Ukraine war: I’m ‘disappointed but not done’ with Putin — Trump

US President, Donald Trump has stated that he is disappointed but not done with Russian President, Vladimir Putin over the failure to make a deal to end the war in Ukraine.

Trump stated this in an exclusive phone call with the BBC, after he announced plans to send weapons to Ukraine and warned of severe tariffs on Russia if there was no ceasefire deal in 50 days.

The US president also said, “I trust almost no one” when he was asked whether he trusts the Russian leader.

In an interview from the Oval Office, Trump also endorsed NATO, having once described it as obsolete, and affirmed his support for the organisation’s common defence principle.

Asked about whether surviving the assassination attempt had changed him, Trump said he liked to think about it as little as possible.

“I don’t like to think about if it did change me,” Trump said. Dwelling on it, he added, “could be life-changing”.

Having just met with Nato chief Mark Rutte at the White House, however, the president spent a significant portion of the interview expanding on his disappointment with the Russian leader.

Trump said that he had thought a deal to end the war in Ukraine was on the cards with Russia four different times.

When asked if he was done with Putin, the president replied: “I’m disappointed in him, but I’m not done with him. But I’m disappointed in him.”

Pressed on how Trump would get Putin to “stop the bloodshed” the US president said: “We’re working at it, Gary.”

“We’ll have a great conversation. I’ll say: ‘That’s good, I’ll think we’re close to getting it done,’ and then he’ll knock down a building in Kyiv.”

Russia has intensified its drone and missile attacks on Ukrainian cities in recent weeks, causing record civilian casualties. It launched a full-scale invasion of its neighbour in 2022.

Putin has insisted he also wants peace, but has said what he calls the “root causes” of the war must be resolved first. He argues that the war is the result of external threats to Russia’s security from Kyiv, NATO and the “collective West”.

The conversation moved on to NATO, which Trump has previously criticised as “obsolete”.

He said he did not think that was still the case as NATO “is now becoming the opposite of that” because the alliance was “paying their own bills”.

Trump said it was “amazing” that NATO leaders had agreed to ramp up defence spending to 5% of their economic output.

“Nobody thought that was possible.”

He said he still believed in collective defence, because it meant smaller countries could defend themselves against larger ones.

Trump said that the leaders of countries, including Germany, France and Spain, had come to respect him and his decision-making, partly because world leaders believed that there was a “lot of talent” in being elected to the presidency twice.

The President also praised his landmark tax and spending bill – “the one big beautiful bill” – which extends 2017 tax cuts from Trump’s first term, as well as creating new tax breaks on tips and steep cuts to Medicaid, the state-provided healthcare scheme.

“We have the largest tax cuts in history,” he said.

Asked what he thought would define his legacy as president, he said: “Saving America.”

“He said, “I think America is now a great country and it was a dead country one year ago.”

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