Vice -president JD Vance met the Ukrainian president Volodomyr Zensky in Munich on Friday evening at a crucial moment in the war against Russia and while Washington insists on a negotiated peace agreement.
Zensky has made it clear that he will not meet Putin until he has made a plan with President Donald Trump.
That gave the meeting of Friday an extra frisson of tension, as the couple gathered on the sidelines of the Munich security conference, in a basement room of the hotel where Vance and the American delegation stayed.
Vance said the goal was to find a “permanent, sustainable peace,” but Zensky has recorded his business results.
“We really want, we want this very much, but we need real security guarantees,” he said, referring to requests that the US and the European Union endorse every peace agreement.
And he said they had to come together to stop the Russian war machine.
“We have to speak more, work more and prepare the plan … How to stop Putin,” he said.
Earlier, in a speech to the conference, he said Trump had given him his mobile phone number.
The Ukrainian president Volodomyr Zensky said 'We need real security guarantees' after meeting vice president JD Vance in Munich on Friday evening
Vance was flanked by Keith Kellogg, Trump's Envoy, and State Secretary Marco Rubio
The meetings come in the midst of mixed messages from Washington.
Trump has led a softening of the American position on Ukraine and held a 90 -minute call on Wednesday with Putin.
He called on Russia to be re -admitted to the G7 group of highly industrialized countries and suggested that he trusted Putin to close a deal.
It led to pushback from European leaders who said that Zensky must be part of any conversations.
Vance offered a more robust line when he was interviewed on Thursday by the Wall Street Journal, which suggests that military violence could be used to convince Russian President Vladimir Putin to reach a deal.
“There are economic aids for leverage, there are of course military tools for leverage,” the US could use, VANCE told the newspaper.
VANCE gave the interview prior to a major speech at Munich's safety conference, at a time of world products, because the established world order threatens to crumble under Putin's attack on Ukraine.
It overshadowed events for the rest of the days.
Vice President JD Vance took European leaders on their own backyard with a fiery speech at the Munich Safety Conference on Friday afternoon
Vance's public from European VIPs was given about democracy and freedom of expression
He used the speech to give European leaders about freedom of expression and said they should do more to pay for their own defense.
“Europe stands for many challenges, but the crisis that this continent is currently confronted with, the crisis that I believe we are all confronted together is one of our own making,” he said.
“If you run out of fear of your own voters, there is nothing that America can do for you, nor is there something that you can do for the American people who have chosen me and chosen President Trump.”
If his audience of European VIPs expected VANCE to discuss the future of the war in Ukraine and outlined Donald Trump's peace plan, they were for a shock.
Some shifted in their seats while attacking European politicians.
He accused officials of the European Union of 'Canceling elections and asked whether' we are sticking to a suitable higher standard '.
