On February 24, 2025, President Macron of France and U.S. President Trump held a press conference in the Oval Office. The main matter of discussion was a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine. Macron stressed the importance of security guarantees within a ceasefire agreement. “We have experienced peace accords that were only ceasefires without ensuring security guarantees, Minsk I and II, and we want to make sure this doesn’t happen again […] this peace must not mean the surrender of Ukraine, it must not mean a ceasefire without guarantees,” Macron said. Two days later, Prime Minister Starmer of the UK joined Trump in the Oval Office and expressed the same sentiment.
Despite Russia’s history of broken accords, Trump does not agree with this opinion. He has remained adamant that security guarantees are not necessary: “Once an agreement is signed, Russia’s going to get back to its business and Ukraine and Europe are going to get back to their business. I don’t think it is going to be a problem.” Trump’s justification for this stance was that President Putin of Russia never broke an accord with him as the president of the United States.
On February 28, 2025, the talk of ceasefires and security guarantees culminated into a heated exchange that left the future of Ukraine’s relationship with the U.S. up in the air. President Zelenskyy of Ukraine joined Trump in the Oval Office, and what started as a civil conversation devolved into behavior that shocked the world.
Following a question regarding Trump’s close alignment and friendship with Putin, U.S. Vice President Vance intervened on Trump’s behalf claiming that “what makes America a good country is America engaging in diplomacy.” Zelenskyy contested this remark, noting that the initial invasion of Ukraine began in 2014, eight years prior to February 24, 2022. “During that time there was president Obama, then president Trump, then president Biden, and now President Trump, and God bless, now President Trump will stop him, but during 2014 nobody stopped him.” In addition, since 2014, Putin has broken 25 ceasefires with Ukraine.
Neither Trump, nor Vance, were pleased with Zelenskyy’s contradiction, but what really aggravated the U.S. President and VP was Zelenskyy implying that though the U.S. may not feel the impact of the war now, as Trump put it, “this war is far more important to Europe than it is to us. We have a big beautiful ocean as separation,” there is a possibility that they may feel it in the future.
Trump immediately responded: “You don’t know that. Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel. You’re in no position to dictate what we’re going to feel. We’re going to feel very good.” Trump then accused Zelenskyy of “gambling with WWIII” and disrespecting the U.S. that has “backed” Ukraine “far more than a lot of people said they should have.”
The irony is, Trump dissociated himself from the previous U.S. presidents numerous times throughout the conference, and responded to any shortcomings mentioned by pointing out that he was not president at the time, and therefore had nothing to do with them. Under this logic, any aid the U.S. has given to Ukraine, also does not pertain to him, meaning he has done nothing for Ukraine, except for saying he will end the war. Even more ironic is how the following statement Vance made earlier in the conference, that the pathway former president Biden took to the conflict was “pretending that the president of the United States’s words mattered more than the president of the United States’s actions,” now becomes hypocritical.
Following the disastrous conference, many leaders of the world took to social media to share their support for Ukraine and on March 2, a summit was held in London with Starmer, Macron, Zelenskyy, and many other prominent leaders such as NATO’s secretary general Mark Rutte, the President of European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, and the President of the European Council Antonio Costa. Numerous European countries had representation at the summit as well, including Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, Czech Republic, Turkey, Spain, Denmark, Italy, Romania, Finland, and Poland. Also in attendance was Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada. The United States was notably absent.
