Tomahawk Missile Sales Top the Agenda at Trump and Zelensky High-Stakes Meeting

President Donald Trump will meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House on Friday, with the possibility of Tomahawk missile sales to Kyiv at the forefront of discussions. The U.S.-made missiles, described by Trump as “vicious, offensive, incredibly destructive”, can strike targets at least 1,550 miles away and are capable of bypassing heavily defended airspace. Should Trump approve the sale of the highly sophisticated weaponry to Zelensky, military targets in Russia’s two major cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg, would be well within range for Ukraine.  Some of the Tomahawks are also capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Earlier this week, the President hinted he could sell the missiles to Zelensky. “If this war is not going to get settled, I may send Tomahawks,” Trump told reporters as he travelled to Israel on Monday.  On Thursday night during a two-hour long phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump said he brought up the possibility of selling the long-range missiles to Ukraine. “He didn’t like the idea,” the President told reporters. However, Trump also seemed to downplay the idea, claiming he would not want to “deplete” U.S. military resources. And, according to President Putin’s foreign policy advisor, Yuri Ushakov, the Russian leader warned Trump during the phone call that giving Tomahawk missiles to Kyiv would “cause substantial damage to relations between our countries.” Prior to the phone call, the Kremlin warned against a potential Tomahawks deal. “The topic of Tomahawks is of extreme concern. Now is really a very dramatic moment in terms of the fact that tensions are escalating from all sides,” spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told Russian state media on Sunday. Trump, in recent months, has expressed frustration with Russia and Putin. In September, the U.S. leader said Putin had “really let me down” over his failure to end the war in Ukraine. Whether it is Tomahawks, or something less in terms of range or capability, an arms deal could be agreed upon by the two leaders at the White House later today. “As for what Ukraine wants from the United States of America, it is all there. We delivered to the U.S. president a request containing details and illustrations of what Ukraine wants,” Zelensky said in a press conference in Kyiv at the end of September.  The Ukrainian President continued: “We discussed and agreed on the main points with the president. Now we are moving on to practical implementation,” adding that separate agreements, including on the sale of long-range missiles, will also be discussed in Washington.  After arriving in the U.S. on Thursday, Zelensky also met with representatives of defense contractor Lockheed Martin to discuss potential arms deals. “I outlined Ukraine’s specific needs for air defense systems and their compatible missiles, as well as F-16 aircraft,” said Zelensky on X, adding that such defenses were needed in response to “increasingly brutal” Russian strikes on Ukraine. Friday’s meeting comes as Trump also announced a fresh meeting with Putin, this time in Hungary. “President Putin and I will then meet in an agreed upon location, Budapest, Hungary, to see if we can bring this “inglorious” War, between Russia and Ukraine, to an end,” said Trump on Truth Social. The President will be hoping that his upcoming meeting with Putin will be significantly more successful than the last. The leaders last met in Alaska in August, serving as their first in-person encounter since 2019, and was intended to foster discussions about a path toward a potential cease-fire, but it ended earlier than expected and, notably, without a deal being reached. Friday’s meeting in the Oval Office at least marks significant progress in the relationship between Trump and Zelensky. During an astonishing meeting played out in front of the world’s media in February, the Ukrainian President was told by Trump, among other things, that he had “disrespected the U.S.” Vice President J.D. Vance also weighed in. “Have you said thank you once? This entire meeting? Offer some words of appreciation for the United States of America, and the President who’s trying to save your country.” Friday’s meeting between Trump and Zelensky will be the latest encounter between the pair since Trump reassumed office at the beginning of the year. In terms of Ukraine’s other western allies, commitments to defense have already been laid down. During a meeting of the ‘coalition of the willing’ in Paris in September, over 30 countries agreed to security guarantees for Ukraine.  Such assurances included 26 countries committing to deploying boots on the ground in Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping force should a peace deal be reached between Kyiv and Moscow.  French President Emmanuel Macron also suggested that further sanctions would be placed upon Russia by the West, including the U.S, should it not facilitate a one-on-one meeting between Putin and Zelensky. “If Moscow doesn’t want to respect these conditions, we will have to take further steps with the U.S.,” warned Macron. “The key argument here is that there are no limitations for the defence of Ukraine.”