After minerals deal, Trump approves arms to Ukraine, plays down peace plan
The Donald Trump administration last week approved its first sale of weapons to Ukraine after signing a memorandum of intent to exploit Ukrainian mineral wealth, suggesting that US foreign and defence policy under its current president will be driven by economic policy.
The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) announced on May 2 that the Trump administration had approved the sale of parts, maintenance and training for F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine worth $310m.Defence newspaper The War Zone had previously said decommissioned F-16s were being shipped from a US Air Force graveyard in Arizona to Ukraine for spare parts, and published photos of partially dismantled F-16 fuselages being loaded onto a Ukrainian Antonov-124 transport plane at Tucson International Airport on May 1.
The US sale announcement did not include operational F-16 aircraft or missiles, but European allies of Ukraine have reportedly promised a total of 85 working F-16s.
This sale represented the first military aid from the Trump administration to Ukraine, and the first aid Ukraine would be paying for.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy first publicly offered to buy US weapons systems on April 15, specifically asking for Patriot air defence systems.
The US sale followed the April 30 signing of a memorandum by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Ukrainian First Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko to jointly exploit new mineral deposits in Ukraine, including metals, oil and gas.
“This agreement signals clearly to Russia that the Trump administration is committed to a peace process centred on a free, sovereign and prosperous Ukraine over the long term,” said Bessent.
The memorandum said half of the proceeds from royalties and licensing fees payable to the government of Ukraine will be put into an investment fund for reconstruction purposes. It did not stipulate whether US investors would similarly invest any proportion of their proceeds, or if the US government would facilitate investment. Nor did the memorandum specify a timeframe for investment.
