LONDON — If he wants to give Ukraine’s leader the same welcome he did Russia’s Vladimir Putin, then President Donald Trump might need a bigger red carpet.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy will bring heavyweight reinforcements to the White House on Monday — a troop of European leaders likely hoping to ensure there is no repeat of his last Oval Office showdown at a moment of even greater stakes for his country and the continent.
The extraordinary public bust-up between Zelenskyy, Trump and Vice President JD Vance in February stunned European powers.
Trump accused a waspish Zelenskyy of “gambling with World War 3,” and of disrespecting the White House as the cameras rolled, before cutting the meeting short and telling the Ukrainian leader to come back “when he is ready for peace.”
He returns Monday flanked by leaders from Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Finland, plus the heads of the European Union and NATO — a show of solidarity and an effort to ensure Europe has a real voice in peace talks after being excluded from Trump’s summit with Putin in Alaska.
“It’s a demonstration of European unity and support to Ukraine precisely to avoid what happened in February repeating itself,” Mujtaba Rahman, Managing Director for Europe at Eurasia Group, told NBC News.
He added that the European side would be “eager to prevent Zelenskyy being bullied into making concessions,” after Trump fueled new alarm among Ukraine’s allies by appearing to lean toward the Kremlin’s view of things following his talks with Putin.
The American president offered no reason to think that had changed in the hours leading up to Monday’s crowded White House gathering.
Trump put the onus on Zelenskyy, saying he could “end the war almost immediately, if he wants to,” and that there was “no going into Nato by Ukraine” and “no getting back” the Crimean Peninsula that Russia illegally annexed in 2014.
This public pressure has fueled fears that he could turn up the heat on Zelenskyy to agree to territorial concessions in exchange for a peace deal.
Hence the Ukrainian leader will not be going in alone.
In British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, NATO chief Mark Rutte and Finnish President Alexander Stubb, the European contingent will feature three men seen as successful at earning Trump’s favor.
They will hope to use that influence to reverse the apparent inroads Putin made in Alaska.
Europe’s leaders have recognized that “if they aren’t on the table, they are on the menu,” Frederick Kempe, the president and chief executive officer of the Atlantic Council, wrote Sunday.
If they aren’t “actively involved” in shaping the conversation with Trump,” he said, “they are vulnerable to being negatively impacted by his decisions and the influence of others —in particular Putin.”
The meeting in Washington will also give the leaders the opportunity to discuss future security guarantees for Ukraine, which U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff floated Sunday as potentially looking similar to NATO’s Article 5.
Ukraine hoped to use the meeting to negotiate an ironclad security guarantee and convince Trump that a temporary ceasefire is necessary to begin real peace talks, a Ukrainian source familiar with the goals told NBC News. The security guarantees should be treaty-level obligations, the source said, which require Senate approval.
Rahman said the nature of the security guarantees was “absolutely key to prevent Russian aggression in the future,” saying the Europeans would travel to Washington hoping to “pin down the detail of what U.S. involvement in Ukraine’s future security will be.”
Citing a deadly strikes in Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia, Zelenskyy said Monday that Russia was continuing its attacks on his country even as talks were ongoing in order “to maintain pressure on Ukraine and Europe, as well as to humiliate diplomatic efforts.”
And in Kyiv, many feel that conceding territory as part of the broader peace deal Trump is now pursuing wouldn’t end the war at all — it would only embolden Moscow to push further.
“It is precisely this so-called long-term peace of Putin’s that would allow him to continue waging war,” said Oleksiy Goncharenko, a lawmaker for Ukrainian opposition party “European Solidarity.” “The quickest step is to establish a ceasefire first, and only then begin negotiations.”
Europe’s leaders appear to share that instinct.
“If we are weak with Russia today, we’ll be preparing the conflicts of tomorrow and they will impact the Ukrainians and — make no mistake — they can impact us, too.” French President Emmanuel Macron said Sunday.
If February was a fiasco, Monday is the do-over — this time with chaperones.
Ostap Hunkevych, The Associated Press, Kristen Welker and Megan Lebowitz contributed.
