The ball is in Russia’s court – this is the mantra of all involved in the US-Ukraine ceasefire proposals. The fact that, after those disgraceful scenes in the Oval Office, such an agreement could be reached at all is a testament to the common sense and skill of diplomats on all sides.
The Ukrainian delegation at the peace talks in Jeddah appear to have reached the levels of deference that their US counterparts judge appropriate – and, more substantively, have accepted the proposed one-month moratorium without any security conditions. Volodymyr Zelensky’s team know that the frozen ceasefire line could end up being their country’s de facto or de jure international border with Russia, meaning the consequent loss of one-fifth of their territory, and accepting the loss of people and resources.
That is a considerable concession, as is the offer of the Americans gaining special access to Ukraine’s mineral riches. If, as has been reported, the prime minister and his national security adviser, Jonathan Powell, had any role in advising Ukraine in this direction then they too deserve a share of the credit; as do other European leaders such as Emmanuel Macron.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, when he was a senator, was a dedicated hawk regarding Russia’s unlawful invasion of Ukraine. In recent times, he has had to publicly support Donald Trump’s radically different policy. Even so, he has, quietly, with the Ukrainians, ensured that the US has restored crucial intelligence sharing with Kyiv, and restored the flow of armaments to Ukraine’s hard-pressed forces. Without that, many more civilian lives would have been lost, and Russia’s marginal gains turned into a Ukrainian rout for want of ammunition. That horrific scenario has, for the moment, been averted.
However, this welcome ceasefire is freighted with troubling questions about the future of Ukraine and the security of the wider European continent. It is, to borrow a phrase, only the beginning of a process that must have a lasting and just end to the war for Ukraine.
The ball is indeed firmly with the Kremlin – and is a tricky one to play.
Between them, the Ukrainians and the US have fixed Vladimir Putin in a bind. If he rejects the deal out of hand, or tries to impose absurd conditions, then he will antagonise Mr Rubio and, more seriously, Mr Trump. That could conceivably lead to an acceleration in US assistance to Ukraine, despite recent tensions, and further sanctions on, for example, Russian banks.
President Putin, who is not used to being confronted with such a fait accompli as this ceasefire proposal will have to accept that the extent of his current territorial gains will not necessarily be a step along the path to the absorption of Ukraine into Russia, but the absolute limit of his gains, provided the eventual security arrangements are robust enough to deter him.
He will need to renounce – implicitly or more formally – the aim of the ill-starred “special military operation” (ie, complete conquest) on which he embarked three years ago. Beyond that, he will be pushed hard to concede territory to Ukraine, to permit Ukraine to join the EU, if not Nato, permit troops from other nations to establish a “reassurance force” in Ukraine and, just possibly, a US security “backstop”.
A deal along those lines will certainly not look like a Russian “victory”, but would at least give the Russian people some respite from a war nobody outside the Kremlin ever wanted.
At such a moment, though, it’s important to remember that the Trump plan, and the deal, whatever it may turn out to be, is far away from what should be happening – which is the restoration of Ukrainian sovereignty and its complete territory. This is not, as it is now fashionable to believe in certain appeasing circles, some Utopian dream, but a perfectly feasible outcome.
As Sir Ben Wallace, the former UK defence secretary, argues, the Russian economy is a year away from a crash, Mr Putin has lost more than 800,000 soldiers (substantial even for Russia), and his military equipment is decimated. Russia is a fearsome nuclear power but not an economic superpower, as is so often assumed, but a medium-sized economy.
President Trump is not President Putin’s equal, but is in a far more powerful position. It is time he used that leverage in his deal-making.
