US troops won't be sent to Ukraine as part of security guarantees, Trump says
Editor's note: This article has been updated to reflect comments from U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Aug. 19 that U.S. soldiers will not be on the ground in Ukraine to ensure security guarantees are upheld, deflecting the responsibility to European allies.
When asked on Fox News if there was an assurance to Americans that U.S. soldiers will not patrol Ukraine's front line region, Trump replied: "Well you have my assurance, you know I'm president. I'm just trying to stop people from being killed."
Earlier in the interview, Trump said that European would lead the charge in ensuring security guarantees on the ground.
"We've got the European nations, they'll frontload it," Trump said. "Some of them: France, and Germany, U.K., they want to have boots on the ground."
Following Trump's comments, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Sky New that it was "premature" to say that British troops will be sent to Ukraine's front line, adding that the country will play their part.
Trump's comments follow a meeting between the U.S. president, President Volodymyr Zelensky, and European allies on Aug. 18 in the White House, where allies made progress in coming to a consensus on what security guarantees for Kyiv may look like.
"We'll give them (Ukraine) very good protection, very good security" Trump told reporters during the meeting, after initially not publicly ruling out the possibility of U.S. troops. The U.S. president added that any security agreements would be done in "coordination with the United States."
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte told Fox News after the meetings that the possibility of sending U.S. or European troops to Ukraine was not even discussed during the meeting.
"That will be part of the discussions, which will now start. We will try to bring them to the next stage of understanding over the coming days and weeks, of course," Rutte said.
European officials later confirmed to the Kyiv Independent that a series of meetings among the participant countries of the "Coalition of the Willing" could take place in the coming days to hash out the details.
During the meeting, European leaders overwhelmingly expressed support for providing "Article 5-style" security guarantees, with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who co-chairs the Coalition fo the Willing, calling the meeting a potential "historic step" for both Ukrainian and broader European security.
The other co-chair, French President Emmanuel Macron, said that security guarantees will consist of a strong Ukrainian army, adding that European allies were "prepared to step up to the plate."
Commenting on his outlook for his country's own security, Zelensky said the first part of these guarantees for Ukraine should be its own "strong army." The second part is a package of American weapons, with Zelensky telling reporters that Ukraine has proposed buying U.S. weapons worth $90 billion as part of the guarantees.
As part of the next steps of the negotiation process, Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin could meet within the next two weeks to discuss territory claims, with plans for a trilateral meeting mediated by Trump afterwards.
Trump and Putin met in Anchorage, Alaska, on Aug. 15 for nearly three hours but failed to reach a ceasefire agreement. Trump later said "many points were agreed to" but offered no specifics.
The last time Zelensky and Putin met in person was in Paris in December 2019 during the Normandy Format talks mediated by France and Germany. They have not held direct talks since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.
