Editor’s note: This piece was originally published on 27 February but was updated in light of recent events. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, left the White House without signing the expected deal on mineral rights on 28 February after an explosive encounter with Donald Trump and his vice president, JD Vance. After berating Zelensky in front of the cameras, Trump accused him of disrespecting the US and told him to “come back when he is ready for peace”.
The US treasury secretary Scott Bessent travelled to Kyiv on 12 February to present Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky with an offer he could not refuse. According to multiple accounts, the US envoy slid a document across the table to Zelensky with a deal to sign away the rights to 50 per cent of his country’s mineral resources, worth $500bn, to the United States. “You really need to sign this,” Bessent told Zelensky, according to the Wall Street Journal. He warned him that “people back in Washington” would be very upset if he refused.
Bessent’s prediction proved accurate. When Zelensky demurred, insisting that he needed time to study the proposal, Trump and his senior officials began openly threatening the Ukrainian leader. In the days that followed, the US president falsely accused Ukraine of starting the war with Russia and lashed out at Zelensky, calling him a “dictator.” In a social media post on 19 February, Trump warned him that he “better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left”. When Zelensky pushed back, lamenting that the US president seemed to be “caught in a web of disinformation”, the US national security adviser Mike Waltz cautioned him to “tone it down and take a hard look and sign that deal”.
Zelensky held his ground in public, insisting on 23 February that he would not be “signing something that 10 generations of Ukrainians will have to repay”. But behind the scenes his officials were already negotiating with their US counterparts as Zelensky acknowledged they might be left with little alternative but to come to terms. “If we are forced and we cannot do without it,” he said, “then we should probably go for it.”
Two days later, Trump announced that they had agreed a “very big deal” on “rare earth and various other things,” which he expected Zelensky to travel to Washington on 28 February to sign. Asked what Ukraine would receive in return, he replied, “$350bn and lots of equipment, military equipment and the right to fight on.” (That figure appears to refer to the $350bn Trump falsely claims the US has spent on military and economic aid to Ukraine since the start of the war, with the real figure closer to $120bn by December 2024 according to the Kiel Institute’s Ukraine war tracker.)
While the details of the final deal – and indeed whether the two leaders will actually sign it – are still unclear, the terms appear less onerous than the initial document Bessent presented to Zelensky in Kyiv, according to the latest drafts shared with media organisations. Ukraine will still agree to sign over 50 per cent of the proceeds “earned from the future monetization of all relevant Ukrainian Government-owned natural resource assets… [including] deposits of minerals, hydrocarbons, oil, natural gas, and other extractable materials.” But the US appears to have dropped its demand for a $500bn stake – a figure the Trump administration appears to have plucked from the ether as “payback” for past American support.
The resulting revenues will be invested in a “Reconstruction Investment Fund” to be jointly managed by the US and Ukraine, although the US government will hold the “maximum percentage of ownership” permitted under US laws. At least some of the funds will then be invested in reconstruction projects in Ukraine. Zelensky’s negotiators also fought hard to insert a reference to the need for security guarantees for Ukraine to prevent a renewed Russian assault. The resulting language, however, is vague and noncommittal, merely stating that the US “supports Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees needed to establish lasting peace.” Trump later told his cabinet, “We’re going to have Europe do that.”
Still, this is what amounts to a diplomatic victory for Ukraine in 2025. Zelensky does not have the luxury of retreating into justifiable outrage at Trump’s predatory demands, and this entirely needless crisis over the rights to hypothetical future mineral revenues at a time when the country is fighting a war to survive. Ukrainian soldiers are dying on the front lines as they attempt to hold back the Russian advance in the east. Ukrainian towns and cities are under continuing bombardment. Ukrainian children have been kidnapped en masse and taken to Russia. The Ukrainian leader has been clear that the country has a “low chance” of survival without American support. He understands that he must find a way to manage the relationship with a US president who seems barely able to conceal his admiration for Vladimir Putin, and to be interested solely in what he can extract – perhaps literally – from Ukraine.
In fact, it was Zelensky’s idea to draw attention to Ukraine’s mineral resources – such as titanium, lithium, and rare earth metals – which he highlighted in his October 2024 “Victory Plan” ahead of the US presidential election, noting the potential investment opportunities for Ukraine’s strategic partners. He was under no illusions, even then, that Trump would consider the threat to Ukrainian sovereignty, European security, and liberal democracy to be worth fighting for. He needed to come up with something more tangible that would appeal to Trump’s nakedly transactional approach to the world. (Putin understands this too, which is presumably why he has boasted of Russia’s own significant mineral deposits in recent days, signalling his openness to joint ventures with US companies to exploit resources in both Russia and the Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine.)
In the most hopeful scenario for Ukraine, Trump is now satisfied with having strong-armed Zelensky into this deal and secured “payback” for the American public. Perhaps he will then move on to bullying other targets in search of his next “big deal” – returning to his grievances against Mexico and Canada, or plotting the takeover of Greenland and the Panama Canal. But it is unrealistic to imagine that Trump will now be meaningfully more inclined to help defend Ukraine. At best, Zelensky will have bought himself time by fending off Trump’s wrath in the immediate term, but if past form is any guide the US president will soon return with more complaints and new demands.
[See also: How will Britain pay for higher military spending?]
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