The U.S. agreement this week to allow Ukraine to produce Patriot missiles and President Donald Trump’s praise for President Volodymyr Zelensky are leading the Kremlin to recalibrate its message on the war.
The Kremlin has downplayed the developments but says they will make a peaceful resolution more difficult.
Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, accused Ukraine on Friday of being “unwilling” to engage in a peace process, while Moscow remains open to ending the war through diplomacy. He reiterated that Putin was open to scheduling another phone call with Trump.
The Kremlin has, in fact, repeatedly rejected Zelensky’s offers to meet with Putin and rejected his calls for a full ceasefire.
“One must give credit to Zelensky’s diplomacy,” the Russian political scientist Vladimir Pastukhov wrote Friday on Telegram. “Ukraine managed to reconfigure the anti-Russian alliance into a new alignment — one far more advantageous for itself and increasingly threatening to Russia.”
Zelensky, Trump told reporters Wednesday at the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, has “done an amazing job.” It was a dramatic departure from Trump’s comments during his first year back in office, when he accused the Ukrainian leader of ingratitude for U.S. help and “gambling with World War III.”
“We’re going to give a license to you to make Patriot missiles,” Trump said Wednesday. “That’s pretty cool. This way, you can’t complain that we’re not giving them enough. I said, ‘Make them yourself.’ We haven’t informed the company of that yet, but that’ll work out all right.”
The Patriot missiles, long sought by Kyiv, are among the few Western weapons capable of shooting down the ballistic missiles Russia is increasingly firing at Ukrainian cities.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking alongside Trump, said Russia was finding it harder to defend its own skies. He expressed hope the deal would “create the space now to negotiate the end of this war.”
“It’s an escalation,” Trump added, “but it’s also an escalation that can help lead to an end.”
Peskov, in response, said the Kremlin does not “see an escalation” but said there were “certain misconceptions within the White House administration … regarding the idea that escalation and military pressure can help pave the way for a peaceful settlement.”
He called this “a flawed judgment” and warned it might cause what Russia calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine to go on longer.
“It will result in our having to establish a larger security zone — a larger buffer zone,” he said. “Consequently, stoking tensions and taking actions that drive escalation will in no way contribute to the peace process.”
Peskov downplayed the Patriot deal.
“Yes, it is an obvious fact that the U.S. is continuing full-scale deliveries of weaponry and military technology to Ukraine — we are aware of this,” he said. “At the same time, however, there is a certain duality in the United States’ position: Unlike the Europeans, the U.S. maintains a desire to facilitate a move toward a peace process.”
Russia, which invaded Ukraine, has pressed maximalist demands on Kyiv, including the surrender of territory its forces have not captured. The Kremlin has invited Zelensky to come to Moscow, while the Ukrainian leader has dismissed the offer as a stalling tactic.
“The Kremlin appears to be struggling to adjust its narrative line in response to the Trump administration’s recent denial of Russian negotiating tactics and acknowledgement of Ukrainian battlefield successes,” the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said in a recent analysis.
Pastukhov, who is based in London, said Zelensky had “succeeded in altering — not so much the ‘reality on the ground’ that Putin is so fond of citing, but rather the West’s perception of that reality.”
“Now,” he said, “it is Putin who must rack his brains over how to present the ‘realities on the ground’ in a more favorable light.”
While the U.S. deal is a diplomatic win for Zelensky, military analysts warn it won’t address Ukraine’s immediate needs. Russia is firing ballistic missiles at Ukrainian cities almost daily. Given strict U.S. technology controls and the complexity of the missile systems, full-scale production is likely years away.
Zelensky thanked the United States for the “positive decision.”
“President Trump has repeatedly emphasized that only two or three countries in the world are currently capable of producing Patriots because the others are not technologically ready,” he told reporters Friday. “The United States has recognized Ukraine as a country that is ready to do this.”
Now, he said, his teams need to work out a timeline to set up production. “The sooner we reach an agreement, the sooner we’ll be able to produce Patriots.”
David L. Stern contributed to this report.
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