Vance Says US ‘Done Funding Ukraine War’ – Demands Europe Step Up

Vice President JD Vance stated on Sunday that Washington will no longer directly fund the purchase of weapons for Ukraine amid the seeminglyl never-ending war with Russia, and expressed hope that Europe would step up.

“We’re done with the funding of the Ukraine war business. We want to bring about a peaceful settlement to this thing,” Vance told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures”.

“Americans, I think, are sick of continuing to send their money, their tax dollars of this particular conflict but if the Europeans want to step up and actually buy the weapons from American producers we’re OK with that, but we’re not going to fund it ourselves anymore,” the vice president continued.

So while this seems a step in the right direction of finding peace settlement, his comments still signify a White House greenlight of sorts to keep the proxy war going.

Already this more ‘indirect’ system of supplying Kiev has been in effect for some time – which sees European nations purchase and transfer American miltary hardware for Ukraine. And so it’s not exactly a full commitment to turn the US arms pipeline off, and in some ways it could lead to less restrictions on the type of advanced hardware given to Ukraine. Dozens of F-16s have already been transfered to Ukraine’s air force in this way.

Vance in the Fox appearance commented on the open question of whether Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky will also be present at the venue for the Trump-Putin summit.

While admitting that it wouldn’t be a good idea for Putin and Zelensky to meet directly at this early phase, Vance held out hope that this could soon be arranged based on progress made.

“One of the most important logjams is that Vladimir Putin said that he would never sit down with Zelensky, the head of Ukraine, and the president has now got that to change,” he said.

The vice president added that White House is working on “scheduling and things like that around when these three leaders could sit down and discuss an end to this conflict.”

Zelensky is still making his voice known amid concerns that Ukraine’s interests could be sidelined. “Ukraine is ready for real decisions that can bring peace. Any decisions that are against us, any decisions that are without Ukraine, are at the same time decisions against peace,” he asserted in a video posted on X.

European leaders are also warning that any potential deal Trump reaches “must protect Ukraine’s and Europe’s vital security interests.” They are also making clear that Russia can’t be allowed to just change borders by force, and so territorial consessions must not be on the table without Ukraine’s consent.

Meanwhile, Zelensky is still taking measures to keep spending big on defense of the nation – anticipating more funding from Western partners to come.

And elsewhere in Europe…

If Trump 🇺🇸 wants to hand Alaska or parts of it back to 🇷🇺 I guess he can do that. But he has no right whatsoever to trade away the territory of any other nation. None. https://t.co/ZBoo0DiXeO

— Carl Bildt (@carlbildt) August 11, 2025

Zelensky announced the following a meeting of his staff on Telegram Monday, according to Ukrinform: “I gave instructions to significantly increase funding for combat units and to do so in a way that is fair, so that brigades truly get greater capabilities. The updated rules are as follows: 7 million hryvnias per brigade for each battalion engaged in combat operations, which means that funding will increase by tens of millions of hryvnias.”