Is Zelensky’s approach to Trump injured Ukraine?

When the finance minister, Scott Bessent, traveled to Kyiv this month, he wanted President Volodymyr Zelensky to sign an agreement that submits mineral rights to the United States and achieved a quick victory for the Trump government.

But Mr. Zelensky had his own question: a meeting with President Trump to complete a deal that he hoped that he would ensure the continued American support. “I hope that in the near future,” he said, “the document will be ready and we can sign it during a meeting with President Trump.”

Due to the melting pot of the three -year leadership of the war, Mr. Zelensky played mostly as when he jumped out of a bunker, while his capital was bombarded early in the war to film selfie videos that gathered his nation and the world to oppose. His showmanship also paid off in conversations in which weapons and ammunition worth billions of dollars came to his military.

But his approach to the Trump administration has fallen flat with the White House and does not produce empathy, but the hostility of the American president. His request for a presidential meeting fell and became the most recent example of a dramatic personal style that was once an integral part of his nation’s struggle, but now looks more like a monkey key in dealing with the Trump administration.

It is hotly discussed in Ukraine whether Mr. Zelensky is wrongly unrest in his news by responding to Mr. Trump’s insults with a couple of his own snipes instead of navigating diplomatically through the attacks by the US president. Although Mr. Trump’s claim that Ukraine started, the war with Russia was clearly wrong, Mr. Zelensky angry him by publicly corrected and claimed that the American president was in a “network of disinformation” held by the Kremlin caught.

Was his reaction a necessary defense of national interests? Or a misstep in dealing with an authorized leader who does not ask criticism and essentially holds the fate of Ukraine in his hands?

“If you are a statesman, you should first think about your country and not about your ego,” said Kostiann Yelisiev, a former diplomat and an architect of the game book that the former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko used for relationships with Mr. Trump.

This approach was identified by offers from business qualifications to US companies and the criticism of Mr. Trump on Ukraine with dry, bureaucratic bodies reacted on a website of the Foreign Ministry.

“It is not a good idea to criticize the leader of a nation and in particular the leader of a nation who do the best for them to help them,” said Yelisieiev.

Many Ukrainians have cheered on Mr. Zelensky to suggest Mr. Trump, even if personal hostility has become an obstacle. On Sunday, Mr. Zelensky said that he would step down as President if Ukraine would bring peace, although it was unclear whether he was seriously thinking about this option.

Mr. Zelensky received advice from alarmed European leaders to avoid escalation, also in a phone call last week with Poland President Andrzej Duda.

“I proposed President Zelensky to remain committed to the course of the calm and constructive cooperation with President Donald Trump,” Duda wrote after calling for X. He said: “I have no doubt that President Trump von a deep sense of responsibility for global stability and peace. “

Mr. Zelensky’s style has already extinguished. During the visits to the western capitals to drum more help for Ukraine, he taught the leaders to trouble. British Defense Minister Ben Wallace replied at some point: “I like it or not, people want to see a little gratitude.” And the Ukrainian President frustrated American military leaders by ignoring her advice on the strategy of Battlefield.

With the future of American military aid and support in all potential peace talks on the line, it threatens a much bigger problem.

In the past two weeks, Mr. Zelensky has refused to sign the mineral agreement, and said that he would not accept a result of Mr. Trump’s negotiations if Ukraine were not represented. He also followed diplomatic efforts to support European support.

But even supporters in Ukraine to say this diplomatic strategy that Mr. Zelensky’s showmanship is an issue.

Instead of once portraying the position of Ukraine, Mr. Zelensky repeated at a security conference in Munich, a press conference in the Turkey capital and two news conferences in Kyiv that he would reject Mr. Trump’s negotiations if they excluded Ukraine.

The constant insistence on the public participation of the Ukrainian participation has appealed to Mr. Trump. “He has been at a meeting for three years and nothing has been done,” said Trump on Friday in the Fox News radio. “So, I don’t think it is very important to be in meetings to be honest.”

But the American guide often uses threats and strong weapons tactics to advance things-and Mr. Trump can ultimately be fine if Mr. Zelensky is involved in the process.

On Sunday, instead of giving his rhetoric advice like some European leaders, Mr. Zelensky has not returned from his earlier comment that Mr. Trump was surrounded by the Russian “disinformation” about war.

He pointed out Mr. Trump’s efforts to increase the relief goods Washington of Ukraine. And Mr. Zelensky, because of the reduction of Mr. Trump, lingered that the Ukrainian leader only has an approval rate of 4 percent – the claim in what critics say was an unclean word war.

This is not the first input of Ukraine with Mr. Trump. During Mr. Trump’s first term, Ukraine offered offers to buy coal and locomotives from Pennsylvania and brought him a victory in public in creating jobs in an important election. The Ukrainian authorities conclude an investigation of payments under the table in Ukraine in Ukraine in Paul Manafort, the chairman of Mr. Trump’s campaign in 2016. Mr. Manafort was later convicted of financial crimes in the United States and pardoned by Mr. Trump.

In this approach, Ukraine, through Mr. Trump’s first term of office, became permitted to buy Javelin tank defense rockets to buy the first deadly military support that was granted to the country-and the introduction of sanctions against Russia’s North Stream Erdgaspipelines.

In today’s Ukraine, many say that they want to have a voice in conversations that will shape their future – and that Mr. Zelensky’s demand is not just a sign of a persistent character, but a broad position in the country. There is hardly an appetite to enable Mr. Trump’s negotiation team to swap the successes of the army in combating Russia near the standstill after three years of war – without being involved in Kyiv.

“The Ukrainians want more peace than any other, but our struggle and the resistance of the Ukrainian military are the only reason why we still exist as a nation and as a topic of international relationships,” said Lt. Pavlo Velychko, who is fighting northeastern Ukraine. “It was not Zelensky who decided what he wanted or not, but all the Ukrainians who got up for the fight.”