Zelenskiy to seek weapons from Trump in the shadow of a new Putin summit

By Jeff Mason

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump will discuss the possible supply of Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday but the surprise announcement of a new U.S.-Russian summit cast doubt over the prospect.

Trump said on Thursday he may meet Russian President Vladimir Putin within the next two weeks in Budapest after a more than two-hour phone conversation about Russia's war in Ukraine that he said was productive.

"My whole life, I've made deals," Trump told reporters later at the White House. "I think we're going to have this one done, hopefully soon."

In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he would brief Zelenskiy on the Russia talks in the Oval Office on Friday.

Trump's conciliatory tone after the call with Putin raised questions over the near-term likelihood of assistance to Ukraine and reignited European fears of U.S. capitulation to Moscow. 

WAR HAS INTENSIFIED

More than three and a half years after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has ground out some territorial gains this year.

Putin earlier this month said his forces had taken almost 5,000 square kilometres (1,930 square miles) of land in Ukraine in 2025 - equivalent to adding 1% of Ukraine's territory to the nearly 20% already held.

Both sides have also escalated attacks on each other's energy systems and Russian drones and jets have strayed into NATO countries.

The White House had seemed in recent days to be leaning toward granting Zelenskiy fresh support and increasingly frustrated with Putin.

The new meeting, which Trump said would likely occur in the next two weeks, follows his consideration of providing Ukraine with long-range Tomahawks missiles.

"We need them, too," Trump said of the missiles on Thursday in his remarks to reporters after his call with Putin.

The weapons are widely seen in Ukraine as a gamechanger that would help it escalate attacks on Russian energy systems far from the border that have already caused significant damage.

Zelenskiy, who has had an up-and-down relationship with Trump, said Putin, who pressed ahead with assaults on Ukraine after meeting with Trump in Alaska in August, was again playing for time.

"We can already see that Moscow is rushing to resume dialogue as soon as it hears about Tomahawks," he wrote on X.

ANALYSTS SEE TALKS AS A DELAYING TACTIC

Putin's move was meant to make the U.S. transfer of such weapons less likely, said Max Bergmann, a Russia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"It does seem that Putin's outreach is perhaps designed to thwart the potential transfer of Tomahawks to Ukraine, so Putin is wanting to put that back in the box," Bergmann said. "It strikes me as sort of a stalling tactic."

Mykola Bielieskov, a senior analyst at Come Back Alive, a Ukrainian non-governmental organization that is a major procurer of military equipment for the Ukrainian armed forces, said Tomahawk missiles would level a playing field that is tipped toward Russia, but that they would not be a silver bullet. 

"We don't expect Russia to crumble after one, two or three successful strikes," Bielieskov said. "But it's about pressure, constant pressure. It’s about disrupting the military industrial complex."

Since taking office in January, Trump has regularly threatened action against Russia, only to delay those steps after talks with Putin.

"The chances of moving toward a ceasefire by pushing Russia to get serious seem to have diminished," said Dan Fried, a former State Department official.

During Thursday's call, Putin told Trump that supplying long-range missiles to Ukraine would harm the peace process and damage U.S.-Russia ties, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters. Trump confirmed Putin had opposed such a transfer.

"What do you think he's going to say, 'Please sell Tomahawks?'" Trump joked with reporters. "No, he doesn't want" Tomahawks given to Ukraine, Trump added, calling them a "vicious weapon."



(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Trevor Hunnicutt; Additional reporting by by Cassel Bryan-Low and Tom Balmforth in London, Daphne Psaledakis in Washington, Bhargav Acharya in Toronto, Anita Komuves in Budapest and Anastasia Lyrchikova in Moscow; editing by Philippa Fletcher and Jon Boyle)