US President Donald Trump saw that Ukraine is not a weak side and has allies, and he can change his strategy, while Europe and Kyiv need to align their strategies with the United States as much as possible.

This was stated in a comment to Ukrinform by Orisya Lutsevych, Deputy Director of the Russia and Eurasia Program and Head of the Ukrainian Forum at Chatham House.

The expert believes that we can now enter a new stage of Ukrainian-American relations, because Trump was still in an experimental mode, when his strategy was to try to put pressure on the weaker side, and he believed that this was Ukraine. But Trump saw that Ukraine is not so weak, and Europe is on its side. At the same time, he saw that it is very difficult to conduct business negotiations with Russia, and Putin is actually ideologically bent on this war and is no longer the person Trump knew him to be.

"Therefore, it is very important now that Ukraine and Europe align their strategies with Washington as closely as possible, so that pressure on Russia is not only rhetorical, as Trump said, but also practical. This applies primarily to armaments," Lutsevich noted.

She recalled that the United States is not currently providing Ukraine with weapons at its own expense, and the existing mechanisms for their purchase are very limited. The $2 billion spent this year is not the amount that Ukraine needs, especially when it comes to very expensive long-range ammunition.

At the same time, the expert drew attention to what Trump said about a counteroffensive: he said that Ukraine is preparing for it and is capable of it.

"I think this is more rhetorical pressure on Russia to show what the consequences could be for it if it does not sit down at the negotiating table," suggests Lutsevich.

Speaking about the planned meeting of Presidents Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky in Washington on Friday, the expert noted that we need to wait to see what the joint statement will be. In her opinion, the meeting at the White House with European leaders after Trump's summit with Putin in Alaska clearly demonstrated to the American president that Europe supports Ukraine, and perhaps that is why he decided that he could also put pressure on Europe, in particular on the issue of sanctions.

But the worst-case scenario has been avoided so far. First, America is still selling weapons to Ukraine — although there were fears that the US would completely block access to them. This did not happen. Second, Europe understood that it had to buy these weapons and spend money on them. Third, Ukraine is developing its warfighting capabilities — these are long-range missiles and drones. Therefore, I think that if we now adapt to this new stage in relations between the US and Europe, then Ukraine will withstand, that there will be no such pressure on it to force it to agree to limit its sovereignty or to legally recognize Russia's territorial gains. But whether we can reach a better scenario — we still need to work on this, - concluded Lutsevich.

As reported, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is scheduled to meet with Donald Trump in Washington on Friday.

The US President expressed his belief that the UAV wants to go on the offensive in the war unleashed by the Russian Federation, and will discuss this with the Ukrainian leader.