EDITORIAL: Zelensky, the tightrope walker who must please both Washington and Brussels

Introduction: a president forced into diplomatic double-speak

Two capitals, two logics, one man to reconcile them

There is a diplomatic exercise that few leaders in the world master with as much forced consistency as Volodymyr Zelensky. Since the NATO summit held in Ankara on July 8, 2026, the Ukrainian president has been navigating simultaneously between the transactional demands of Washington and the institutional slowness of Brussels, never able to openly favor one over the other. This tightrope diplomacy, conducted under the constant pressure of Russian strikes, deserves to be told for exactly what it is: an exercise in political survival as much as strategy.

In Ankara, Zelensky secured from Donald Trump a promise of a license to co-produce Patriot interceptors, a symbolically powerful gesture whose concrete implementation, according to several specialists cited by Euromaidan Press, remains hostage to terms not yet negotiated with the manufacturers themselves. At the same time, he must keep pressure on European capitals to ensure the promised 70 billion euros translate into real disbursements, not merely summit announcements.

A posture reflecting Ukraine's structural vulnerability

This two-speed diplomacy is not a strategic choice of convenience for Kyiv, it is a necessity imposed by a brutal reality: Ukraine has no sufficient production capacity to defend itself alone against waves of drones and Russian ballistic missiles, and therefore depends almost entirely on the combined goodwill of its American and European partners to keep existing as a sovereign state.

This dependence, however uncomfortable it is to acknowledge publicly, takes nothing away from Zelensky's political courage, as he continues defending his country's interests before interlocutors with sometimes contradictory priorities, never yielding on the fundamental goal of Ukrainian survival and sovereignty.

I consider Volodymyr Zelensky a genuine hero of our time, not because he is infallible, but because summit after summit he keeps defending his country with a consistency few Western leaders could have sustained under this kind of existential pressure.

This tightrope diplomacy is not a sign of Ukrainian weakness, it is on the contrary proof of rare political intelligence: knowing how to hold two partners with opposing logics without ever breaking with either one, that is an exercise few leaders could pull off under such constant wartime pressure.

Ankara, the summit that changed the tone with Trump

A relationship that warmed against all expectations

The Ankara summit marked a notable shift in tone in the relationship between Zelensky and Donald Trump, after several previous encounters that had turned into public acrimony. According to the Los Angeles Times, Trump praised the Ukrainian president's leadership on the battlefield and raised the possibility of a peace deal drawing near, while promising a new American security package for Ukraine.

This shift in the American president's tone, however encouraging, must be weighed with the methodological caution required when dealing with a leader known for the day-to-day variability of his positions. The same summit saw Trump publicly attack several European partners over matters unrelated to Ukraine, notably Greenland and NATO's financial burden-sharing, a reminder of the fundamentally unpredictable nature of his diplomacy.

The Patriot license, symbol of a still-fragile compromise

The announcement of a license allowing Ukraine to co-produce Patriot systems constitutes, on paper, a major advance for the country's air defense. But Zelensky himself, according to Reuters, specified that this agreement had been reached "at the political level" with the United States, a cautious phrasing suggesting the technical and legal details remain to be finalized in the weeks and months ahead.

This caution in Ukrainian presidential communication stands in contrast to the media enthusiasm that immediately followed the announcement, illustrating the diplomatic maturity Zelensky has acquired over the months: he now knows that an American promise, however welcome, must be verified in its details before being presented to his own people as a definitive achievement.

Zelensky has learned, the hard way, not to be dazzled anymore by Trump's spectacular announcements. This caution, acquired through pain, may be one of the most important diplomatic evolutions of his wartime presidency.

Brussels, the fight for disbursed financing, not symbolic pledges

The European loan, a quiet but indispensable pillar

Alongside his efforts in Washington, Zelensky continues waging tight diplomacy in Brussels to secure the actual disbursement of the European loan meant to cover Ukraine's budgetary needs for 2026-2027. This financial mechanism, essential to the daily functioning of the Ukrainian state, remains subject to internal tensions within the European Union, notably the recurring opposition of Hungary under Viktor Orban.

This Brussels battle, less spectacular in media terms than the summits with Trump, is nonetheless just as vital to Ukraine's economic survival: without this constant European financing, the Ukrainian government simply could not pay its civil servants' salaries or maintain the minimal functioning of its public services in the middle of a war.

A diplomacy of patience against European institutional slowness

Unlike Trump's fast, transactional diplomacy, negotiations with Brussels demand from Zelensky a different kind of institutional patience, made of multiple consultations among twenty-seven member states, complex legal compromises, and occasional resistance that must be defused one at a time without ever losing sight of the final goal of disbursed financing.

This dual diplomatic demand, between American transactional speed and European consensus-driven slowness, requires from Zelensky considerable intellectual and political agility, which he has developed over more than four years of war and permanent crisis diplomacy.

Credit must be given to Zelensky's ability to juggle between Trump's transactional bluntness and Brussels' bureaucratic slowness without ever losing patience in public. Few leaders could have withstood this dual pressure without a major diplomatic misstep.

The weight of Orban's Hungary in the Brussels equation

A European Union ally that behaves like a systematic obstacle

Viktor Orban's Hungary continues to be the most predictable, and most frustrating, obstacle in Zelensky's diplomatic efforts in Brussels. This government, known for its persistent ambiguity toward Moscow, systematically uses its veto power or blocking capacity to slow collective European decisions on financing and military support for Ukraine.

This Hungarian obstruction, documented since the start of the conflict, illustrates a real fracture within the European Union over the Ukrainian question, a fracture Zelensky must manage diplomatically without ever publicly breaking with a member state whose complacency toward the Russian aggressor he nonetheless has every reason to denounce.

A diplomacy of workaround rather than direct confrontation

Faced with this recurring obstruction, Zelensky has developed a strategy of diplomatic workaround, seeking qualified majorities or alternative legal mechanisms that allow essential files to keep moving forward without waiting for the unanimity that Hungary systematically refuses to grant.

This pragmatic approach, while it does not fully eliminate friction with Budapest, allows the bulk of European support to keep progressing, demonstrating once again the Ukrainian president's diplomatic adaptability in the face of obstacles he cannot eliminate but is learning to methodically neutralize.

Orban's Hungary's behavior within the European Union should embarrass every Western leader sincerely committed to Ukraine's cause. It is time for Brussels to find more binding mechanisms to neutralize this kind of persistent complacency toward Moscow.

Patriot interceptors, Zelensky's absolute emergency

Thirty ballistic missiles, zero intercepted on July 6

The urgency driving Zelensky to negotiate so fiercely for access to Patriot systems comes down to a chilling statistic: during the Russian strikes of July 6, 2026, Ukrainian air defenses intercepted none of the nearly thirty ballistic missiles fired by Russia, according to the Ukrainian air force itself. This figure illustrates, in the starkest possible terms, the critical interceptor shortfall the country faces today.

This operational reality explains why Zelensky keeps pressing Washington and its European allies not only for a long-term production license, but also for immediate deliveries of existing interceptors, a demand running into the global shortage of these systems, further worsened by needs created by the war in Iran.

An emergency diplomacy that no longer tolerates bureaucratic delays

This military urgency turns every diplomatic negotiation of Zelensky's into a race against time: every week of delay in interceptor deliveries potentially translates into civilian lives lost under Russian strikes, a reality that gives his diplomacy an intensity and gravity few Western observers fully grasp from the relative comfort of their own capitals.

This constant time pressure also explains Zelensky's occasionally visible impatience with institutional slowness, whether from Washington or Brussels, an impatience legitimate given the immediate human cost of every delayed decision on Ukrainian soil.

Zero missiles intercepted out of thirty fired in a single night, that is the kind of statistic that should shame the entire Western diplomatic apparatus. Zelensky negotiates under that pressure, a pressure no one in the West should ever minimize.

Turkey's role, an unpredictable but useful ally

Ankara, summit host and ambiguous regional player

The choice of Ankara as the site of the NATO summit is not incidental to the diplomacy Zelensky must conduct. Turkey, led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, occupies a singular position within the Atlantic Alliance, maintaining significant economic ties with Russia while simultaneously hosting crucial negotiations for military support to Ukraine.

This Turkish ambiguity, which Zelensky must handle with particular delicacy, illustrates the complexity of Western coalition diplomacy, where each ally brings specific assets, in Turkey's case a regional mediating role and strategic access to the Black Sea, while maintaining positions that do not always align perfectly with the firmest Western line toward Moscow.

The lifting of American sanctions on Turkey, an indirect signal for Kyiv

Donald Trump's decision to lift American sanctions against Turkey and restore its access to the F-35 program, announced in the same context as the Patriot license for Ukraine, illustrates the overall transactional logic of this summit diplomacy, where several distinct bilateral files end up negotiated simultaneously, with knock-on effects Zelensky must watch closely to ensure they benefit, at least indirectly, the Ukrainian cause.

This interconnection of diplomatic files, typical of the Trump administration's negotiating style, forces Zelensky into constant vigilance across the entire Western geopolitical chessboard, not just files directly tied to Ukraine, an additional diplomatic burden that reflects the growing sophistication of his presidential diplomacy.

Erdogan's Turkey remains a double-edged ally for the West, but Zelensky is right to work with this ambiguity rather than ignore it: in an existential war, you don't always choose your diplomatic partners, you learn to use them in your country's best interest.

The pressure of the American electoral calendar on Ukrainian diplomacy

Trump and the promise of a peace deal still to be defined

Donald Trump's statements in Ankara raising the possibility of a peace deal drawing near put Zelensky before a delicate diplomatic dilemma: welcoming any prospect of ending the war, while ensuring such a deal does not translate into territorial or political concessions unacceptable to Ukrainian sovereignty, under pressure from an American ally mindful of his own political record.

This tension between the legitimate aspiration for peace and the fear of a rushed, unfavorable agreement runs through all of current Ukrainian diplomacy, forcing Zelensky into carefully calibrated public statements meant never to appear either intransigent toward a possible peace, nor naively willing to accept conditions that would betray the sacrifices his people have made since 2022.

Necessary vigilance toward American domestic political calculations

This dynamic also forces Zelensky into a careful reading of American domestic political calculations that often decisively influence Trump's diplomatic positions on the Ukrainian file, an analytical exercise that goes well beyond the traditional framework of bilateral diplomacy between two sovereign states.

This vigilance, while necessary, must never turn into excessive psychological dependence on Washington's shifting moods: Zelensky must continue, simultaneously, building alternative diplomatic channels, notably European ones, so as never to be left entirely at the mercy of a single partner, however powerful.

Trump remains, geopolitically, a necessary evil for the West and for Ukraine, but Zelensky is right never to bet his country's future solely on American presidential consistency, however encouraging it currently seems.

Ukrainian parliamentary diplomacy in support of Zelensky

The quiet but essential role of the Ukrainian Parliament

Beyond the heavily covered presidential summits, Ukrainian diplomacy also relies on quiet but essential parliamentary work, notably around ratifying European loan agreements and the legislative texts needed to secure international financing. This institutional work, less visible than summit meetings, nonetheless forms the indispensable legal foundation on which the entire financial architecture supporting the Ukrainian war effort rests.

This parliamentary dimension of Ukrainian diplomacy illustrates the country's institutional maturity, which keeps its internal democratic processes running despite the war, a striking contrast with the opaque, centralized functioning of power in Moscow, where no independent institution counterbalances the Kremlin's decisions.

A democracy functioning under bombardment, a diplomatic argument in itself

This Ukrainian democratic continuity, documented by numerous international observers, itself constitutes a powerful diplomatic argument Zelensky can use with his Western interlocutors: supporting Ukraine means supporting a functioning democracy against an authoritarian aggressor, not simply financing an abstract war effort disconnected from the democratic values the West claims to defend.

This symbolic dimension, which goes beyond the purely military or financial question, strengthens the legitimacy of Ukrainian diplomacy with Western public opinion, which remains broadly favorable to supporting Ukraine despite growing diplomatic fatigue observed in certain segments of the Western electorate.

A democracy that keeps passing laws and holding parliamentary debates under Russian bombardment deserves a respect too many Western commentators forget to express, obsessed as they are with the front's military maps alone.

The internal criticism Zelensky must also manage

A Ukrainian opposition questioning certain diplomatic choices

Zelensky's diplomacy is not unanimously supported within Ukrainian society itself, where some critical voices question the growing dependence on Western partners whose consistency is never fully guaranteed. These criticisms, legitimate in a democracy that continues to function despite the war, require the Ukrainian president to regularly justify his diplomatic choices before his own Parliament and his own public opinion.

This internal pressure, often underestimated by Western observers focused solely on international summits, constitutes an essential dimension of current Ukrainian diplomacy: Zelensky is not only negotiating with Washington and Brussels, he must also maintain the trust of his own population amid very real war fatigue after more than four years of conflict.

A relative transparency that paradoxically strengthens his credibility

This obligation to answer to a demanding Ukrainian public opinion, rather than weakening Zelensky's diplomatic position, paradoxically strengthens his credibility with his Western partners, who know they are negotiating with a democratically accountable leader, unlike his Russian counterpart who answers to no one within his own vertically structured power system.

This fundamental difference in political nature between the two leaders constitutes, in itself, a powerful moral and strategic argument in favor of continued support for Ukraine, independent of tactical assessments of the front's state or the speed of Western arms deliveries.

A president who must answer for his choices before his Parliament and his public, even in the middle of a war, remains infinitely preferable to an autocrat who answers to no one. That difference alone, between Kyiv and Moscow, sums up the essence of this conflict.

Steady Western public support, a diplomatic asset

Sympathy that remains majority despite war fatigue

Despite more than four years of conflict and a certain media weariness perceptible in several Western countries, public support for Ukraine remains broadly majority, a reservoir of sympathy Zelensky continues carefully cultivating through public appearances, interviews with Western media, and his regular presence at major international forums.

This public sympathy, while it does not automatically translate into swift government decisions, constitutes an indirect diplomatic lever Zelensky knows how to use, particularly when certain Western governments show signs of hesitation or slowness in executing their commitments to Kyiv.

Presidential communication that has evolved over time

Zelensky's communication has evolved considerably since the first months of the Russian invasion, moving from a register of existential urgency to a more technical diplomacy centered on financing details, weapons production, and institutional negotiation, without ever losing the ability to mobilize emotion and international solidarity when the context requires it.

This communicational evolution reflects growing diplomatic sophistication, acquired through repeated exposure to demanding international summits, which today makes Zelensky a respected voice on the global diplomatic stage, far beyond the mere symbol of resistance he embodied at the start of the war.

Zelensky has grown diplomatically before our eyes, moving from the moving symbol of the war's first days to a seasoned negotiator capable of standing up to Trump as much as to Brussels bureaucrats. That evolution deserves recognition as a political achievement in itself.

What this diplomacy reveals about the state of the Western alliance

A coalition that holds, despite visible friction

The complex diplomacy Zelensky must conduct between Washington and Brussels reveals, in the negative space, the real state of the Western alliance against Russia: a coalition that holds over time, despite visible friction between American transactional style and European institutional slowness, but that keeps producing concrete results, however imperfect and incomplete, to support the Ukrainian war effort.

This persistence of the Western coalition, despite more than four years of war and significant political changes in several allied capitals, is in itself an important strategic signal to Moscow, Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang: the West, despite its internal divisions, remains capable of sustaining substantial support for an attacked partner over the long haul.

A credibility test for the entire Western order

This diplomatic test, embodied in Zelensky's constant navigation between his various Western partners, goes well beyond the Ukrainian case alone: it is a credibility test for the entire international order dominated by the West, at a moment when several authoritarian powers are closely watching whether Western solidarity withstands the test of time and diplomatic fatigue.

This systemic dimension of Ukrainian diplomacy reminds us that support for Kyiv is not merely a bilateral matter between Ukraine and its allies, but a matter of global strategic credibility for the entire Western world against powers directly challenging its international leadership.

Every summit where Zelensky obtains, even partially, what he came for sends a signal to Putin, to Xi Jinping, and to Kim Jong-un: the West, despite its slowness and internal friction, still stands and remains united on what matters most.

The structural limits of this tightrope diplomacy

A permanent risk of Western diplomatic fatigue

Despite the diplomatic successes Zelensky has achieved, this tightrope strategy carries structural limits it would be unwise to ignore. Western diplomatic fatigue, documented by several opinion polls in different European countries, could eventually weaken the consistency of the financial and military support on which Ukrainian resistance capacity entirely depends.

This structural vulnerability forces Zelensky into permanent vigilance, summit after summit, to renew and consolidate support that can never be considered permanently secured, in a geopolitical context where Western priorities can shift quickly with each ally country's internal political changes.

A dependence that cannot last forever without risk

This structural dependence on Western consistency constitutes, over the long term, a strategic risk for Ukraine itself, which must simultaneously develop its own autonomous industrial and military capacities, notably in drones and defense production, to progressively reduce its vulnerability to the vagaries of Western diplomacy.

This dual strategy, between summit diplomacy and the development of national strategic autonomy, illustrates the growing sophistication of the Ukrainian approach to a war whose exact duration remains, to this day, impossible for anyone to predict with certainty, including the best Western analysts.

We must have the courage to say that Ukraine cannot depend forever on Western goodwill. Building national strategic autonomy is not a repudiation of Western support, it is a long-term survival necessity that Zelensky has clearly understood well.

The weight of the Chinese threat on Western diplomatic calculations

Western attention split between several crisis theaters

Zelensky's diplomacy must also contend with a broader geopolitical reality: Western attention and resources, especially American ones, are today split between several simultaneous crisis theaters, from the war in Ukraine to the conflict with Iran over the Strait of Hormuz, to the constant monitoring of China's regional ambitions in the South China Sea and around Taiwan.

This dispersion of Western strategic attention, while it does not fundamentally undermine support for Ukraine, forces Zelensky to redouble his diplomatic efforts to keep his file a priority against competition from other equally legitimate geopolitical urgencies in the eyes of Western decision-makers.

A diplomatic argument Zelensky skillfully deploys

Faced with this dispersion, Zelensky skillfully deploys a strategic argument consistent with the firmest Western line: Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea form an axis of powers hostile to the Western-dominated international order, and yielding ground on any one of these files, in this case Ukraine, sends a signal of weakness that would directly encourage the ambitions of the other three.

This argument, however strategically sound, must nonetheless be constantly renewed by Zelensky with his Western interlocutors, who do not always share the same hierarchy of geopolitical priorities amid these multiple simultaneous flashpoints.

Zelensky is right to relentlessly remind everyone that Ukraine is only one front among others in a broader confrontation between the West and an axis of authoritarian powers. Ignoring this systemic dimension would be a major strategic error for any serious Western leader.

What this diplomacy personally costs Zelensky

A human pressure few leaders have known

Beyond strictly geopolitical considerations, it is worth acknowledging the considerable human cost this constant diplomacy imposes on Zelensky personally. Summit after summit, negotiation after negotiation, the Ukrainian president must maintain a posture of firmness and dignity before interlocutors, some of whom, like Trump during earlier encounters, have not always shown the basic diplomatic respect owed to a head of state at war defending his people's survival.

This constant psychological pressure, borne by a man who remains, above all, a democratically elected leader confronted with an existential war he never wanted, deserves to be recognized for what it is: a considerable personal sacrifice in service of his country's collective survival.

A personal resilience that inspires beyond Ukrainian borders

Zelensky's personal resilience, documented since the first days of the Russian invasion in 2022, continues to inspire not only Ukrainians themselves, but also many international observers who see in him the embodiment of democratic leadership able to withstand extreme existential pressure without ever giving in to despair or compromise.

This human dimension of Ukrainian diplomacy, often eclipsed by strictly geopolitical analyses, deserves to be remembered: behind every summit, every negotiation, and every diplomatic announcement, there is a man who has carried, for more than four years, the weight of a war he never wanted.

I continue to consider Zelensky a hero of our time, not out of naive idealization, but because few human beings could have withstood this constant diplomatic and existential pressure without giving in, either to panic or to compromise with the aggressor.

Conclusion: a tightrope diplomacy that still must prove its durability

What this balancing act has achieved so far

At the end of this analysis, Zelensky's diplomacy between Washington and Brussels appears as a remarkable exercise in political and strategic survival, having secured substantial, though still incomplete, commitments on financing, weapons, and overall diplomatic support for Ukraine. This achievement, however fragile and provisional, deserves recognition for what it represents: the ability of a small country at war to hold the attention and engagement of powers far larger than itself.

This diplomatic achievement must never be confused with a definitive victory, however: every commitment obtained in Ankara or Brussels will still need to be turned into actual deliveries, real disbursements, and a political consistency nothing automatically guarantees over time.

A permanent test that will not let up before the war ends

This tightrope diplomacy will continue, in the months ahead, to be one of the most revealing tests of the real solidity of the Western alliance against Russian aggression. Whether Zelensky manages to maintain this delicate balance between his various partners, or is at some point forced to openly favor one over the other, every development in this diplomacy deserves to be followed with the analytical rigor this file demands.

What this diplomacy fundamentally reveals is that no Ukrainian victory, military, economic, or diplomatic, can be built without the consistency of Western support that Zelensky will keep having to request, negotiate, and verify, summit after summit, never able to consider it permanently secured.

Signed Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

What I know and what I don't

I know that the NATO summit in Ankara, on July 8, 2026, brought together Volodymyr Zelensky and Donald Trump around an announcement of a Patriot co-production license, whose terms remained, according to Reuters and Euromaidan Press, negotiated only "at the political level" without a finalized technical agreement with manufacturers Lockheed Martin and RTX. I know that NATO allies pledged at least 70 billion euros in aid to Ukraine for 2026, and that Viktor Orban's Hungary continues to hold back certain parts of European financing. I know that Ukrainian air defenses intercepted none of the thirty Russian ballistic missiles fired on July 6, 2026.

I do not know with certainty within what precise timeframe the Patriot license will become fully operational, nor whether the peace deal Donald Trump raised in Ankara will actually materialize in the months ahead. I prefer to admit this rather than present diplomatic speculation as established certainty.

Method

This editorial draws on the Los Angeles Times' and Reuters' coverage of the Ankara summit on July 8 and 9, 2026, on Euromaidan Press's analysis of the concrete limits of the Patriot license, and on Al Jazeera's reporting on NATO's financial commitments. No scene has been invented, no direct testimony is claimed.

My editorial angle is stated plainly: I consider Volodymyr Zelensky a courageous leader whose diplomacy deserves critical but sincere support, and I treat obstructionist postures, notably Hungary's, with the severity they deserve given the existential stakes for Ukraine.

Sources

Primary sources

Zelensky confirms a political-level agreement on Patriot licenses — Reuters, July 9, 2026

The concrete limits of the Patriot license announced at Ankara — Euromaidan Press, July 10, 2026

Official declaration of the Ankara summit — NATO, July 8, 2026

Secondary sources

Trump announces a license to produce Patriot systems in Ukraine — Los Angeles Times, July 8, 2026

NATO pledges 70 billion euros for Ukraine — Al Jazeera, July 8, 2026

Trump tells Zelensky Ukraine will be able to make Patriot interceptors — Time, July 8, 2026