Russia Stuck to Its Demands on Ukraine. Many Are Now in Trump’s Peace Plan.
For the past four years, Russia has stuck by a single set of demands for ending its war in Ukraine. Now, Moscow is sitting back and reaping the fruits of its strategy, as President Trump presses a peace plan that broadly conforms with its demands.
The latest 28-point document that Trump has championed as a path to ending the war includes some of Russia’s most important conditions. Those terms include giving Russia more land in Ukraine’s east, defanging Ukraine’s military and closing off the path for Kyiv to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
The points in the document—and the uproar they have caused in Europe and Ukraine—bring Russia closer to some of its longest-sought foreign-policy goals of limiting the expansion of NATO while pushing the U.S., Europe and Kyiv further from one another.
Trump said Saturday that he might be open to changes to the plan following criticism from Europe and Kyiv.
But any gains Russia manages to pocket from the peace settlement, or the tensions it has triggered between Washington and Europe, can be attributed to a negotiating strategy by Moscow that hasn’t wavered. In recent weeks, Russia has backed up its maximalist demands with important gains on the battlefield.
“The Russians have remained very consistent,” said Thomas Graham, a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “If diplomacy will give them what they want, they’ll take it. Otherwise, they’re prepared to continue fighting on the battlefield.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin said as much in comments to his security council Friday, when he praised the paper as a potential basis for a peace settlement. Trumpeting Russia’s recent battlefield success in eastern Ukraine, he warned that any refusal by Ukraine or its European allies would only prolong the war and pave the way for more Ukrainian losses.
“If Kyiv doesn’t want to discuss the proposals of President Trump, then they and the European warmongers should understand that [their battlefield failures] will inevitably repeat themselves on other key areas of the front,” he said.
“Overall, that’s fine with us, as it leads to achieving the goals of the special military operation by force,” he said, using Russia’s euphemism for its invasion.
Much of Russia’s strategy is based on a bet that its authoritarian system, which stifles dissent, can outlast messy democracies in the West, where populist politicians are already playing on voter fatigue over support for Ukraine. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s ruling party is being rocked by a corruption scandal, and prominent figures close to the military are criticizing the way the front-line effort is being organized.
The cracks starting to show in both Ukraine’s military and its political leadership have likely played to Moscow’s advantage. Russia’s strength on the battlefield has also likely been a factor in convincing Trump to embrace more of the Kremlin’s demands to reach a deal quickly.
That has contrasted with Kyiv’s expressed goal—increasingly seen as unrealistic in the short term—to take back all of its occupied territory. Manpower issues have hobbled its ability to hold back a grinding Russian advance that is now threatening two major cities in Ukraine’s east.
“Ukraine has no clear theory of victory. Some vague notions are out there. Russia is bigger. It has the resources,” said Linas Kojala, chief executive of the Geopolitics and Security Studies Center, a think tank based in Lithuania.
Critics of Trump’s peace plan say that if it were accepted in its current form, it could leave open opportunities for Russia to justify a resumption of the war down the line. Ukraine has pointed to previous agreements broken by Moscow as reasons to be wary of its intentions.
“Putin is banking on a resumption of military hostilities,” said Abbas Gallyamov, a former Putin speechwriter who is now a Kremlin critic living abroad. “And with this agreement, Ukraine will emerge defenseless against him.”
Moscow, for example, is likely to back multiple pro-Russian candidates in a Ukrainian election organized under the terms of a peace agreement. Kyiv would be obliged to respond to any violations of electoral laws by such candidates and bar them from participating. Putin could then claim that the requirement for an open vote wasn’t met and use that as a reason to resume the invasion.
Likewise, the new plan says Ukraine must adopt “rules on religious tolerance,” opening the door for activity by the Ukrainian branch of the Russian Orthodox Church. Kyiv has banned the branch, describing it as a front for Moscow’s covert operations and espionage inside Ukraine.
Still, there are various points in the draft that don’t fully embrace Russia’s positions. Moscow has long insisted on a full disarmament of Ukraine’s military, but the deal instead stipulates a reduction in the size of the army to 600,000 troops—some 300,000 fewer than the current estimated number of active duty personnel.
The plan also doesn’t include any restrictions on Ukraine’s development and use of long-range weapons, a priority for Kyiv as it seeks to undermine Russia’s war economy with deep strikes against energy infrastructure and military facilities. Putin has sought to prevent a buildup of such arms by Ukraine, but the plan doesn’t appear to address that.
“Putin’s calculation is that whatever happens in the coming weeks, Ukraine will be getting weaker and more cornered, and in any event, he will get what he wants,” said Tatiana Stanovaya, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.
Write to Thomas Grove at thomas.grove@wsj.com and Matthew Luxmoore at matthew.luxmoore@wsj.com
The War in Ukraine
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