My train rolled into Kyiv last week as Russian ballistic missiles and drones hit the city, killing a mother and her son. I had last been in Ukraine just over a year earlier. Back then, in April 2024, the mood was dark. Frustrated by delays in western military aid, people had a palpable fear of escalating Russian territorial gains, perhaps even a collapse of Ukraine’s frontline. Today, the international context is even more fraught. The Biden administration was frustratingly slow and scared, but few doubted that the US wanted to prevent Russia from prevailing. The same cannot be said of Donald Trump, whose ideological affinity with Vladimir Putin has thrown Europe, starting with Ukraine, off balance.
But despite the Trump administration’s betrayals, I found the mood in Kyiv more confident than a year previously. After more than three years of war, Ukrainians are tired, but they are not exhausted. The soldiers, civil society representatives, parliamentarians and government officials I met seemed ever-more determined to stand tall and defend their country.
