Donald Trump is fulfilling Vladimir Putin's every wish in Ukraine, according to the Kremlin. The shocking public disgrace of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy by Trump and his vice president, JD Vance, went beyond what Russia could have hoped for. As one senior European official said, The only one laughing here is Putin.

Russian assistance was prompt. The deputy chairman of Russia's security council, former president Dmitry Medvedev, claimed that Trump told Zelenskyy "the truth to his face" before saying, "But it's not enough - military aid should be stopped." Alexander Dugin, a Moscow-based political scientist who promotes a "Russian World" worldview to defend Kremlin expansion, claimed that Trump and Vance "wiped their feet on Zelenskyy like a doormat." “Game over.”  An official close to the Kremlin stated that Russia does not have influence over the US.

Kirill Dmitriev, a former Goldman Sachs banker turned key Putin envoy, posted something on X, only to delete it later. He then shared a video of the heated exchange between Trump and Zelenskyy, with the one-word description: "Historic." Putin can afford to simply observe as things seem to go in his favour. He has often questioned Zelenskyy’s legitimacy as Ukraine’s president, since his term ended last year, despite the fact that it was Russia’s invasion that forced Ukraine to declare martial law and suspend elections. Now, voices within the US, close to the Trump administration, are echoing the same sentiment, suggesting Zelenskyy should step down. From Russia’s point of view, U.S. relations with Ukraine—and even with Europe—have almost completely fallen apart. This was a goal that Putin set back in 2007 during a speech at the Munich Security Conference. Interestingly, in 2025, at the same event, Vance echoed some of Putin’s past statements while criticising European values.

Even before peace talks have begun, Trump has already agreed to one of Russia’s key demands: that Ukraine give up its goal of joining NATO. His top officials have stated that Ukraine is unlikely to reclaim the land Russia took in 2014, and Trump has made it clear that U.S. troops will not act as peacekeepers to support a ceasefire. A joint press conference was cancelled, and Zelenskyy left the White House without signing the minerals contract that Trump had made clear was essential to ongoing US engagement with the war-torn nation. Trump wrote on social media that Zelenskyy had "disrespected" the United States and was "not ready for peace if America is involved." 

U.S. aid for Ukraine will be drastically cut as a result of the confrontation, according to Kremlin-connected political strategist Sergei Markov. According to his Telegram post, it demonstrated that Zelenskyy "must leave the post of president as quickly as possible." Shocked European leaders are beginning to grasp the huge impact of the White House conflict. With the possibility of the U.S. pulling back its support, the responsibility for Ukraine’s future and Europe’s security may now fall on them as they face the challenge of dealing with Putin. “Today, it became clear that the free world needs a new leader,” European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas wrote on the X social media platform. “It’s up to us, Europeans, to take this challenge.”