Vladimir Putin’s ‘negotiations’ are a trap

In November 2022, we warned that allowing Russia’s war on Ukraine to become a frozen conflict would mean defeat for Ukraine and the democratic world. Sadly, this point is often lost.

Those covering the issue in the media or pursuing political efforts to contain the war have failed to recognize the bigger picture: Russia is already waging war on the West by other means — including through political interference, disinformation and sabotage.

The Kremlin has shown no genuine interest in any peace or ceasefire in the war it started, because its goals have not changed. It wants to destroy Ukraine as a state and Ukrainian as a national identity. That is why Russian state-owned media continue to publish commentaries with headlines like: “There is no other way out. No one should stay alive in Ukraine.” In the face of such genocidal ambitions, even ceding Ukrainian territory will not end the war.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s constant talk of negotiations has one purpose: to reduce international support for Ukraine and demobilize Ukrainian society by creating false hopes. If people start to believe there could soon be a ceasefire, they will also start to wonder whether Ukraine really needs more weapons deliveries or whether they should bother joining the Ukrainian Army.

It should be obvious by now that muddying the water is Putin’s only goal in holding out hope for diplomacy. So far this year, an official Ukrainian delegation has met with an official Russian delegation three times in Istanbul; U.S. President Donald Trump has called Putin more than a dozen times and rolled out a red carpet for him in Alaska; and, Steve Witkoff, a real-estate developer with no diplomatic experience, has paid regular visits (usually relying on a Kremlin-supplied translator and with no U.S. official taking notes) to Moscow as Trump’s special envoy.

The results speak for themselves. Russia continues to shell Ukrainian cities and step up its attacks on the front lines, ramp up military production, mobilize more men to become cannon fodder and receive more weapons and manpower from North Korea. It has also launched drone incursions into Polish and Romanian airspace and continues to meddle in European elections. If it can install more illiberal Russophiles like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, it can weaken Western democracies and reduce support for Ukraine.

The smoke screen of “negotiations” should fool no one. Russia, supported by China, North Korea and Iran, will continue its military aggression against Ukraine. And when China and Russia determine that NATO has been sufficiently weakened, they will attack other countries. The more concessions Putin gets (like lifting some sanctions or delaying a shipment of weapons bound for Ukraine), the sooner this will happen.

With the shameful Alaska summit, Putin came one step closer to achieving his dream of a “Yalta 2,” where Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump and he carve the world into spheres of influence. And while all the empty talk continues, the Ukrainians who remain in the occupied territories must bear the unbearable. Freedom House, in its effort to quantify the results of Russia’s barbaric rule, has assigned these territories a value of -1 on its 100-point index of rights and civil liberties.

Among its many atrocities, Russian forces have brutalized and murdered Ukrainian journalists who try to investigate torture, unlawful detentions and other crimes against humanity in the occupied territories. Incompetent and corrupt occupation authorities have left basic infrastructure to decay. An escalating water crisis has hit the populations in Donetsk and Mariupol, and abandoned coal mines are poisoning ground water and threatening to make vast swaths of territory uninhabitable. This zone of lawlessness and ecological catastrophe will only expand if Ukraine is forced to cede more land to Russia.

Putin’s ultimate goal is to overturn the post-Cold War international order, and this process has already started. The only path to stability and security now is for Russia to be soundly defeated in Ukraine. There will be no lasting peace until its leaders are brought to justice and until its people are made to understand that they cannot simply murder others on a tyrant’s whim.

Those who think it is impossible to defeat Russia should recall that the Soviet Union was far more powerful than Putin’s wannabe empire, and yet it lost in Afghanistan in 1989 and lost the first Chechen War in 1996. More recently, Russia failed to secure its allies in Iran and Syria when they came under attack. On the contrary, when the Kremlin stopped its “peacekeeping” efforts, Armenia and Azerbaijan were able to sign a peace agreement. In these latter cases, deployments to Ukraine had stretched Russia’s military resources too thin. Moreover, there are many signs that the Russian war economy is running out of steam.

Unfortunately, Trump is hardly the only one who wants to make land concessions at Ukraine’s expense in the hopes of restoring the old status quo. Everyone who favors this approach must realize that there can be no going back.

We are approaching the point with only two options. The first is for Russia to be defeated, which requires that the West impose harsher sanctions and meet Ukraine’s need for weapons. The second is a defeat for democracy, fulfilling Stalin’s and Putin’s dream of subduing Europe. In the first scenario, Europeans will need to sacrifice some of their welfare. In the second, they will lose it all.