Trump kept Germany’s Scholz unaware of his Ukraine peace plan

Scholz spoke to POLITICO on Wednesday, only hours before the Trump administration’s shock announcement that it would conduct peace negotiations over the head of European leaders, effectively ceding Ukrainian territory to Russia and insisting that Europe should provide the lion’s share of military and financial aid, News.Az reports.

In his conversation with Berlin Playbook, Scholz said he had been receiving indications from Trump and his advisers that Washington would not perform such a dramatic U-turn on support for Kyiv.

Later on Wednesday, Trump announced he would begin immediate negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin while U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ruled out Ukrainian membership in NATO and said Europe “must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and nonlethal aid to Ukraine.”

Hegseth also warned his counterparts at a NATO meeting in Brussels that Ukraine would not be able to take back all the territory Russia had seized, and said there would be no U.S. troops involved in any peacekeeping operation.

The German chancellery has not yet responded to a request for comment relating to the latest developments.

On the question of whether Germany would send troops as part of a peacekeeping operation in Ukraine, Scholz suggested there would be no solution without U.S. involvement.

“It is very clear to me that there must be no solution that is not also a solution in which the U.S. is involved, because transatlantic unity must always be guaranteed,” Scholz said when asked whether Gemany would send troops as part of any potential peacekeeping operation.