Within hours of a public showdown at the White House between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, in February, a Ukrainian banker started a fundraising campaign to buy nuclear weapons. Despite the privations inflicted by the war, Ukrainians donated as much as they could and gathered more than half a million dollars before he declared it was meant in jest and redirected the fund toward the purchase of drones.

Oleg Horohovsky, the co-owner of Monobank and a businessman, later said it was meant to “let off steam.” But the speed with which people responded to the joke nonetheless expressed a sense of insecurity that Ukrainians may have felt as their president was berated in Washington and backing from a key ally in an existential war against Russia seemed to have all but vanished.

Within hours of a public showdown at the White House between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, in February, a Ukrainian banker started a fundraising campaign to buy nuclear weapons. Despite the privations inflicted by the war, Ukrainians donated as much as they could and gathered more than half a million dollars before he declared it was meant in jest and redirected the fund toward the purchase of drones.

Oleg Horohovsky, the co-owner of Monobank and a businessman, later said it was meant to “let off steam.” But the speed with which people responded to the joke nonetheless expressed a sense of insecurity that Ukrainians may have felt as their president was berated in Washington and backing from a key ally in an existential war against Russia seemed to have all but vanished.

Ukraine gave up its nukes in 1994 in exchange for assurances from the United States above all that its sovereignty was guaranteed. But as the Trump administration abandons previous promises, Ukraine isn’t the only one feeling insecure and isolated. There are growing fears among Washington’s European allies that they may be left with the French and British nuclear deterrent, if the United States withdraws conventional troops and assets from Europe as it pivots to the Indo-Pacific.

Nuclear weapons are the biggest taboo in Europe, where even whispering about them—and in countries such as Germany, even about the civilian use of nuclear power—is highly controversial. Yet in late February, Friedrich Merz, then the likely next German chancellor, said it was imperative he discussed “whether nuclear sharing, or at least nuclear security from the U.K. and France,”........

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