Article Summary: Putin publicly claims openness to a Ukraine ceasefire but continues pressing militarily, imposing surrender-like terms that highlight Russia’s true wartime ambitions.
Russia’s Ceasefire Demands Reveal Putin’s True Ambitions in Ukraine War
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday said he agreed “in principle” to a 30-day ceasefire with Ukraine. The conditions he laid out, however, makes it clear he is not interested in any cessation of hostilities.
His actions, on the contrary, say he is interested in continuing the fight and winning the war on the battlefield.
That’s not to say he isn’t genuinely willing to conduct diplomacy with Trump. If Putin is able to get a deal he can live with and attain through negotiations what he feels he must have to secure his western flank, he will. But we must all be clear-eyed that Putin won’t make diplomatic concessions, from a position of strength. Thus, if he is not offered the conditions he deems necessary for Russian security, he will continue fighting until he seizes by force of arms what he wants.
That is the key dilemma that too few in the United States and Europe understand or are willing to acknowledge: Russia is in the dominant military position and doesn’t need to negotiate to attain its political objectives (security on its western borders). Ukraine needs a negotiated settlement to avoid a total military defeat.
Putin said he is generally open to “the proposals to cease hostilities, but they must lead to long-term peace and address the root causes of the crisis.” In Russia’s telling, solving the root causes means any end-of-war agreement will have to result, at a minimum, in a) Ukraine giving up all four administrative borders of Zaporizhia, Kherson, Luhansk, and Donetsk provinces; b) the “denazification” of Ukraine (featuring Ukraine having a new presidential election); c) demilitarizing, meaning reducing their Army to 85,000; and d) a declaration of neutrality, in which no NATO membership will ever be offered.
Ukraine has called these terms an effective surrender.
Russia Has Big Advantages in Ukraine War
They aren’t wrong. Those words are chilling to Ukrainian backers all across the West. But they also reflect reality. Russia’s armed forces are now approaching 1.5 million men, and growing. They have air superiority over the Ukrainian air force. The Russians have a vast advantage in available manpower to replace troops killed and wounded. Russia has vast natural resources that Ukraine can never match, and perhaps above all, the Russians have a defense industrial base that dwarfs Ukraine and all of Europe combined.
Putin is well aware of these realities, if many in the West aren’t. The reason he can so confidently say he will consider a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement, but be so confident to demand terms favorable only to Moscow, is because he doesn’t need to solve the problem diplomatically; he has the capacity to seize by force of arms what he feels Russia needs for its national security.
If the U.S. and Ukraine do not jointly agree to Putin’s draconian terms and surrender all four administrative borders of the four oblasts, agree to elections, reduce their army to 85,000, and vow neutrality, Russia will simply keep fighting – but they likely will not stop at the four oblasts. The most likely scenario if Putin doesn’t win by negotiations what is currently on the table, he’ll continue seizing land at least up to the Dnieper River.
Many hardliners in Russia are already opposed to even the four oblasts. One Russian field commander, interviewed by the Washington Post, said to him and his troops, “It’s all about victory, victory, victory for us,” he told the Post. “We’ll sweep away this puppet Zelensky, we’ll liberate Kyiv, we’ll get to Odessa, and we’ll liberate our native lands.” A recent video analysis by respected Austrian Col. Markus Reisner, showed how it was possible Russia could capture all the territory mentioned by the commander in the Washington Post interview.
I’ll honestly point out that we are in this position now because the bulk of European NATO and the Biden Administration over the first three years of the war were resolutely opposed to ending the war with diplomacy, choosing instead to keep fighting “for as long as it takes.” But the fundamentals of war and the balance of power between the two sides was always with Russia, which the West blinded itself to seeing.
As a result of those first three years of unforgivable and incompetent decisions, the Ukrainian people are condemned to accept one of two outcomes: either an ugly negotiated settlement that grants to Russia nearly all of what Putin wants, or a continued refusal to acknowledge ground truth reality and continue to fight – and eventually be subject to whatever terms of surrender the Russian government issues.
A Sad Reality and Tough Choices Ahead
Had the West and Kyiv acknowledged reality long ago, they could have avoided war by diplomacy prior to February 2022. They could have accepted a negotiated end in Istanbul in April 2022, or any point thereafter. But since they didn’t, this is what they’re left with.
F-16 fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
The longer Volodymyr Zelensky ignores reality, the deeper and bloodier will be Ukraine’s final end. I grieve for the millions of Ukrainian men, women, and children who have paid such a bitter price for the malfeasance of the previous U.S. Administration, so many current European leaders, and their own President Zelensky.
History will judge them all harshly.
About the Author: Daniel L. Davis
Daniel L. Davis retired from the U.S. Army as a Lt. Col. after 21 years of active service and is now a 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, writing a weekly column. He was deployed into combat zones four times in his career: Operation Desert Storm in 1991, Iraq in 2009, and Afghanistan twice (2005, 2011). Davis was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for Valor at the Battle of 73 Easting in 1991 and awarded a Bronze Star Medal in Afghanistan in 2011. He is the author of The Eleventh Hour in 2020 America. Davis gained some national notoriety in 2012 when he returned from Afghanistan and published a report detailing how senior U.S. military and civilian leaders told the American public and Congress the war was going well while, in reality, it was headed to defeat. Events since confirmed his analysis was correct. Davis was also the recipient of the 2012 Ridenhour Prize for Truth-telling. Currently, you can find Lt Col. Daniel Davis on his YouTube channel, “Daniel Davis Deep Dive,” where he analyzes war, national security, politics, foreign policy, and breaking news with expert commentary.
