Analyzing The Ambiguity Over The American-NATO Arms Arrangement For Ukraine

Andrew Korybko 

The Europeans’ compliance or lack thereof will play a crucial role in the conflict’s future course

The offensive dimension of Trump’s new three-pronged approach to Ukraine involves the sale of American weapons to NATO who’ll in turn transfer them to Ukraine. This aligns with what Trump told NBC several days prior to the aforesaid announcement. According to Reuters’ sources, however, “Trump presented a framework - not a fleshed-out plan”, and some of the six countries that NATO chief Rutte mentioned will participate in this scheme allegedly only found out about it during that time.

Other reports then circulated about France, Italy, and Czechia’s refusal to participate on various pretexts ranging from their principled support for the European defense industry, which would struggle to fulfill its potential if EU countries buy more expensive US arms, to simple budgetary concerns. The resultant ambiguity over the American-NATO arms arrangement for Ukraine that Trump announced accordingly raises questions about what’s really going on. There are three likely explanations.

The first is that there were innocent communication issues between the US, NATO, and the bloc’s individual members, but that’s difficult to believe since everyone just gathered for the latest NATO Summit less than a month ago. This arrangement was presumably discussed during that time. It would also contextualize their agreement to raise defense spending to 5% of GDP, especially if the Europeans expected to purchase more expensive arms for transfer to Ukraine as part of this arrangement.

The second explanation is that nothing concrete was agreed to, at least with all members, during that summit. This would account for why some of them were reportedly caught by surprise and others refuse to participate. In this scenario, Trump’s announcement would have been meant to pressure them into this profitable arrangement to “save face” since all but Hungary and Slovakia (which also won’t participate) have consistently claimed that they’ll support Ukraine “for as long as it takes”.

And finally, the last possibility is that the analyzed media reports are part of a deception campaign along the lines of what Israeli media claimed that Trump and Bibi pulled off ahead of them bombing Iran. This version of events assumes that there’s much more agreement between NATO members behind the scenes than has been reported. The purpose of claiming otherwise would be to get Russia’s guard down ahead of what could be NATO’s rapid rearmament of Ukraine with American weapons.

Whichever explanation(s) one adheres to, more clarity will be forthcoming from Russian media reports, which will reveal the existence of these new arms on the battlefield or lack thereof ahead of the expiry of Trump’s 50-day deadline. If lots of US arms flood into Ukraine, then it’ll show that there was enough agreement and capacity to back up his threat. If not, then he might blame the Europeans for fumbling it, after which he might only impose some secondary sanctions but no longer militarily escalate.

Trump repeatedly said that the Europeans must step up since this conflict is waged on their continent. If enough prioritize other interests over supporting Ukraine “for as long as it takes”, however, then Trump likely isn’t going to have the US once again “lead from the front”, do the “heavy lifting”, and thus let them keep “freeloading” off of it since that would betray his planned reform of US-NATO relations. The Europeans’ compliance or lack thereof will therefore play a crucial role in the conflict’s future course. 

Andrew Korybko, Substack, July 19, 2025  

Anteriores: 
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