The Outlines of a Peace Agreement for Ukraine are Becoming Clearer
There is still a path to a reasonable solution.
The Gaze reports on it according to WP.
A simple description of what peace should look like for Ukraine: a sovereign state whose borders are protected by international security guarantees, which is part of the European Union and is rebuilding its economy with large investments from the United States and Europe. Despite US President Donald Trump's tough negotiating tactics and his puzzling sympathy for the Russian aggressor, such an agreement, according to American, Ukrainian, and European officials, seems to be getting closer, writes columnist David Ignatius in a new article for the WP.
Trump could still ruin everything by putting so much pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and European allies that they decide to continue fighting despite horrific losses. That would be bad for everyone. Trump should now reassure Ukraine and Europe, rather than trying to force them into a “settlement.”
Trump's tilt toward the Kremlin in the updated US National Security Strategy, released by the White House last week, has complicated negotiations. Trump seems to want to take an equidistant position between democratic Europe and autocratic Russia “to reduce the risk of conflict between Russia and European states,” the document says. Such equality between friends and enemies makes no sense from either a strategic or moral point of view — and this is indeed worrying for Europe.
Despite this uncertainty, Trump's peace efforts are quite promising. American negotiators Jared Kushner and Steve Wigoff are business tycoons, not diplomats. But they seem to understand that the best protection for Ukraine is a combination of binding security guarantees and future economic prosperity. And they know that the package of measures will fail if Zelensky cannot “sell” it to a bold but exhausted Ukraine.
As a Ukrainian official told Ignatius, the “negotiation package” includes three documents: a peace plan, security guarantees, and an economic recovery plan. The negotiations are far from complete, and Ukraine and its European allies plan to present joint “amendments” on Wednesday, December 10. But here are some of the ideas currently under consideration, according to American and Ukrainian officials.
Ukraine will join the European Union as early as 2027. Such rapid accession worries some EU states. But the Trump administration believes it can overcome resistance from Hungary, which is Kyiv's biggest opponent in the EU. Joining the Union will promote trade and investment. But perhaps most importantly, it will force Ukraine to control the harmful culture of corruption in state-owned enterprises. At the heart of this war is the question of whether Ukraine can become a European country. Russian dictator Vladimir Putin hates this idea because he believes in the “unity” of Russia and Ukraine. Kyiv's rapid accession to the EU, according to Ignatius, is a victory.
The US will provide Ukraine with security guarantees similar to those provided for in Article 5 of NATO to protect the country in the event of a Russian breach of the treaty. Ukraine wants the US to sign such an agreement and ratify it in Congress; European countries will sign separate security guarantees. An American-Ukrainian working group is studying how this will work in practice — and how quickly Ukraine and its allies will be able to respond to any violation by Russia. The reliability of US guarantees is likely to be undermined by language in the National Security Strategy that appears to undermine the very NATO alliance on which those guarantees are based. But Trump's team says it wants to continue US intelligence support for Ukraine, which is a necessary condition for security.
The biggest mistake Trump could make is to insist that it's “now or never.” Diplomacy doesn't work that way, and neither does good business. As Trump noted several decades ago, “the worst thing you can do in a deal is to look desperate; it makes the other guy smell blood, and then you're finished.”
Trump must strike a reasonable deal that will be long-lasting. Otherwise, he may end up with nothing, and the war will risk entering an even more destructive phase, Ignatius notes.
As the Gaze reported earlier Ukraine to Deliver Revised Peace Plan to U.S. on Tuesday.