The US president, Donald Trump, said on Tuesday his country may provide air support to back a Ukraine peace deal. Trump ruled out putting US troops on the ground in Ukraine, but said he might provide air support as part of a deal to end Russia’s war in the country. It comes a day after Trump pledged security guarantees to help end the war at an extraordinary White House summit. The path to peace remained uncertain as the US and allies prepared to work out what military support for Ukraine might include.
“When it comes to security, (Europeans) are willing to put people on the ground. We’re willing to help them with things, especially, probably … by air,” Trump said in an interview with the Fox News “Fox & Friends” program.
Nato military leaders were expected to meet on Wednesday to discuss Ukraine, with US Gen Dan Caine, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, expected to attend virtually, officials told Reuters.
Also:
Putin has said Russia will not tolerate troops from the Nato alliance in Ukraine. He has also shown no sign of backing down from demands for territory, including land not under Russia’s military control, after his summit with Trump on Friday in Alaska.
Later, in an interview with radio host Mark Levin, Trump characterised his negotiating style in trying to end the war as “probably instinct more than process.”
Following Monday’s meeting, Russia launched its biggest air assault in more than a month on Ukraine, with 270 drones and 10 missiles launched, the Ukrainian air force said. The energy ministry said the strikes caused big fires at energy facilities in the central Poltava region, home to Ukraine’s only oil refinery.
Oil is flowing to Slovakia again via the Druzhba pipeline, the Slovak economy ministry said late on Tuesday, after a Ukrainian drone strike on an oil pumping station in Russia’s Tambov region cut off supplies. Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, a key conduit for generating money for Kremlin’s war efforts, with oil and gas sales accounting for a quarter of Russia’s total state budget proceeds.
Updated at 02.48 EDT
Key events
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An object which fell and exploded in a cornfield in eastern Poland may have been a component of an old propeller engine, the Polish army said on Wednesday, adding that there had been no violation of Poland’s airspace from Ukraine or Belarus. Police had earlier announced that an unidentified object had fallen in a field in the village of Osiny in eastern Poland’s Lublin province, which borders Ukraine.
“…after conducting preliminary analyses of radar system records, no violation of Polish airspace was recorded last night from either Ukraine or Belarus,” the Operational Command of the Polish Armed Forces said on X.
“The information about the discovery of an object, which, according to preliminary assessments, may be a component of an old propeller engine, has been forwarded to the Air Operations Center Air Component Command.”
The blast shattered windows in several homes, but nobody was injured, PAP news agency reported. Police officers found burnt metal and plastic debris at the site, it added. Air raid sirens rang out for about an hour over the border in Ukraine’s Volyn and Lviv regions from around 0900 GMT, according to messages from its military posted on Telegram. There were no reports of air attacks in those regions, their governors said.
W odniesieniu do informacji o znalezieniu szczątków obiektu na terenie powiatu łukowskiego, informujemy, że po przeprowadzeniu wstępnych analiz zapisów systemów radiolokacyjnych, minionej nocy nie zarejestrowano naruszenia polskiej przestrzeni powietrznej ani z kierunku Ukrainy,… pic.twitter.com/DUcE5kIDWy
— Dowództwo Operacyjne RSZ (@DowOperSZ) August 20, 2025
Shares of defence-linked companies dropped 1.5% in early trade. In the previous session, these stocks suffered their worst day in more than a month, pressured by news of a potential Ukraine-Russia summit, as hopes for de-escalation reduced demand for military-related assets.
Russia launched 15 drones in an assault on the Okhtyrka area in the early hours of Wednesday, local prosecutors said on the Telegram messaging app.
The children injured in the attack on Odesa, which struck a residential neighbourhood in the town, were aged 5 months, 4 years and 6 years, Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko wrote on X.
Overall, Russia launched a total of 93 drones and two missiles to attack the country overnight, the Ukrainian air force said, adding it downed 62 drones and one missile, and recorded hits at 20 locations.
Firefighters work at the site of a fuel storage facility hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Odesa region, Ukraine August 20, 2025. Photograph: State Emergency Service Of Ukraine/Reuters
Ukraine’s State Emergency Services reported a “massive drone strike” on the southern region of Odesa, saying one person was wounded and a large fire erupted at a fuel and energy facility.
Officials of the Izmail district in the Odesa region said port infrastructure in the city was damaged.
Fabrizio Tassinari
Seven is a biblical number, a number dear to ancient Rome, and the number of Cristiano Ronaldo’s lucky jersey. Perhaps it is also now going to be the answer to Henry Kissinger’s (probably apocryphal) question: what number do I call when I want to talk to Europe? Maybe the answer is seven, like the number of leaders sitting at the table in Washington on Monday alongside Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
It’s difficult to say at this stage whether anything good will come from the impromptu White House summit, but European leaders showing up as a group in support of Ukraine was a first. This seven-member format – Nato, the European Commission, France, Germany, the UK, Italy and Finland – truly spoke with one voice. They did so on a crisis, Ukraine, over which they have sometimes been bitterly divided throughout the past three and a half years (remember Emmanuel Macron’s early concern not to “humiliate” Vladimir Putin?). Yet Ukraine is also the dossier over which European leaders have converged and yielded the greatest impact during the same timeframe: from the 18 sanctions packages the EU has imposed on Russia and the opening of EU accession negotiations for Ukraine, to the supply of weapons to Kyiv.
The US president may be helping Putin to destroy the west, but his vanity is causing Europeans to speak with one voice on Ukraine, Fabrizio Tassinari writes.
Dan Sabbagh
Over dinner on Monday, a simple barbecue of meat and roasted vegetables, the soldiers of Ukraine’s 150th reconnaissance and strike battalion have other things on their mind. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is in the White House and Donald Trump has just promised to give Ukraine “very good protection”.
When this development is passed on to the group around, one of the soldiers pipes up “From who?” and laughs, such is the uncertainty about who the US really supports. But in reality the troops are not following the news closely. After three and half years, the war has its own momentum, technology and schedule.
Near Dobropillia new trenches are visible, drone attacks continue and there is no sign of the fighting easing. Ukrainian frontline troops are sceptical of ceding land, writes Dan Sabbagh near Dobropillia. Read the full report here:
Updated at 03.27 EDT
Patrick Wintour
After a week of historic summits on the future of Ukraine, will the president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, have to trade land for peace? Diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour reports.
Anton Levsiushkin grew up in Mariupol, eastern Ukraine. It is a seaside city. “Swimming, windsurfing, kitsesurfing”, he tells Helen Pidd, “anything a human being can do in water, we did it”.
Sofiia Rozhdestvina is from a little farther north, in Donetsk. It’s a place, she explains, famed for its roses and its football club, Shakhtar Donetsk. Her family had their surname inscribed on a few of the stadium seats.
So is the three-year war in Ukraine close to an end? And what will it mean to Ukrainians like Anton and Sofiia if it is?
Updated at 03.27 EDT
At least 14 people, including a family with three children, were wounded in an overnight Russian attack on Ukraine’s northern region of Sumy, Ukraine’s prime minister said on Wednesday.
“Russia continues to manifest its fears through acts of pure terrorism across Ukraine, once again targeting the homes of families and their sleeping children,” Yulia Svyrydenko wrote on X.
Russia continues to manifest its fears through acts of pure terrorism across Ukraine, once again targeting the homes of families and their sleeping children.
Among the regions targeted overnight was Okhtyrka in Sumy region, where a residential neighborhood was hit. Thirteen… pic.twitter.com/QkbZjK3evL
— Yulia Svyrydenko (@Svyrydenko_Y) August 20, 2025
Russia launched a “massive drone strike” on the southern Ukrainian region of Odesa, injuring one person and causing a large fire at a fuel and energy facility, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said on Wednesday.
Administration of the Izmail district in the Odesa region said on social media that port infrastructure in the city was damaged.
A firefighter works at the site of a fuel storage facility hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Odesa region, Ukraine August 20, 2025. Photograph: State Emergency Service Of Ukraine/ReutersShare
Russia’s air defence units destroyed 42 Ukrainian drones overnight, Russia’s RIA news agency reported on Wednesday, citing data from the Russian defence ministry.
ShareDonald Trump says US may provide air support as part of peace deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine
The US president, Donald Trump, said on Tuesday his country may provide air support to back a Ukraine peace deal. Trump ruled out putting US troops on the ground in Ukraine, but said he might provide air support as part of a deal to end Russia’s war in the country. It comes a day after Trump pledged security guarantees to help end the war at an extraordinary White House summit. The path to peace remained uncertain as the US and allies prepared to work out what military support for Ukraine might include.
“When it comes to security, (Europeans) are willing to put people on the ground. We’re willing to help them with things, especially, probably … by air,” Trump said in an interview with the Fox News “Fox & Friends” program.
Nato military leaders were expected to meet on Wednesday to discuss Ukraine, with US Gen Dan Caine, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, expected to attend virtually, officials told Reuters.
Also:
Putin has said Russia will not tolerate troops from the Nato alliance in Ukraine. He has also shown no sign of backing down from demands for territory, including land not under Russia’s military control, after his summit with Trump on Friday in Alaska.
Later, in an interview with radio host Mark Levin, Trump characterised his negotiating style in trying to end the war as “probably instinct more than process.”
Following Monday’s meeting, Russia launched its biggest air assault in more than a month on Ukraine, with 270 drones and 10 missiles launched, the Ukrainian air force said. The energy ministry said the strikes caused big fires at energy facilities in the central Poltava region, home to Ukraine’s only oil refinery.
Oil is flowing to Slovakia again via the Druzhba pipeline, the Slovak economy ministry said late on Tuesday, after a Ukrainian drone strike on an oil pumping station in Russia’s Tambov region cut off supplies. Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, a key conduit for generating money for Kremlin’s war efforts, with oil and gas sales accounting for a quarter of Russia’s total state budget proceeds.
Updated at 02.48 EDT