Here’s a dispatch from the Financial Times: 

Ukraine has halted an intense campaign of drone strikes on oil tankers using a critical Black Sea port after a request at the end of last month from US vice-president JD Vance, according to Ukrainian officials.

Washington was alarmed that Ukraine was further destabilising oil markets and harming US companies by targeting tankers carrying crude piped from Kazakhstan to a Caspian Pipeline Consortium terminal in the Russian port of Novorossiysk.

Vance asked President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to halt the attacks during a call on July 31, the Ukrainian officials and other people familiar with the matter said. 

If anyone is wondering why oil markets are unstable, it isn’t because of Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil infrastructure. It has far more to do with the unnecessary war that Donald Trump, Vance’s boss in the White House, launched against Iran. It’s a war that has given Iran full control over the Strait of Hormuz, and a war no one in the Trump regime knows how to win. 

But here’s the funniest part. Ukraine apparently told Vance, “Sure, we’ll stop,” then proceeded to do no such thing.

A plume of black smoke is seen over the port of St. Petersburg, Russia, on June 3, 2026, after a Ukrainian drone attack. AP

“Ukraine has struck Novorossiysk, Russia’s main operational hub on the Black Sea, which has become Moscow’s last major naval base in the region after sustained Ukrainian attacks forced much of its fleet from occupied Crimea,” Euro News reported on on Wednesday. On Telegram, Ukrainian President Volodynyr Zelenskyy said that his forces had struck “air defense positions, docks, and infrastructure within the seaport.” 

The Trump administration may be the worst collection of negotiators in modern American history, having already botched negotiations with Iran and over Gaza. So it’s no surprise that Vance managed to fumble this one too. He demanded that Ukraine stop attacking tankers carrying Russian oil while leaving a gaping loophole: Ukraine could simply destroy the port infrastructure those same tankers need to load and depart.

Either way, Russia loses. Whether the tankers are hit directly or the port that serves them is crippled, Moscow is denied the oil revenues it desperately needs to finance its war.

Zelenskyy has little reason to worry about keeping Donald Trump or JD Vance happy. The Trump administration cut off military aid to Ukraine after taking office, then Trump and Vance famously ambushed Zelenskyy during that humiliating Oval Office meeting, shouting that he didn’t “have the cards.”

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Related | Zelenskyy shows true leadership as Trump implodes in Oval Office meltdown

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Turns out Zelenskyy has plenty of cards. He’s just playing them carefully. And he knows what much of the rest of the world has figured out as well. 

“For a world weary of the United States’ capacity to disrupt, [Trump’s] bombast is baked in, the threats are frequently bluffs and the president who relishes shock and awe, in the end, often backs down,” The Washington Post recently observed.

Why should Ukraine treat Trump’s demands as anything more than another bluff? Vance asked for one thing and got another. Ukraine nodded, then kept degrading Russia’s ability to export oil.

Keep striking Novorossiysk, Zelenskyy, and bleeding Russia’s war machine dry.

We all know that Vance doesn’t have the cards.

Power matters.

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