Ukraine would have a “very, very difficult” time surviving without U.S. military support to fend off Russia’s invasion, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a interview broadcast the night before he is scheduled to address the Munich Security Conference.
“Probably it will be very, very, very difficult. And of course, you know in all the difficult situations, you have a chance,” he told NBC News. “But we will have low chance — low chance to survive without support of the United States.”
Zelenskyy also said that Ukraine has increased its war production but not enough to make up for what it would lose if it did not have U.S. backing.
Zelenskyy on Feb. 14 took part in a day of meetings and news briefings at the Munich Security Conference as efforts to seek a resolution to the war ramp up. The Ukrainian president is scheduled to deliver a speech on diplomacy and prospects for Ukraine’s future at the conference on Feb. 15.
He will take the spotlight after meeting with top U.S. officials, including Vice President JD Vance, who stressed the need for a “durable, lasting peace” in Ukraine in his speech to the conference on Feb. 14. Zelenskyy told Vance that Ukraine wants “security guarantees” from Washington before any negotiations with Russia on ending almost three years of war.
Zelenskyy said in the interview that he doesn’t want to think about Ukraine not being a strategic partner of the United States because it would damage Ukrainian morale, but added, “We have to think about it.”
The United States has sent mixed signals on its strategy, sparking worry in Kyiv that Ukraine could be forced into a bad deal that leaves Putin emboldened.
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told NATO defense ministers earlier this week that it’s “unrealistic” to expect Ukraine’s borders to return to their pre-2014 positions and said NATO membership is not seen by the White House as part of the solution to the conflict.
Ukraine demands Russia withdraw from captured territory and says it must receive NATO membership or equivalent security guarantees to prevent Moscow from attacking again.
Speaking in Warsaw on Feb. 14, he again warned that America’s European NATO partners would have to do far more for their own defense and to secure a future Ukraine peace.
Hegseth also argued that you “don’t have to trust” President Vladimir Putin to negotiate with Russia.
Two days earlier U.S. President Donald Trump said he had a “lengthy and highly productive” phone call with Putin and said they agreed that their teams should begin negotiations immediately.
Zelenskyy responded by saying he wouldn’t accept any deals made without Ukraine’s involvement.
Asked in the interview if he believed that Ukraine would be vulnerable in another few years if a cease-fire were reached, Zelenskyy said: “Yes, I think this can be.”
He said Putin wanted to come to the negotiating table not to end the war but to get a cease-fire deal to lift some sanctions on Russia and allow Moscow’s military to regroup.
“This is really what he wants. He wants pause, prepare, train, take off some sanctions, because of ceasefire,” Zelenskyy said.
Vance, who is representing Trump at the high-profile gathering of world leaders and foreign policy experts, said the United States wants “the kind of peace that’s going to have Eastern Europe in conflict just a couple years down the road.”
There have been a number of “good conversations” with Ukraine, and more would follow “in the days, weeks and months to come,” Vance said.
Zelenskyy agreed, calling the meeting with Vance “a good conversation” and said Kyiv wants to work toward ending Russia’s war in Ukraine, but added that “we need real security guarantees.”
Some information for this report came from NBC News.
