Kyiv, Ukraine – Ahead of the emergency summit in Paris on Europe’s response to being excluded from US-Russia peace talks, Ukraine’s president warned of his country’s bleak future if US military aid is cut.
“[W]e will have low chance – low chance to survive without support of the United States,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an interview on the NBC news programme Meet the Press.
In December, US President Donald Trump said he was open to the idea of reducing military aid to Ukraine.
In a move that could further strain relations, Zelenskyy rejected a proposed US agreement granting Washington access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals in exchange for continued military aid.
The refusal, along with Trump’s recent statements and private calls with both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin, have raised fresh uncertainty about Washington’s long-term support for Kyiv.
Relying on Europe
With US support uncertain, Europe faces mounting pressure to fill the gap.
During the February 14-16 Munich Security Conference, Zelenskyy appeared to respond to Trump’s actions and comments by raising the issue of Europe building its “own military”.
“Let’s be honest. We can’t rule out the possibility that America might say, ‘no’ to Europe on an issue that threatens it,” Zelenskyy said.
Lieutenant General Ihor Romanenko, former deputy head of the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, told Al Jazeera that Ukraine will need more help than Europe can offer.
“Europe can’t possibly replace American aid,” he said, adding that Ukraine won’t survive long without US military aid and predicting, “We will last six months.”
There are political complications that could interfere with European support.
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Slovakia’s PM Robert Fico, both sceptical of military aid to Kyiv, could block EU-wide decisions. Meanwhile, Germany’s far-right AfD party is surging in the polls, further complicating Europe’s ability to act decisively.
Alternative for Germany (AfD) is anti-immigration, anti-European Union, and often pro-Putin. There are concerns it could push for an end to Berlin’s aid to Kyiv and the deportation of Ukrainian refugees.
Even if Europe could reach an agreement to boost military aid to Ukraine, it has faced challenges in scaling up its weapons and ammunition production. Russia’s defence industry was outpacing NATO in weapons production, emphasising the need for the EU to reinvigorate its defence industrial base to effectively support Ukraine.
Russia has also received support from North Korea, with Ukrainian intelligence estimating that Pyongyang has sent thousands of troops to Russian-held territory. South Korea reports that North Korea has also supplied Moscow with millions of artillery shells.
‘It was lousy’
Romanenko pointed out that Ukraine has already had a preview of life without US military aid.
Republican hardliners under the influence of former President Donald Trump had delayed for months a bill passed in April 2024 that would open the way for more than $60bn in desperately needed funding for Ukraine.
“We’ve already seen what a six-months-long suspension of aid resulted in,” Romanenko said.
Before the package was approved, Ukraine lost several strategic strongholds in the southeastern Donbas region at the cost of “thousands of lives”, Romanenko said.
Bohgan, a military officer who was deployed in Donbas during the delay in military aid, told Al Jazeera that fighting became much more dangerous during that time.
“It was lousy, we could fire only five shells a day, while the [expletive] Russians could fire hundreds at us without counting,” said Bohgan, who could not give his last name due to Ukraine Ministry of Defence regulations.
‘Mid-summer or autumn’
With five separate bills voted through the US Congress, Washington has so far provided $175bn in aid to Kyiv since Russia began its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Nikolay Mitrokhin, a researcher with Germany’s University of Bremen, told Al Jazeera that how fast Ukraine goes through its US-funded military supplies will depend on how quickly its soldiers are forced to use them.
Constant Russian air raids mean that Kyiv relies on missiles for the US-made Patriot air defence system, he said. Patriot missile costs several million dollars, and they are often spent on expendable targets such as Iranian-made Shahed drones or their Russian-made replicas.
“That’s why my assumption is that the current and upcoming US supplies will definitely last until mid-summer [July], if not until autumn [September], provided they are spent moderately,” Mitrokhin said.
The loss of US military supplies can not be made up for by Europe, especially when it comes Patriot missiles, light armoured vehicles and 155mm shells used to suppress advancing Russian infantry, he said.
Mitrokhin added that how long or whether Ukraine would have to survive without US military aid would be linked to how long it takes for Russia-US ties to deteriorate.
“Trump’s and Putin’s relationship will turn sour, and we will soon see a decisive increase in US supplies,” he told Al Jazeera.
‘Russians and Americans in expensive suits’
Kyiv-based analyst Alexey Kushch said that Zelenskyy was right to decline Trump’s deal that tied military aid to Ukraine’s mineral resources.
He told Al Jazeera that the US should treat Ukraine like an ally and that “it would be just” if Washington writes off half of the debt and schedules the rest to be paid back by the end of the century.
“Nobody asked the USSR to compensate for the military aid by giving away its natural resources, Kushch said, referring to the billions of dollars in military equipment provided by Washington during World War II that Russia completed payments on in the 1990s.
“Why should Ukraine, an ally, do it?” Kushch asked Al Jazeera.
Regardless of whether the US stops sending military aid, some Ukrainians are feeling disillusioned by the latest developments.
“As usual, somebody else will decide our fate,” Vsevolod Boyko, a retired school principal whose son Ihor is fighting in Donbas despite two wounds, told Al Jazeera.
“A bunch of Russians and Americans in expensive suits will carve up Ukraine without asking us,” Boyko said. “And if we reject their conditions, they will push the button to stop the aid.”
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