On August 18, a US source familiar with the matter said that Ukraine had sent a proposal to the US government, with the aim of purchasing $90 billion in weapons using European funding. This is seen as an effort to seek a US security commitment.
In the document that the source accessed, although not detailed, Ukraine is likely to buy 10 more patriot air defense systems (each cluster costs about 1 billion USD).
In addition to purchasing weapons, the document also outlines a $50 billion deal to call for US partners to participate in the production of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Not stopping there, the document also requires Russia to compensate Ukraine for the damage in the conflict, possibly through $300 billion in Russian assets being frozen in Western countries.
In addition to Washington, the document was also sent to several European countries in support of Kiev, just before US President Donald Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House on August 18.
Speaking after the meeting, Mr. Zelensky not only confirmed the existence of the above document, but also revealed that the US may buy UAVs from Ukraine if the two sides cooperate in production. This is very important for us, Zelensky said.
Observers say Kiev's initiative was designed to violate the "America First" policy, convincing President Trump to make the same defense guarantees to Ukraine as what his predecessor Washington's administration has done, which is almost free military aid.
However, in a recent statement, when asked about the possibility of providing additional military equipment packages to Ukraine in the future, the US leader was determined to affirm: "We are not giving anything, we are selling weapons".
Previously, on August 10, Vice President J.D. Vance also affirmed that the US would not directly supply any weapons to Ukraine, but noted that Kiev was still capable of receiving weapons from Washington but under the form of European payment and the US would "completely agree with that".
With the viewpoint of "only selling, not giving", the prospect of the US continuing to provide unconditional military aid to Ukraine as under President Joe Biden seems unlikely to repeat.
However, other security commitments are still likely to be maintained, as Trump himself had asserted to Zelensky that the US would participate in ensuring security for Ukraine in a peace deal, although the specific level of support has not yet been clearly defined.
