The United States will abandon efforts to end the war in Ukraine if it proves impossible to broker meaningful progress in the next several days, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in remarks that piled pressure on Ukraine as he departed Paris on Friday.

“If it is not possible to end the war in Ukraine, we need to move on,” Rubio told reporters a day after meeting with President Emmanuel Macron of France, adding that the Trump administration would decide “in a matter of days whether or not this is doable in the next few weeks.”

It was not entirely clear from Rubio’s remarks whether he meant that the United States would merely abandon its effort to reach a 30-day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, President Donald Trump’s immediate focus, or abandon Washington’s commitments to Ukraine altogether.

But his remarks were certain to worry Ukraine, which is heavily dependent on U.S. military support, and appeared intended to inject urgency into European efforts to prod Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy toward painful compromise. Later Friday, Trump vented his own frustrations at the way at least one country had failed to respond to U.S. overtures.“If for some reason one of the two parties makes it very difficult, we’re just going to say you’re foolish, you’re fools, you’re horrible people, and we’re just going to take a pass,” Trump said from the Oval Office. “But hopefully we won’t have to do that.”

Trump said the war was costing the lives of 2,500 soldiers every week but has put virtually no pressure on Russia to end the fighting and at one point claimed that Ukraine was responsible for the Russian invasion in 2022.

While the United States is Russia’s chief interlocutor in the negotiations, Europe has far greater sway over Zelenskyy. Trump said Thursday that he was “not a big fan” of the Ukrainian leader. It is clear, not least in Ukraine, where Trump’s sympathies lie.

Rubio said Trump “has spent 87 days at the highest level of this government repeatedly making efforts to bring this war to an end. We are now reaching a point where we need to decide and determine whether this is even possible or not.”

Before taking office, Trump said he would end the war within “24 hours.”

Responding to Rubio’s comments, the Kremlin signaled that it was in no hurry for a ceasefire, a consistent message from Moscow throughout Trump’s attempts to end the war.

High-level talks on Thursday between American, European and Ukrainian officials were the first of their kind, intended to bring “convergence” between views of the war in Washington and European capitals. Rubio said the conversations had been constructive, but it appeared clear that Trump was losing patience.

During the talks, a “broad framework” for peace, in effect a U.S. plan, was presented to Ukraine. “It’s a framework that gets us into a position to see — look, there are going to be differences; there’s no — no one’s saying this can be done in 12 hours,” Rubio said. He declined to give any further details of the proposal.

“It is not our war. We didn’t start it,” Rubio said. “The United States has been helping Ukraine for the past three years and we want it to end, but it’s not our war.”

He added: “If it’s not possible — if we’re so far apart that this is not going to happen — then I think the president’s probably at a point where he’s going to say, well, we’re done. We’ll do what we can on the margins.” He described Trump as feeling “very strongly” about this.

Rubio and Steve Witkoff, Trump’s envoy, have led the U.S. diplomacy aimed at ending the war, which has festered for more than three years. Witkoff has met with Russian President Vladimir Putin multiple times and said he was trying to develop a “friendship, a relationship” with the Russian leader.

But Putin has balked, setting various conditions even for a 30-day ceasefire. The Russian bombardment of Ukraine continues.

Rubio’s comments came after he spoke with Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, on Thursday. In that call, the State Department said, Rubio told his Russian counterpart that “peace is possible if all parties commit to reaching an agreement,” and that the United States had been encouraged by the Ukrainian and European response in Paris to Trump’s plan for peace.

The Russian Foreign Ministry’s description of that call was more circumspect. Russia said Lavrov “reaffirmed Moscow’s readiness to continue collaborative efforts with American counterparts to comprehensively address the root causes of the Ukrainian crisis.”

Asked whether Russia planned to respond to a ceasefire offer from Trump this week, Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesperson, said Friday that ending the war was “not a simple topic” and that Russia was seeking a settlement that would “ensure its own interests.”

“We are open for dialogue,” Peskov said. “There are already certain developments, but many difficult discussions lie ahead.”

There was no immediate official reaction from Ukraine to Rubio’s remarks.

Ukraine and the United States signed a memorandum of understanding late Thursday as a “step toward a joint economic partnership agreement,” according to Ukraine’s economy minister, bringing both sides closer to a contentious minerals deal. The deal, if concluded, would make U.S. abandonment of Ukraine appear a remote possibility.