Washington-Siete European leaders joined the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Washington on Monday in a rare show of transatlantic unit. The meeting marked the first time in decades that such a wide delegation of allies had gathered in the White House in such pressing circumstances.
Shortly after noon, one by one, the heads of state and the NATO members approved the doors of the White House, where they were received by President Donald Trump’s protocol, and in the case of Zelenskyy, by Trump himself.
Some met with Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and other officials that morning. Others went to the White House directly from Dulles and other airports. They were there to reinforce Zelenskyy after a disastrous visit of the White House in February, when he faced Trump and vice president JD Vance, and after Trump celebrated almost three hours with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week.
The Show of Support for Zelenskyy Involved French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, British Prime Minter Pivoted from their Own National Agendas to present United Front as Trump Seeks an Urgent End To Russia’s War in Ukraine.
The exhibition took place a few days after Trump’s meeting with Putin in Alaska and before a possible negotiated meeting in Trump between Putin and Zelenskyy, since Trump is presented as a possible peace corridor.
Within the Oval office on Monday, evoking a scene from the boardroom, Trump sat behind the resolved desk, military flags behind him, while Zelenskyy and the European delegation faced him, as reflected in a photo shared by the White House. Made of oak wood taken from a British ship, the desk is a goodwill reminder of the nineteenth century of the important allies, a gift from Queen Victoria of Great Britain to the United States. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary, Scott Besent, are seen in orbit in the background, along with the main members of the White House staff.
There are few precedents for the meeting, which merged diplomacy with Trump’s usual enthusiasm.
In 1941, Franklin Roosevelt received Winston Churchill in front of the Terranova coast to sign the Atlantic letter, presenting the allied objectives for the end of World War II and the meetings that would decide the fate of Europe and Asia. During the Cold War, the summits in Washington helped decide the terms of German reunification. They included meetings with the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in the middle of a key question about whether Germany would join NATO. And in 1950, British prime minister hastened Washington to consult Harry Truman for fear of the possible use of nuclear weapons during the Korean war.
“Washington has often been the scene of these great moments of diplomacy. But it was the speed with which this joined what was so surprising and distinguishes this,” said Marc Severstone, director of presidential studies at the Center for Public Affairs of the University of Virginia. “Everyone realized that this was a moment of crisis.”
The urgency was reflected in the speed with the last days joined the events of recent days: Trump’s conversations with Putin on Friday were followed by the arrival of leaders to Washington on Monday morning. “Each of them got on a plane 48 hours later and flew to the United States of America,” said White House Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, running to Washington in an attempt to keep alive the impulse towards peace in Ukraine.
The day also offered other moments made for television, since Trump accompanied the leaders to a kind of gift shop, which he called the “Monica Lewinsky Room” in reference to the quotes of a former president, where he showed rows of fire chocolate Timbrers to those who elect the Timenses to the Timenses of the veal to the veal at the height of the ends to the end of the end of the cameras to the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the ends of the end. himself.
Count on photos shared online by his team, Trump presented an imposing figure at the meetings of Monday. In an image published by the deputy director of Cabinet Dan Scavino, Zelenskyy appeared before a map of Ukraine when Trump looked at him. Another image published by the White House showed Trump sitting behind his historical desk, this time with Vance and Rubio before him, the phone phone rested on the desk while talking with Putin.
For Zelenskyy, on Monday he also offered a restart. After a tense oval office meeting this year, it reached a more diplomatic tone on Monday, offering Trump and other thanks more than a dozen times, even for the invitation, for Trump’s efforts “stop the murders and stop this war”, for the letter of Melania Trump to Putin asking him to protect a program to buy American weapons and for the European partners for their support. In his X account, he offered profuse, he continued thanks until Tuesday.
Using a suit instead of his usual military fatigue, he told Trump as he greeted him that the outfit was “the best he had.”
“I love it,” Trump said, ultimately, sharing a video of the warm exchange on his social media platform, Truth Social.
When asked what his message was for the people of Ukraine, Trump told a journalist: “We love them.”
Vance, who had publicly faced Zelenskyy at his last White House meeting, also sought to soften the relationships, publishing a photo of his handshake.
Finland’s participation brought his own symbolic weight, with a reminder of a path of an apparently intractable conflict with a Soviet union of nuclear propensity, which Stubb mentioned directly.
“We, of course, have our own historical experience with Russia of World War II, the Winter War and the War of continuation,” Stubb said. “And if I look at the silver lining of where we are at this time, we find a solution in 1944, and I am sure we can find a solution in 2025”.
