Zelenskyy's secret strategy for Trump meeting revealed — The Times

The meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and US President Donald Trump, which took place on July 28 at the White House, marked another significant milestone in relations between Kyiv and Washington.

According to insiders, the Ukrainian leader decided to go all in and adopted a new strategy for engaging with his American counterpart.

First and foremost, Zelenskyy sought to convince Trump that Ukraine and the US share a common enemy—Russia.

In this way, he hoped to shift the White House leader from the role of mediator in this war to that of a full-fledged ally.

In particular, the Ukrainian President told his American counterpart that it was Russia that had been helping Iran target US troops in the Middle East with weapons.

"Well, we’ll find out if that’s true. I’ll ask Putin about it. It hasn’t had much impact because we’ve knocked the hell out of them … Venezuela had all Russian equipment. How did that work out?" Trump responded.

According to insiders, the US President is favorably disposed toward Zelenskyy primarily because Ukraine is delivering increasingly devastating blows against Russia and is doing so with real success.

"It’s clear both sides wanted to accentuate the positives. They talked about two main subjects, one of which was on Zelensky’s agenda and one of which was on Trump’s agenda: the Zelensky agenda was the licensing agreements and the Trump agenda was peace talks," said former US Ambassador to Ukraine John Herbst.

Earlier, RBC-Ukraine reported on why Trump made a sharp turnaround regarding Ukraine.

We also wrote that he decided for the first time to send his team to Kyiv.

Incidentally, Zelenskyy recently revealed when the turning point in his relationship with the U.S. president occurred.