Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth rejected the premise of concern coming from European leaders about the proposed negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
The secretary, who is on his first trip to Europe since assuming the role, participated in Tuesday’s Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting and Wednesday’s NATO defense ministerial.
Hegseth said Wednesday that it was “unrealistic” for Ukraine to attempt to get all of its territory back from Russia and that the United States does not “believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement,” both of which sparked concerns from Ukraine and its allies.
He pushed back on that criticism in new comments Thursday.
“It’s just a cheap political point to say, ‘Oh, we’ve left all the negotiating cards off the table’ by recognizing some realities that exist on the ground,” he explained. “President Zelensky understands the realities on the ground, President Putin understands the realities on the ground, and President Trump, as a deal maker, as a negotiator, understands those dynamics as well.”
“I think realism is an important part of the conversation that hasn’t existed enough inside conversations among friends, but simply pointing out realism, like the borders, won’t be rolled back to what everybody would like them to be in 2014 is not a concession to Vladimir Putin,” Hegseth added. “It’s a recognition of hard power realities on the ground after a lot of investment and sacrifice, first by the Ukrainians and then by allies, and then a realization that a negotiated peace is going to be some sort of demarcation that neither side wants.”
President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that peace negotiations would begin after he held a conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin before he spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, whom he talked to shortly thereafter.
Trump also raised eyebrows when he responded to a question from a reporter about whether Ukraine was an equal member of the peace process, saying, “It’s an interesting question,” before adding, “I think they have to make peace. Their people are being killed, and I think they have to make peace. I said that was not a good war to go into, and I think they have to make peace. That’s what I think.”
Several European leaders spoke up in the aftermath of the U.S.’s comments, which appeared to give Russia favorable leverage in future negotiations to end its war in Ukraine partly because both of Hegseth’s admissions represented the opposite of what Zelensky has spent more than a year advocating.
“There can be no negotiation about Ukraine without Ukraine, and Ukraine’s voice must be at the heart of any talks,” U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey said Thursday.
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius added, “In my view, it would have been better to talk about Ukraine’s possible NATO membership or the country’s possible loss of territory only at the negotiating table and not to take it off the table beforehand.”
Lithuanian Defense Minister Dovile Sakaliene said any negotiations that are agreed upon by Putin and Trump exclusively would be a “deadly trap.”
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“Whether we decide to fall under the illusion that Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin are going to find a solution for all of us, and that would be a deadly trap, or we will, as Europe, embrace our own economic, financial, and military capacity,” she explained.
Hegseth, during his Thursday press conference, was asked but did not directly answer what concessions Putin would be asked to make to end the war.