But the tale is over, and it was a fiction. The West’s military support succumbed to disillusion, Crimea and the Donbas will be part of Russia, and there is no hope of NATO membership.
Zelensky, who had once issued a decree that Ukraine would not negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin, now says that he will talk to Putin “if that is the only setup in which we can bring peace to the citizens of Ukraine.”
And it is the only way to bring peace to Ukraine. Once disappointed that fantasies of total victory had settled into a stalemate, Ukraine now faces the reality of the possibility of total collapse. And it Zelensky is going to stop that by talking to Putin, he will have to talk fast. His head of defence intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, has reportedly told a closed meeting of Ukraine’s leadership that “[i]f there are no serious negotiations by the summer, dangerous processes could unfold, threatening Ukraine’s very existence.”
Once insistent that Ukraine would recover all of its lost territories, Zelensky has conceded that “De facto, these territories are now controlled by the Russians. We don’t have the strength to bring them back,” while still insisting that Ukraine “cannot legally acknowledge any occupied territory of Ukraine as Russian.”
On February 12, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth emphasized to NATO and Ukrainian defense ministers that any thoughts of recovering Ukraine’s lost territory is “an unrealistic objective” and an “illusionary goal.”
Hoping to recover that lost territory diplomatically, on February 11, Zelensky said that he planned to offer Russia a swap of captured territory, trading land held by the Ukrainian armed forces in Kursk for Ukrainian land occupied by Russia: “We will swap one territory for another,” he said.
Zelensky’s suggestion is either for public consumption or he has not fully freed himself from his fantastical tale. After dramatically capturing Russian territory in the Kursk region, Russian forces have pushed the Ukrainian occupiers almost two-thirds of the way back to the Ukrainian border. The Ukrainian armed forces recently attempted to take some of that territory back. But, after some quick success, they seem already to be being pushed back, apparently sustaining heavy losses.
Zelensky’s imagined swap is not going to happen. From the Russian perspective, Zelensky has little to trade. The Donbas and Crimea are significantly more valuable than Kursk, and the Russian armed forces will take Kursk back when they are ready to. On February 12, the Kremlin swept aside Zelensky’s proposal. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov simply said, “This is impossible. Russia has never discussed and will not discuss the exchange of its territory Ukrainian units will be expelled from this territory. All who are not destroyed will be expelled.”
And the land that is left to Ukraine will not receive the security guarantee of NATO’ article five because NATO membership is not on the table. U.S. President Donald Trump has made it clear that he will not support NATO membership for Ukraine. And on February 12, U.S. Hegseth made that clear again, saying that Trump “does not support Ukraine’s membership in NATO as part of a realistic peace plan.” That closed door was already clear during the Biden administration, and Zelensky had already made it clear in the first days of the war that it was a closed door he was willing to concede.
But the reality that Zelensky now faces is that there is no wide open door to his second choice for security guarantees either.
Zelensky has said that if the U.S. offers strong security guarantees for Ukraine he “will move along this diplomatic path.” Only NATO membership can provide that guarantee, Zelensky has said. But, since that option is off the table that Trump is setting, second best is a large European peace keeping force with the fully committed support of U.S. troops. That force, Zelensky has said, would have to be at least 200,000 strong.
There are two problems with Zelensky’s terms. The first is that it is impossible. The number of troops demanded by Zelensky is, as The New York Times has pointed out, “nearly three times the size of the entire British Army and is regarded by analysts as impossible.” A senior European official told The Times that Europe “doesn’t even have 200,000 troops to offer.”
The second is that Europe is unwilling. Trump has made it clear that he wants Europe to bear the responsibility of providing a peacekeeping force, and Keith Kellog, his envoy for Ukraine and Russia, is preparing “to discuss with European officials their willingness to take the lead on providing deterrent forces to ensure that any peace settlement holds.”
But European officials have made it clear that the idea would need to involve some kind of U.S. backup.” Without it, European troops would be in peril. Officials have said that “[b]inding security guarantees from European capitals that would potentially involve them in a war with Russia if Ukraine was attacked again are unfeasible without a guarantee that the US would support those European armies.”
And, even if Europe was on board with a European peacekeeping force without U.S. guarantees, Zelensky is not. “It can’t be without the United States,” Zelensky has said. “Even if some European friends think it can be, no it can’t be. Nobody will risk without the United States.” Zelensky reiterated that rejection again recently, saying that “There are voices which say that Europe could offer security guarantees without the Americans, and I always say no. Security guarantees without America are not real security guarantees.”
Even Zelensky’s idea of trading Ukraine’s rare earth minerals to the U.S. in exchange for continued American military aid faces challenges. Trump is interested, and, though geological data is insufficient and the mines untapped, Ukraine’s rare earth potential is promising. But, after having lost so much land and so many lives, Ukraine would now be trading away one of its most promising sources of future development. And there is the added problem that almost half of Ukraine’s mineral wealth is buried under land that is now controlled by Russia.
In addition to all this reality that all Ukrainians are going to have to face, Zelensky will, personally, have to face one more reality. It is becoming clear that the U.S. favors parliamentary and presidential elections in Ukraine. On February 1, Kellogg said that elections in Ukraine “need to be done.” He said that “[m]ost democratic nations have elections in their time of war. I think it is important they do so. I think it is good for democracy.” According to Kellogg, White House officials “have discussed in recent days pushing Ukraine to agree to elections as part of an initial truce with Russia.” Once riding an unchallenged wave as presidential war hero, Zelensky would now face the very real possibility of losing that election, fulfilling Russian dreams of a change of regime in Kiev.
As the battlefield stage of the war starts to come to a close and the negotiating table stage rises on the horizon, Ukrainians are going to have to close the book on the hopeful story they were told and face an impending new reality.
Source: AntiWar.
