Europe pushes hard to sway Trump before Alaska summit with Putin on Ukraine

Washington Post

19 hours ago

BRUSSELS — European leaders are seeking to impress upon President Donald Trump one key point before he meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday: The West cannot — must not — negotiate away Ukrainian territory, especially for nothing in return.
As Trump floats 'land swaps,' Kyiv's European backers have rejected a Russian proposal to trade Ukrainian land for an undefined truce. And they have issued declarations that 'international borders must not be changed by force.'
European leaders are set to press their priorities in a call with Trump on Wednesday, organized by Germany Chancellor Friedrich Merz, which will include Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The call is intended to shape Trump's thinking before he sits down with Putin one-on-one in Alaska.
The Europeans are insisting that Moscow agree to a ceasefire before negotiations over territory, and that Kyiv needs security guarantees.
And, if such negotiations occur, a European counteroffer has pushed the idea that any retreat of Ukrainian forces from Ukrainian-controlled territory should be matched on an inch-for-inch basis by Russia's withdrawal from occupied Ukrainian territory, according to three people briefed on the discussions.
European and NATO allies have often failed to sway Trump's thinking, or even to be heard by the U.S. president ahead of big policy decisions, such as to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities. And they are frequently dismayed by Trump's policy moves, for example, his unilateral imposition of tariffs.
The Europeans recognize that they can only do so much to influence a president who often veers off-script and likes nothing more than to declare a deal.
But on Ukraine recently they have met with some success, for example, by persuading Trump to allow them to transfer U.S. weapons to Ukraine and purchase replacements for themselves.
And in recent days, especially after a meeting with Vice President JD Vance in Britain over the weekend, they have found the U.S. administration receptive to some of their red lines.
After that meeting, Vance, in a television interview, endorsed at least one European position — that the current line of contact and positioning of Ukrainian and Russian troops should be the starting point of any talks — rejecting a Russian demand that Ukraine first surrender its entire eastern Donbas area.
Ahead of Wednesday's call some Europeans expressed guarded optimism, especially with Trump seeming to lower expectations of securing a deal in Alaska.
There appears to be 'more of an understanding from the Americans that you can't just go for land swaps which would somehow give a prize to Russia,' said one European Union official, who like others in this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy.
Still, the official added, 'it's clear that there are sort of discrepancies, and as we've seen it in the U.S. system by now, you have one man who will decide.'
But even with Trump making a more concerted effort to consult allies and keep them updated, there has been confusion over whether Putin is even willing to swap territory, officials said.
The administration understood that a partial Russian retreat might be possible after U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff returned from meeting with Putin in Moscow last week. However, the Russian offer apparently calls for a Ukrainian surrender of territory that Russian forces don't even control as a precondition for a ceasefire, the people briefed on the talks said.
As that mix-up has come untangled, the administration has lowered expectations for the high-stakes Trump-Putin summit, officials said.
Wednesday's call with Trump caps a flurry of meetings and statements organized by the Europeans since the Alaska summit was announced, all of which have provided a strong endorsement of Kyiv's position.
Wednesday's virtual summit hosted by Germany will include the leaders of France, Britain, Italy, Poland, Finland, the E.U. and NATO. The Europeans will meet first with Zelensky before Trump and Vance are expected to join the call.
Trump has also promised to call Zelensky and European leaders right after talking with Putin, to relay whether 'a fair deal' is on the table.
'It's not up to me to make a deal,' he told reporters Monday — seemingly echoing a European refrain that a truce cannot be sealed without them or Ukraine.
'I have many fears and a lot of hope,' Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said this week. Tusk said recent comments indicate Trump is increasingly understanding of Ukrainian and European views on the war, but that he was not so sure that would hold.
'I guess everyone's afraid Putin will play Trump's ego again like he has in the past,' said a second European official. 'Who knows, maybe he comes there with another noble-sounding offer or maybe they give [Trump] some state award.'
Trump has repeatedly balked after threatening to pressure Russia into a ceasefire. As recently as last week, the president's mounting frustrations with Russia stalling on a ceasefire, and his threats of fresh U.S. sanctions, gave way to his invitation to Putin to meet on U.S. soil.
While there has been speculation that Trump may yet try to involve Zelensky in the Alaska talks, European leaders are definitely not invited — giving them little sway over the diplomatic spectacle, even as they have become Ukraine's chief military and financial backer.
Most proposals for a truce also envision a role for European nations in enforcing any deal that could reshape the continent's future security.
In the scramble to sway Trump, European officials have also stressed that any deal must give Ukraine a bulwark against future attacks, especially because Putin is insisting that Ukraine be barred from joining NATO.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has suggested a deal could involve acknowledging de facto Russian control of some of Ukraine's regions, without Kyiv officially ceding them.
If Trump's meeting with Putin advances to 'full-scale negotiations,' Rutte said Sunday, territory would 'have to be on the table,' as would security guarantees for Ukraine. Rutte said talks should recognize 'that Ukraine decides on its own future,' with 'no limitations' on its military or on NATO's posture in Eastern Europe.
Freezing the current front lines would leave about one-fifth of Ukraine's territory in Russian hands. Ukraine, meanwhile, has little leverage for a land swap, holding a small toehold in Russia's western Kursk region since a faltering offensive last year.
'Europeans can say what they want, but in the end, Ukraine and Russia will have to agree,' said a third European official. 'It's unlikely there's a peace deal now where Putin says, okay, I'm going to withdraw from all of Ukraine.'
The chief diplomat for the 27-nation European Union, Kaja Kallas, told the bloc's foreign ministers in recent days that the initial contours of a deal between Washington and Moscow seemed to 'focus on territory only' and that 'the Ukrainians are very worried,' according to a copy of a written note seen by The Washington Post.
Kallas warned against a 'fragile ceasefire' that would solidify Russia's gains in more than three years of war. On Monday, Kallas held a four-hour virtual meeting of E.U. foreign ministers to deliberate on Ukraine ahead of the Trump-Putin meeting and on Israel's war in Gaza.
The E.U. official said they didn't see 'willingness' from Kyiv or many of its staunch European allies for trading territory within Ukraine, citing distrust with Russia, which is pressing its advances in the east and attacks on Ukrainian cities.
'We have to understand the Ukrainian position, they have a million men who've been fighting for years now, so it's also something that President Zelensky wouldn't be able to have domestically accepted,' the official said.
Though polls show war-weary Ukrainians increasingly favor a settlement to end the fighting, it would be tough to sell ceding territory — home to hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and where forces built up defensive lines over years — for a ceasefire that can't be guaranteed.
But even as Europe insists that Ukraine must receive security guarantees, its own ideas of what those guarantees would look like remain fuzzy.
Ukraine's chief backers say guarantees should start with pledges of more weapons and training for its army, and that they will reject any Russian demand to limit Ukraine's military.
Kyiv's top aspiration — NATO membership — seems far-fetched without U.S. buy-in, and a plan for European troops in Ukraine remains on a back burner.
Carl Bildt, a former prime minister of Sweden, said European governments can shape the talks as Ukraine's chief suppliers of arms and cash. 'That blocks the possibility for Trump to make any concessions to Putin on what I think is among the most important of his demands,' to halt the flow of Western weapons to Ukraine, Bildt said.
European leaders also still control billions in Russian frozen assets that will factor into negotiations, as well as the battery of sanctions that Russia wants lifted.
Camille Grand, a former NATO and French defense official, said there was a disconnect between Europe's financial and political investment in the Ukraine war and its role in the upcoming talks.
'The Europeans today provide the bulk of humanitarian, economic and military aid, and have now accepted to pay for American weapons,' Grand told French public radio, 'while in the negotiations, they can at best hope to influence the American position or to support Ukraine.'
Catherine Belton in London contributed to this report.