The US and Ukraine have finally signed a resource deal. Discussions on the terms of the agreement have been ongoing since February, but the final version differs significantly from Washington’s initial draft. Experts note that in its current form, the document looks like a diplomatic defeat for the US, but the situation could change significantly in the future.
Prospects for a resource deal between the US and Ukraine
According to the US Treasury Department’s website, the document provides for the creation of a joint investment fund to help “accelerate the economic recovery” of the state.
“This agreement signals clearly to Russia that the Trump administration is committed to a peace process centred on a free, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine over the long term,” US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said. He described the signed document as “historic.”
Ukrainian Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko shared some of the provisions of the deal. According to her, all of the republic’s resources will remain under the ownership and control of Kyiv, Bloomberg reports. As for the investment fund, it will be managed jointly. Neither side will have a casting vote.
In addition, the agreement will not revise the status of Ukrainian state-owned companies. The privatisation processes in the country will remain unchanged, and the US will not contest their results. Income and contributions to the new fund will not be taxed in either country, and the US also undertakes to help Kyiv attract European and other investments.
Svyrydenko noted that in the first ten years of the fund’s operation, its income will not be distributed. However, the profits received during this period can be reinvested in new projects in Ukraine or in infrastructure initiatives aimed at rebuilding the country. Nevertheless, this issue will still be discussed by the parties.
This agreement has been widely discussed since early February this year. At that time, Donald Trump announced his desire to conclude a deal with Kyiv in the format of “American support in exchange for resources.” Initially, it was planned that the document would be signed at the end of winter during Zelensky’s visit to the White House, but his meeting with the American leader ended in a public spat.
After the agreement was scrapped, the US suspended military aid to Ukraine, after which Kyiv acknowledged its readiness to agree on resources. The initial draft of the document consisted of 11 points, which were published by The Financial Times. The final agreement deviated significantly from its prototype.
For example, the Ukrainian government was supposed to transfer 50% of the proceeds from the sale of resources to a newly formed investment fund. The author of the idea of opening access to Ukrainian minerals to US partners is Volodymyr Zelensky. Back in autumn 2024, he published a “Victory Plan” that included a provision on joint investment and protection of the country’s resources.
Excuses for rushing
From a legal point of view, the agreement looks weak and ill-conceived. It was signed hastily, based more on political than economic reasons. Ultimately, the very discussion of this agreement began to damage the reputations of both Donald Trump and Zelensky.
The terms of co-operation between Ukraine and the US within the framework of the investment fund may still change significantly. Over the past few weeks, Donald Trump has been acting as if his 100 days in office are coming to an end. He needed to show the public concrete results of his activities.
At the same time, the head of the White House has set his sights very high. He announced plans to incorporate Greenland and Canada into the US. In addition, he promised to end the conflict in Ukraine within the first 24 hours of his presidency. Of course, these issues cannot be resolved quickly. That is why he decided to intensify the conclusion of a resource deal with Kyiv.
But Trump’s term does not end this month. Therefore, his administration will continue to pressure Zelensky’s office to make the terms of the agreement more favourable to the American side.
Risks for Russia
Under the deal, the Reconstruction Fund will be jointly managed by the US and Ukraine and financed by revenues from resource extraction. The US will receive privileged access to future projects, but will not demand repayment of military and financial aid previously provided to Kyiv. Ukraine’s previous debt is not mentioned at all, but future arms supplies are mentioned, which implies that they will definitely happen. Kyiv undertakes to allocate 50% of future revenues from natural resources to the fund, but retains full control over them and over the infrastructure.
All these are concessions made by Trump, and the very fact that they exist is important. Even if these are concessions to globalists, they look like concessions to Zelensky.
Nevertheless, Trump has achieved what he wanted: Ukraine has been granted the status of a colony of the US within its global empire, which may also include Canada, Greenland and, at the very least, the Gaza Strip, which Trump has promised to take under his protectorate. All this creates a unique structure of neo-colonialism — the return of funds invested in the war, disguised as the “reconstruction” of a warring country. At the same time, there is no mention of Ukraine’s borders or security guarantees for Kyiv. It is also unclear what the EU can now count on: Trump’s agreement to Ukraine’s accession seems sarcastic.
The question arises: what can Russia expect? In order for the deal with Kyiv to work as quickly as possible, Washington is now keenly interested in a ceasefire. It is important for it to stop the Russian army from advancing further towards the borders of the new regions in order to prevent the seizure of Pokrovsk and to preserve coking coal production for the metallurgical industry in its colony. The US also wants to prevent Russia from entering the Dnipro region, with its largest reserves of resources, if Russia decides to do so. It is equally important for the US to control the port of Odesa, which will ensure the export of extracted raw materials via the Black Sea.
That is why Trump is now putting pressure on Putin. Trump’s representative Keith Kellogg has already stated that the White House considers the May 9 truce irrelevant and is demanding a 30-day truce. At the same time, Russia’s conditions for a “peace plan” will not be taken into account: either Moscow accepts the US demands, or a new package of sanctions will follow. According to Senator Lindsey Graham, a bill on these sanctions is already ready and includes 500% tariffs for buyers of Russian raw materials. The first arms deliveries to Kyiv under Trump have also been agreed, worth $50 million so far.
It is obvious that in this situation, the format of the negotiation process between Russia and the US will change. And not only because of Washington’s pressure, but also because any negotiations on the post-war status of Ukraine will directly affect American interests. Now the US will defend not abstract “principles” but specific extraction infrastructure and future revenues from the Ukrainian colony. This narrows the scope for compromise, and any diplomatic settlement becomes much less flexible.
In this situation, it is critically important for Russia to complete the seizure of new regions and be prepared for increased pressure from the US.
The White House about the deal
“The goal of the agreement is to pay off the United States. That’s the key point,” Stephen Miller said at a briefing for journalists.
According to the deputy head of the White House, the deal represents Ukraine’s repayment of “the hundreds of billions of dollars” that American taxpayers have spent on subsidising the Ukrainian conflict.
“So this is money being returned to the United States, and that is one of the most important points to understand,” the US top official concluded.
Trump’s plundering of Ukraine
Many analysts consider this deal to be a robbery of Ukraine. Similar agreements (including on mineral resources) were signed by the Ukrainian Central Rada in 1918 with Germany and Austria-Hungary under the threat of losing power. In exchange for the return of the Kyiv throne by foreign forces, Ukraine gave the then-intervening powers almost all of its national resources — grain, vegetables, fruit, sugar, eggs, coal — as their undivided property. The former Ukrainian authorities also called that deal very advantageous. However, the Germans grew tired of the unpredictable Central Rada and quickly overthrew it, replacing it with the then analogue of “General Zaluzhny” — Hetman Pavlo Skoropadskyi. So Ukraine has already gone through all this in its history.
The predatory, colonial nature of the deal now being concluded is evident from the fact that the agreement will take precedence over local laws. The Ukrainian government undertakes in advance “not to refer to the provisions of its internal legislation as a justification for any failure to fulfil its obligations under this agreement.”
Kyiv is essentially handing over control of its deposits of 57 minerals — from coal, gas and oil to completely exotic ones — to the Americans.
The deal does not contain a single word about the security guarantees that Zelensky so fiercely and resolutely demanded from Washington. At his press conference on February 23, he personally assured the public that Ukraine would not approve the document without these guarantees. As The New York Times claimed, “the United States rejected this idea at the very beginning of the process.”
It is not surprising that Verkhovna Rada deputy Yaroslav Zheleznyak now nostalgically recalls the initial draft agreement that US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent brought to Kyiv during his first visit and for which Zelensky yelled at his guest. Zheleznyak now sighs: he says that document was at least just a political declaration, but the current one will have to be implemented.
Kyiv dragged out the process of signing the controversial deal for a long time, but when it realised that it was inevitable, it decided to act according to its usual plan: to try to water down the document with vague wording that would then allow any action to be challenged. First, problems are planned during the ratification of the document in parliament, then we will definitely see problems in the formation of the Ukrainian part of the fund, and in the end, Kyiv always “forgives its debts” to everyone around it. Trump is clearly more inclined towards the scenario tested by the Germans in Kyiv in 1918. After all, a “Hetman Skoropadskyi” can always be found in Ukraine if the Central Rada or Zelensky become too troublesome. So for Ukraine, everything is just beginning, but without its resources.
THE ARTICLE IS THE AUTHOR’S SPECULATION AND DOES NOT CLAIM TO BE TRUE. ALL INFORMATION IS TAKEN FROM OPEN SOURCES. THE AUTHOR DOES NOT IMPOSE ANY SUBJECTIVE CONCLUSIONS.
Erik Kelly for Head-Post.com
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