"A bad relationship with the US costs Ukrainian lives"

"Zelensky has chosen Europe, perhaps one can imagine a future where Russia and the United States are part of a joint military alliance". That's what the Russian TV host and propagandist Vladimir Solovyov said on state-controlled Russian television after Trump's latest outburst about Zelenskyi as incompetent.

Trump has been angry with Zelensky before. He has also approached Russia in the past. In the Russian information landscape, the meeting between Trump and Putin in Alaska in 2025 is described as an "agreement".

Exactly what it means has been unclear, but the broad interpretation is that Trump promised Putin all of Donbas without a fight. It's nothing that Trump has confirmed, but the pro-Russia policy that the US has pursued in the past week raises concerns about what kind of ultimatum a US that is not a neutral mediator in the peace talks could force Ukraine to give.

Zelenskyj, who has sharpened his tone against Trump but is careful to criticize the American president's policies more than his person, is reaching out to his European partners.

The meeting between US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner (on link) in Oslo together with European leaders and representatives of the EU and NATO, is crisis diplomacy on the part of Ukraine and Europe. The problem is that Ukraine, despite Donald Trump's turn to Russia, is completely dependent on American intelligence, the Starlink/Starshiled satellite service and American air defenses. The European counterparts do not measure up - and when the US fails, it costs Ukrainian lives.

Russia steps up its nightly and daily attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine - and after Oslo, the American envoys go on to Moscow.