The bilateral meeting between US president Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy held at the White House on 28 February 2025, the purpose of which was the signing of a rare earth minerals deal between the two countries, was marked by the unprecedently harsh tone adopted by both sides in getting their disagreements out in the open, thus generating headlines around the world and also temporarily influencing certain policy actions on the part of the Trump administration, to the detriment of the Ukrainian side.

One of the major themes that emerged out of the heated exchanges between the politicians concerned the notion of gratitude, with Trump and Vice President JD Vance repeatedly berating Zelenskyy for supposedly not being sufficiently thankful and not behaving in a deferential fashion, in accordance with him being the recipient of US aid. Even prior to the contentious discussion with Zelenskyy, Trump had been highly critical of the amount of financial assistance provided to the war-torn country. However, even though US support has undoubtedly constituted a cornerstone in terms of allowing Ukraine to at least maintain parity in the fight for its continued existence as a fully sovereign state, there are in fact plenty of grounds on which to challenge the narrative that Ukraine is unduly benefiting at the expense of the United States.

Firstly, if we are to adopt a purely transactionalist approach to international relations, it is still clear that the aid provided to Ukraine does not tell the full story with regard to the dividends being reaped. One comprehensive study from early 2024 reveals that in actuality as much as 90% of the funds allocated as aid for Ukraine remain in the United States, encouraging investments by US defense contractors in facilities for industrial manufacturing and thus bringing about the opening of new workplaces for Americans in more than 30 states. Key munitions that serve the Ukrainian war effort are produced in full on US territory. Not surprisingly, industrial production in the US defense and aerospace sector has seen an increase of 17.5% since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Given that Trump has on numerous occasions displayed pride in what he has assumed to be a natural aptitude on his part with regard to boosting job creation, the investment in Ukraine is actually fully in line with one of the overarching economic goals of his presidency.

It is worth noting that purely transactionalist criteria cannot necessarily be neatly isolated from other, less easily measurable indicators. There is solid evidence that countries that draw admiration for their soft power are more successful with their exports in the global marketplace and are significantly more likely to become export powerhouses. The existence of a virtuous circle, as a result of which strong soft power projection is helpful in terms of enhancing the capacity to trade, foreign direct investment (FDI), and economic clout, is well-established. Thus, continued US support for Ukraine is likely to further increase the country’s soft power, laying the groundwork for additional improvements when it comes to economic performance as well.

Moreover, though Trump has frequently engaged in such rhetoric since his first presidency, he had until 2022 not seen much success in his attempts to get EU countries to ramp up the contributions to their own security. Before the massive escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian war, few countries in Europe used more than 2% of their GDP (gross domestic product) on defense spending. To put things in perspective, nowadays more than 10 European NATO members’ military expenditures exceed this percentage in relation to their GDP. Thus, Ukraine’s valor and resilience in the face of adversity, which has not allowed Russia to present Europe with a fait accompli, as it happened in 2014 with the latter’s quick annexation of Crimea, has been one of the factors conducive to the potential easing the economic burden on the United States pertaining to the funds allocated for the defense of the country’s European allies.

Secondly, contrary to the prevailing view that the USA is picking up the tab for Ukraine while the Europeans are basically free-riders, calculations made by the Kiel Institute in Germany reveal that European military aid for Ukraine has been comparable to that of the United States, constituting approximately $1.8 billion per month, being especially crucial in late 2023 and early 2024 when the US Congress was in the process of debating the next aid package for Ukraine.

Thirdly, even though over the course of the last two years the conflict between Ukraine and Russia has been characterized as starting to resemble a military stalemate, the uncertain final outcome of the war notwithstanding, the United States in many respects remains a beneficiary when it comes to the chessboard on which the struggle for global primacy plays out due to the military of Russia (a significant geopolitical adversary) being severely degraded, at the cost of less than 2% of the US federal budget. As for the human capital factor, the United States has, at least officially, not sustained a single casualty, for which Lindsay Graham, the Senator from South Carolina, explicitly praised the Ukrainians a few days prior to the much publicized meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump.

With regard to US soft power, it is also worth keeping in mind that a rapid Russian victory, for instance as a result of Russia being successful in taking over Kyiv in early 2022, would likely have left Washington with relatively few options to drastically change the course of events, with this being a serious blow to the country’s international standing, especially given that such a development would have occurred shortly after the 2020-2021 pullout from Afghanistan, which has been characterized as miscalculated and a massive policy failure. In fact, if Russia had been able to achieve its maximalist aims in Ukraine, this would have likely taken the gloss off the United States being spot on in its intelligence during the prelude to Russia’s invasion – in spite of Russian politicians’ denials, US officials had correctly predicted the full extent of the Russian onslaught and informed their Ukrainian counterparts of the possible repercussions. Thus, one could cautiously make the argument that the Ukrainians’ ability to overcome the odds in the face of a powerful nemesis and the role played by the United States in terms of providing them with a much needed early warning about Russia’s true intentions have arguably served to at least partially reduce the public scrutiny and take the spotlight off the botched US exit from Afghanistan.

Furthermore, if we are to extend our analysis beyond the pragmatic factors, there are ample reasons to assume that helping Ukraine constitutes a US obligation rather than simply a display of a spirit of magnanimity towards the Eastern European country. Putin’s decision to invade was in direct violation of the Budapest Memorandum, an important instrument that included a pledge on the part of the signatories pertaining to the preservation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and which is also part of the broader nuclear non-proliferation regime that largely corresponds to the interests of nuclear powers such as the United States. The ambiguous wording notwithstanding, which makes it somewhat open to debate whether the memorandum constitutes a treaty under international law or merely a political deal, some scholars have advanced the argument that the commitments toward Ukraine undertaken in the Budapest Memorandum are legally binding by other means like the UN Charter, especially given that Russia remains a member of the UN, with one of the implications being that the other signatories such as the United States are not expected to merely remain bystanders. Prior to 2022, US negotiator Steven Pifer recalled that in the discussions about the Budapest Memorandum the United States did not promise unlimited support, but still clearly stated that it would take a strong interest in and respond to any violations of the agreement or the memorandum’s spirit, including by providing military assistance. Accordingly, it is evident that in offering military support to Ukraine, Washington is not engaging in charity, but is fulfilling its part of the bargain, as stipulated under international law. Similarly, former US President Bill Clinton has openly expressed regret for playing a role in Ukraine’s surrender of its nuclear arsenal in the 1990s, thus being inclined to view continued US support for the Eastern European country as reflective of the underlying motivation to at least partially undo an injustice.

Lastly, the United States has built its identity around its commitment to the spirit of freedom and opposition to totalitarian excesses. In addition to certain shocking atrocities committed against Ukrainian civilians, such as the Bucha massacre, Celeste Wallander, an American international relations advisor who served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs at the United States Department of Defense under Joe Biden, has referred to Russia’s abductions and forceful adoptions of Ukrainian children as reflective of Nazi-like purity ideas, while the attempts to erase their national identities through Russification have been depicted by some scholars as essentially falling under the definition of acts of genocide. Thus, staying out of the fight or even doing the bare minimum in terms of supporting Ukraine is to a large extent in contradiction with the self-identity of many Americans and the moral leadership or relatively benign realism that is often associated with US hegemony.

All in all, no matter what political, economic or social sphere is put on the radar, Ukraine can hardly be considered to be a burden on the United States and has actually in many respects contributed to advancing vital US interests. The public bust-up between Trump and Zelenskyy, a few days after which the United States suspended military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine, is thus hopefully just a bump in the road when it comes to Ukraine-United States relations. The lifting of the security sharing pause after the meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia between the American and Ukrainian delegations that was held on 11 March 2025 is probably a sign that the Trump administration has come to the realization that a strong partnership with Ukraine is far from a one-way-street in terms of the benefits likely to accrue to both sides, with the Ukrainians more than deserving to see themselves as equals rather than merely junior partners.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author(s) alone and do not necessarily reflect those of Geopoliticalmonitor.com.

*This article was originally published on March 31, 2025.