Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that US troops must be included in a Western peacekeeping force that he wants deployed to Ukraine as part of a potential peace deal with Russia.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Zelensky called for 200,000 European troops to be sent to Ukraine to uphold a peace deal, an idea that’s a non-starter for talks with Moscow.
“We need contingents with a very strong number of soldiers,” Zelensky said. “From all the Europeans? Two hundred thousand. It’s a minimum. Otherwise, it’s nothing.”
In an interview with Bloomberg following the remarks, Zelensky said US troops needed to be involved, or the Europeans wouldn’t want to be involved. “It can’t be without the United States. Even if some European friends think it can be, no, it can’t be. Nobody will risk without the United States,” he said.
The Wall Street Journal reported in December that President Trump wanted European troops to deploy to Ukraine to enforce a ceasefire, but the idea was quickly dismissed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who said Moscow was “certainly not satisfied” with the proposal.
One of Russia’s primary motivations for launching its invasion of Ukraine was the country’s alignment with NATO, and Ukrainian neutrality is a key Russian demand for peace, meaning Moscow won’t settle for an agreement that involves a major Western troops presence in Ukraine.
The Trump administration has said its official policy is to end the war in Ukraine, and Trump has tasked his envoy to the conflict, Keith Kellog, to achieve that goal within 100 days. But it remains unclear what sort of deal the US may offer Russia.
