Hegseth rules out NATO membership for Ukraine and says Europe must be responsible for countrys security
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Trump's Putin Call 'Not a Betrayal' of Ukraine, Hegseth Says
Above: NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte speaks with US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during a group picture following a meeting of NATO defense ministers at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, on Feb. 13, 2025. Image copyright: Simon Wohlfahrt/Contributor/AFP via Getty Images
The Facts
Speaking ahead of a NATO summit in Brussels on Thursday, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth dismissed suggestions by some that this week's phone call between US Pres. Donald Trump and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin was to be considered a betrayal of Ukraine.
Trump's announcement that he'd had "a lengthy and highly productive phone call" with Putin on ending the nearly three-year Russia-Ukraine war displayed how Trump's approach to ending the conflict may jar with America's NATO allies.
Ahead of Thursday's defense ministers' summit, British Defense Minister John Healy issued a response to the call that risked a diplomatic fallout between Britain's Labour government and Trump's administration.
The Spin
Anti-Trump narrative
Hegseth claims the call between Trump and Putin was no betrayal of Ukraine despite no representatives of the country being present. A day earlier, he'd just announced that a return to Ukraine's 2014 borders was unrealistic — and so too were hopes of joining NATO. Despite these concessions, the one piece of good news is that at least Trump is not pulling the US out of the military alliance.
Pro-Trump narrative
The US recognizes the incredible commitment Ukraine has made over many years, and no country, as Trump has pointed out, has made a larger commitment to support Ukraine as strongly as the US has. However, there is a recognition that the whole world and the US are interested in peace — and Trump is the only leader capable of achieving that.