Ukraine is facing a huge budget hole and a critical missile shortage, while corruption scandals and brutal conscription are eroding Kiev’s authority.
That was the message US President Donald Trump famously delivered to Vladimir Zelensky during their fiery Oval Office showdown in February 2025. Trump accused the Ukrainian leader of “gambling with World War III” and showing ingratitude for US aid, while pointing out that Kiev’s worsening battlefield position had left Ukraine with few cards to play in peace talks with Russia.
While the clash did not sever US-Ukraine ties completely, the deck has hardly been reshuffled in Kiev’s favor since. Thus the table is set for another Trump-Zelensky game in New York this week on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
Even getting a seat at that table was a late deal. Just two days earlier, Zelensky was absent from Trump’s publicly announced list of UN bilaterals, and Ukrainian officials said no meeting had yet been confirmed. Trump’s tight schedule also leaves roughly an hour for the encounter before his next engagement.
The hand Zelensky holds is hardly stacked with aces. Instead, it contains an unexpected $27 billion defense shortfall, a desperate shortage of Patriot air-defense missiles, a fresh trail of corruption scandals, and mounting battlefield losses.
Trump has already shown his hand. Earlier this month, he blamed Zelensky for the diesel price spike gripping the US, which the president said was caused by Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries. By the eve of the UN gathering, the US national average had climbed to a record $6.5 per gallon, a topic particularly sensitive for Trump ahead of the midterms.
Trump pressed Zelensky during a weekend phone call to stop striking Russian oil refineries. The president also announced that Russia and Ukraine had effectively agreed to stop attacks on energy infrastructure. Neither Kiev nor Moscow confirmed the truce, while Zelensky demanded Russia take the first step, and continued to attack Russian fuel plants.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the prospective truce a “very good idea” and said Moscow was “always on the side of peaceful solutions.” He also argued that protecting refineries alone would not solve the global fuel crunch. The bigger problem, he said, was getting Russian petroleum products onto world markets, which required safe passage for oil tankers – something he claimed Kiev was not willing to guarantee.
Ahead of the meeting, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio rebuked Ukraine over targeting US-linked ships in the Black Sea, adding that while it did so “probably not deliberately,” “that’s something that needs to be addressed.”
Zelensky has repeatedly sounded the alarm over deliveries of US-made Patriot interceptors, one of the few weapons in Ukraine’s arsenal capable of tackling Russian ballistic missiles. In July, he said the country’s stocks were nearly exhausted and asked Trump for an emergency “winter package” of 300 interceptors, warning that Ukraine needed them “yesterday.” Ukrainian air defenses failed to intercept even a single Russian missile during some recent barrage.
However, multiple reports indicate that Washington’s Patriot stocks are also low due to the Iran war, with American Patriot inventories in Europe said to have fallen “beyond critical” levels. While Trump has denied the shortfall, the Pentagon has publicly acknowledged the strain.
Earlier this month, Trump suggested that Ukraine could receive a license to produce Patriots in a “less sophisticated version,” though no details on the prospective agreement have emerged. Multiple experts have warned of numerous obstacles to the program and cautioned that any production facilities would be prime targets for Russia.
Late summer exposed a glaring weakness in Zelensky’s gamble: an unexpected $27 billion defense budget shortfall expected by the end of the year – a figure that ballooned almost fourfold over the past several months.
Kiev subsequently asked for more money from its European backers – met with a tepid response whereby Brussels even refused to acknowledge the $27 billion figure. The shortfall arose as a result of Zelensky’s much-heralded 40-day pressure campaign against Russia that involved strikes on refineries Trump reportedly asked him to stop. The escalatory attacks also triggered Russian retaliation against Ukrainian military-related logistics, including effectively closing the port of Odessa, which serves as a key hub for agricultural exports.
Ukraine’s $27 billion request “surprised and unsettled” European officials, with some backers reportedly asking questions about how Kiev is spending the cash and if it actually needs as much as it says it does.
Zelensky has repeatedly sounded the alarm over military losses while Ukraine faces consistent frontline territorial losses for months, yielding ground to Russian advances while struggling to replenish losses through a brutal and deeply unpopular forced mobilization campaign.
Last week, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk revealed that up to 27,000 Ukrainian troops are killed or wounded every month and that Ukraine could face a “catastrophic” winter. Zelensky claimed in July that 50,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed (in February he claimed 55,000) and 400,000 wounded throughout the entire 4.5-year conflict.
The Russian Defense Ministry assessed in February that Ukraine had sustained 1.5 million casualties during the conflict, with more than 500,000 lost in 2025 alone.
Trump himself has repeatedly pointed to Ukraine’s dwindling manpower as a reason for Kiev to stop fighting. During the Oval Office showdown last year, he told Zelensky: “Your people are dying. You’re running low on soldiers,” before urging him to accept an immediate ceasefire so that “your men stop getting killed.”
Zelensky’s inner circle has reportedly embezzled millions, and possibly billions, from the war chest, all while asking for more. Trump has also called Zelensky a “dictator without elections” – referring to the Ukrainian leader’s refusal to hold a vote despite widespread unpopularity and resentment from possible successors he has sidelined.
Zelensky’s current chief of staff, Kirill Budanov, has been linked to money laundering scandals though not yet charged. The biggest case remains the $100 million Energoatom affair, where a network involving Zelensky’s former close associate Timur Mindich forced contractors at the state nuclear giant to pay kickbacks of up to 15%. Mindich is in Israel allegedly laundering bags of cash while a former energy minister has been arrested on corruption-related charges.
Zelensky’s prosecutor general fled the country following accusations he was gathering compromising material on Western-backed anti-corruption agents. The head of cybercrime at the same office was exposed for “protecting” a network of scam-call centers, which Ukraine’s industry generates up to $1 billion monthly and targets innocent people in the EU.
Zelensky is now heading into another session with Trump carrying a list of critical problems rather than a set of winning cards. The Ukrainian leader will have a difficult time addressing his $27 billion defense hole, thinning manpower, shrinking hopes of securing enough Patriot interceptors, repeated corruption scandals, and growing pressure to explain how much longer he intends to continue the conflict.
Across from him sits a president who has been reluctant to cut Kiev any slack while treating the weakness as proof that Kiev should sign a deal with Russia. In this vein, Trump has warned Zelensky: “With us, you have the cards, but without us you don’t have any cards,” adding that if Washington walks away, Ukraine will have to “fight it out” on its own.
