Donald Trump called Volodymyr Zelensky harder to deal with than Vladimir Putin on Thursday night. By Friday morning the Kremlin was repeating him.
The order that slowed Ukraine's battlefield satellites came from inside the White House. Two U.S. officials and a Western official told Reuters on Thursday that the White House told the Pentagon's leaders to slow down the Starshield service for Ukraine's military. The sources did not say who in the building gave the order. The only denial came from a senior official: "No such request was ever made by the president." The White House did not answer whether anyone else there had made it.
Elon Musk had already put the switch in Washington's hand. Answering Kyiv on Wednesday night, he wrote that limits on Starshield "are decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS." Reuters moved it one floor up on Thursday, from the military to the White House.
A Defense Ministry official in Kyiv said Thursday the receivers work in motion again, but only up to 100 mph. The slowdown complicated strikes on Russian forces in occupied territory and slowed the interceptor drones Kyiv flies against Russia's Shaheds.
Then Trump went on Newsmax. Ukraine's strikes on Russian refineries push up the world oil price, he said, and "I think that's a disgrace." Then the line Moscow had been waiting for. "I'm not a big fan of Zelenskyy," he said. "I think I find Zelenskyy to be more difficult to deal with than Putin."
Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov took it from there at his Friday briefing. "The fact that Zelensky doesn't want to take responsibility and enter a peaceful settlement process is unambiguous," he said. He took credit.
Nine senators want to know who sent the message.
