No Tomahawks in sight for Ukraine after Zelenskyy–Trump meeting

The Ukrainian president was otherwise taking questions from reporters outside the White House, while Trump departed for Mar-a-Lago for the weekend.

“We decided [at the meeting] that we will not talk publicly about long-range weapons,” said Zelenskyy.

“The United States does not want escalation, so I will not answer questions about it.”

He described the meeting as “long and productive,” covering a wide range of topics including efforts to strengthen Ukraine’s air defenses to counter a renewed Russian bombing campaign targeting energy infrastructure.

“We talked about air defense because even now many drones are attacking Ukrainian civilians,” the president said.

“We decided to work more on production. Our teams will try to determine if it’s possible to replace another country’s order, for which [air defense] systems are ready, with ours. It’s a complicated process, but we’re working on it.” 

He added that Trump shared details of his Oct. 16 conversation with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

“The president shared details of the dialogue with Russia,” Zelenskyy stated.

“We understand the signals from Russia, but we rely on the president and his pressure on Russia to stop the war.” 

In recent weeks, Trump and other senior U.S. officials suggested that Washington could arm Ukraine with Tomahawks, which would place many Russian energy and military facilities within strike range from Ukrainian territory. This rhetoric seemingly unnerved the Kremlin, prompting Putin to agree to another meeting with Trump—this time in Budapest, Hungary, within the next two weeks. The U.S. president said he hopes the summit would end the Russo–Ukrainian war, which could explain the pullback from a concrete commitment to give Ukraine Tomahawks.