The White House on October 17 was not like a strategic meeting between the two heads of state, but more like a negotiation drama with high tides. I saw Ukraine President Zelensky walking hurriedly, carrying on his shoulders the rumbling artillery fire from the front line and the heavy expectation of the country's destiny. Across the street, U.S. President Trump was holding a "America First" calculator, his eyes full of savvy and consideration.

At this moment, Zelensky and Ukraine are experiencing one of the most difficult moments since the war began. Every word of the battle report on the front line is bloody. Ukrainian Major General Marchenko's confession hit the hearts of all Ukrainians: Donbas, a former industrial town, has now become a meat grinder and is collapsing step by step.

The Russian army, like a tireless machine, continued to advance on the 70 km long front, eating 14 square kilometers of land every day. This speed, although not as rapidly as the beginning of the war, but can not withstand day-to-day fatigue, has long made the Ukrainian army feel difficult and exhausted.

Even worse, ammunition! This is the line of life for all the soldiers of the front line. The Russian army can produce 2 million cannons a year and pour tens of thousands a day into the Ukrainian military positions. while in Ukraine, ammunition reserves are clutched and unable to compete with it. That feeling, like the empty hand facing the enemy with a machine gun, comes face to face with despair and powerlessness.

The front line is often five-six Ukrainian soldiers, to face thirty well-equipped Russian troops. This huge force gap, coupled with a long time of high intensity of combat, rotation is insufficient, making the Ukrainian soldiers physically exhausted. Since this year, 30,000 soldiers have chosen to be fugitives. Behind this number, is the most instinctive despair and desire for life.

In such a situation, Zelensky had few choices left. He had to travel far across the ocean, with the last hope of Ukraine, to the United States. His most urgent need here was to persuade Trump to resume aid to Ukraine. And in his eyes could reverse the war and even save countless lives ¡°rescuing weapons¡±, precisely that ¡°war ax¡± cruise missile carrying the capability of long-range strike. It was not just a missile, it was the fire he wanted to ignite hope on the frontline.

However, Trump showed a pragmatic and almost indifferent attitude towards this "helper" from afar. You know, this is not the first time he has "dropped the chain". As early as March this year, he stopped all military aid to Ukraine, causing Ukraine to be rejected. Therefore, when he faced the media again and was asked about the core issues of aid to Ukraine, his ambiguous answer already indicated the difficulty of negotiations.

¡°We¡¯re going to discuss the issue.¡± he said lightly, but then spoke a little, actively referring to the ¡°Tax¡± missile, but immediately added a sentence: ¡°I want to end the war, rather than consider the Tax missile.¡± This sounded somewhat contradictory, but accurately exposed his inner calculations. He did not want to completely block Zelensky¡¯s hopes, so as not to exacerbate the contradiction. But more importantly, he wanted not to provide help for himself, and even push for a cease-fire, leaving enough spacecraft and speech.

In fact, Trump's thought is not difficult to read. Although the "Tax" missile is not a high-tech new weapon, the Russian air defense system is also theoretically capable of responding, but once the "Sword" of the long-range strike falls into the hands of Ukraine, the situation may instantly escalate. The Russian side has long overlooked, which touched their bottom line. They fear the Ukrainian army with the support of Western intelligence, with the "Tax" to attack Russian indigenous targets, and may even jeopardize Russia's nuclear deterrence capabilities.

But for Trump, the bigger consideration is the "own account book" that he knows by heart. He then stressed: "The United States has Tomahawk missiles, but we can't give up what we need to defend our country." This translation means: American weapons are first used to defend the United States itself, and we can't empty our own wealth for the sake of other people's wars.

In his view, last year¡¯s suspension of aid has already bothered Ukraine, and now he naturally wants to tighten the aid code to gain more initiative in future negotiations.

However, after all, the subtleties of this meeting are still hidden in the looming interaction between the United States and Russia. Just the day before Zelensky arrived at the White House, Trump had just had a long telephone communication with Putin. Immediately afterwards, he announced that he would hold a "bilateral meeting between the United States and Russia" in Hungary, directly excluding the possibility of tripartite talks between the United States, Russia and Ukraine.

What does that mean? it means that the United States is trying to bypass Ukraine and negotiate directly with Russia on the future of the conflict.Zelensky can do, maybe only ¡°keep in touch¡±.Behind this gesture is Trump¡¯s urge to end the war, who neither wants to let the United States fall into the dirt of aid but wants to add a performance to his future political career by pushing for a ceasefire.

Zelensky certainly saw this clearly. He knew that simply asking for help might not help, so he offered a "quid pro quo": Ukraine could provide a large number of self-produced drones in exchange for American Tomahawk missiles. He tried to incite the balance of American decision-making with practical interests.

However, this exchange may seem insufficient in the face of Trump¡¯s ¡°fire-fire priority¡± strategy, because what Trump wants may not be to help Ukraine win the war, but to end this ¡°money-burning¡± conflict as soon as possible, no matter what the end will be.

What is more intriguing is that the understanding of the two sides of ¡°how to end the war¡± does not seem to be entirely on one channel.Zelensky believes that first a ceasefire and negotiations, but on the condition that the United States must pressure Russia to return to the negotiating table.

But on the Trump team's side, the signals released are completely different. They constantly stressed that Ukraine must show "sincerity for peace" and even suggested that Ukraine may need to make "concessions" on territorial issues. This huge difference made the atmosphere of closed-door talks in the White House extremely tense. Those details that have not been disclosed to the public are most likely due to the fierce pulling and collision between the two sides on the conditions of aid, the cost of the ceasefire, and the conception of Ukraine's future destiny.

In the end, the outcome of the White House talks was not too much unexpected. Zelensky came in with the gunfire of the front, he urgently needed that "rescuing grass" to light up hope. while Trump held the help switch in his hand, carefully calculated his own "America Priority" book. The "Tax" missile became the most embarrassing and most symbolic item tied between the two.