating table. “The European Union,” the message said (hint, hint), “is ready to play its full part, together with its partners, in the upcoming peace negotiations.”
In general, European leaders were shocked by the anger displayed against President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine in the now infamous Oval Office media gaggle on Feb. 28 and Mr. Trump’s apparent acceptance of the Russian narrative that Ukraine started the war.
They were also struck when Mr. Trump’s special envoy, Keith Kellogg, said that Ukraine had to be hit in the head, “sort of like hitting a mule with a two-by-four across the nose,” to get it to comply with Mr. Trump’s demands. The lumber turned out to be the denial of lifesaving American military and intelligence support to Ukraine, its missiles and its American-built fighter jets.
That prompted some in Europe, like Nathalie Tocci, director of Italy’s Institute of International Affairs, to wonder if Washington would do the same to them some day, and whether it was such a good idea to buy so much high-tech American weaponry, like F-35 fighter jets, that depends on American software and integration with American satellites.
European leaders gathered in Paris, London and Brussels last week and this one to promise Ukraine continued and even increased support. “Ukraine is a matter of our own security,” said Norbert Röttgen, a foreign policy expert and German member of Parliament for the Christian Democrats. “If Ukraine falls, it would be a clear threat to Europe.”
But the key point, emphasized by President Emmanuel Macron of France and Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain, was that Ukraine needed American backing. Europe, despite all its vows to continue providing Ukraine with money and weapons, cannot replace key American capabilities like intelligence and missile defense, at least not in the near future.
So European leaders were also relieved at Mr. Zelensky’s understanding of his quandary. After the Oval Office blowup, they worked hard to convince Mr. Zelensky to kowtow to the White House with repeated expressions of gratitude to assuage Mr. Trump. Mr. Zelensky did so, while promising that he continued to support another demand of Mr. Trump for providing the United States privileged access to Ukraine’s mineral wealth, and a share of it besides.
The Europeans have been urging Mr. Zelensky to go along for now to put pressure on Russia and help Mr. Trump see that its president, Vladimir V. Putin, is the problem.
The Europeans have also gathered to have preliminary discussions of what they might be prepared to do to guarantee a future longer-term deal between Ukraine and Russia. Much remains unknown, including the purpose of such a force, its size, financing and command structure. But the Europeans do know they will need American cooperation and air support to make such a mission credible.
Nor is it even clear that Moscow will relent on its current refusal to consider allowing European troops in Ukraine, given that one of the main aims of Russia’s invasion was to keep Ukraine from joining NATO and allowing NATO troops to base there.
But Mr. Macron in particular has gone further, seeing the American turnabout on Ukraine as yet another sign that Europe must do more for its own defense and not rely so much on a United States that appears indifferent to Europe, if not openly hostile to it, both economically and politically.
Now Europeans, like Ukrainians, wait for the response of Mr. Putin. So far, he and his officials have rejected the idea of a cease-fire before a final settlement of the conflict. And of course there are no guarantees that even if a 30-day cease-fire were put in place the war would not recommence, giving at least some the impression that Mr. Trump simply wanted a victory to show that he could stop the killing, even temporarily.
