It is a policy shift for the US, which had provided about US$67 billion ($113b) worth of weapons and other military aid directly to Ukraine during the Biden Administration.
It will also offer a financial windfall for American weapons producers while shielding Trump — who has expressed scepticism of devoting US military support to Ukraine — from accusations of direct involvement in the war.
“It’s not a game-changer for Ukraine’s Air Force, but it might signal that there’s a productive conversation between Europeans and the Trump Administration, in terms of future supply of modern equipment to Ukraine,” said Rafael Loss, a defence and security expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations.
Last month, Trump said European allies had agreed to buy American-made weapons for Ukraine under a deal clinched with Nato Secretary-General Mark Rutte.
Previously, the Biden Administration had sent new shipments of weapons to Ukraine, from air defences and tanks to ammunition, every few weeks since the start of the war.
That included a period when supplies began to run out in 2023 during a 119-day debate in a Republican-led Congress over whether to continue the paying for them.
Some of the military aid committed to Ukraine under the Biden Administration was still in the pipeline when Trump took office.
He has paused and restarted the weapons flow several times and said in July that Ukraine needed additional US military aid — although he did not say how much — to defend itself from a ferocious uptick in Russian attacks.
A week later, he announced the agreement to sell the weapons to European allies, who then would pass them on to Ukraine.
Trump has sought to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine, but his effort has largely stalled since his high-profile meetings last month with President Vladimir Putin of Russia in Alaska and, days later, with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine and European leaders in Washington.
Steve Witkoff, who serves as Trump’s special envoy to Russia, met senior Ukrainian officials in New York on Saturday to discuss a way forward.
Russia has continued to pound Ukraine with airstrikes, including a barrage last week that killed at least 23 people in Kyiv, the capital, including four children. The United Nations Security Council met on Saturday NZT to discuss the attacks.
At that meeting, John Kelley, the acting US representative, condemned Russia’s latest attack on Ukraine, saying it “cast doubt on the seriousness of Russia’s desire for peace”.
He then said continued aggression from Moscow could be met with economic consequences. Trump has threatened tougher sanctions but has so far not followed through.
Speaking to reporters in Kyiv, Zelenskyy expressed his desire to intensify discussions about security guarantees that Western partners can provide to post-war Ukraine to deter further Russian aggression.
He said the discussions, which have taken place between top government officials and advisers, should be elevated to country leaders.
He also said he hoped the legislatures of Ukraine’s allies would ratify any eventual agreed-upon guarantees to make them legally binding.
In August, the Netherlands pledged to pay for an initial US$500m package of American equipment and munitions that Ukraine said it urgently needed. The next day, Denmark, Norway and Sweden said they would finance another US$500m package of US-made materiel for Ukraine.
It was not clear if the cruise missiles that were announced last week were part of either package.
The missiles can be fired from the F-16 fighter jets that Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway are giving to Ukraine. Belgium is also poised to send a first shipment of the fighter jets soon.
A former senior Defence Department official said that the US weapons would provide Ukraine’s Air Force a new capability and fill a gap in the country’s munitions arsenal. But the former official cautioned that the weapons would not necessarily be game- changers.
Germany also recently pledged a big donation to Ukraine: two more Patriot air defence systems that fire missiles to intercept incoming projectiles.
As part of the deal with Trump, Germany will receive priority to buy new Patriots from the US. The systems cost about US$1b each and can take years to build.
Ukraine is buying some military aid directly from the US. The purchases include more than US$200m in equipment and support for howitzer guns and transportation services last month, and about US$322m in parts for Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles and Hawk surface-to-air missile systems in July.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Lara Jakes
Photograph by: Finbarr O’Reilly
©2025 THE NEW YORK TIMES
