Europe could have claimed more agency instead of waiting for Trump’s initiative, Tyyne Karjalainen, of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, said.

“These statements we’re seeing now…I’m afraid they’re a symbol of weakness not strength,” she added.

So far, there is no obvious space for Europe in Trump’s peace push, and arguably not enough for Kyiv. Until now there had been a general acceptance that there should be no talking to Vladimir Putin without Ukraine.

Trump is planning face-to-face talks with the Russian leader, apparently in Saudi Arabia, but the two men have already prepared the ground with a lengthy phone-call.

The US president’s follow-up chat with Volodymyr Zelensky was far shorter.

Zelensky spoke initially of his belief that “America’s strength is sufficient to pressure Russia and Putin into peace”.

But on a trip to the southern city of Kherson on Thursday he made clear that, as an independent state, Ukraine would not accept either bilateral negotiations or “any agreements reached without us”.

“Putin hopes that by holding talks only with Trump, he will be able to negotiate more favourable terms,” Aleksandra Kozioł, from the Polish Institute of International Affairs, said.

“In doing so, he will also present himself as a leader who talks to another superpower on an equal footing.”

The worry for European leaders is that the US may have already moved some way towards meeting Russia’s war aims – and that it might go further.

Ukraine’s consistent demand has been for a complete withdrawal of Russian troops from its sovereign territory and for Ukrainian control over its state borders.

Judging by remarks from Trump and Hegseth, the US already considers Russia’s 2014 capture of Crimea and eastern areas in the Donbas as a fait accompli and that Ukraine won’t be joining Nato.

Trump added that Ukraine needed fresh elections “at some point”, repeating a Putin fallacy that Zelensky was no longer a legitimate leader, even though Ukraine is under martial law precisely because of Russia’s war.

Hegseth was adamant there had been no betrayal of Kyiv, but German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said it was “regrettable…that the Trump administration has already made public concessions to Putin before negotiations have even begun”.

“It would have been better to talk about Ukraine’s possible Nato membership or the country’s possible loss of territory only at the negotiating table and not to take it off the table beforehand,” he said.