Finnish President Stubb: Ukraine will have to make territorial concessions
Finnish President Alexander Stubb said that Ukraine will have to make territorial concessions, writes NYT. He recalled the Soviet-Finnish war, when Finland lost about 10% of its territories and was unable to regain them during World War II.
Paul Sonn
Finnish President Alexander Stubb, who became a participant in the peace talks, said in an interview that he did not want Ukraine to suffer the same fate as his country once did.
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The day after the leaders of the United States and Finland played golf together in Florida, Trump said he was "angry" with the Kremlin and threatened new sanctions against Russian oil.
A few hours after Trump and Stubb met at the funeral of Pope Francis at the Vatican, the US president criticized Moscow for rocket attacks on civilian areas in Ukraine. "Too many people are dying!!!" – Trump wrote on Truth Social on Saturday, threatening Russia with sanctions again if the Kremlin does not agree to a truce.
It could be a coincidence. Or Trump listens to the opinion of Finnish President Alexander Stubb, who is not shy about voicing the opinions of small European countries about the Ukrainian crisis.
In an interview with The New York Times last Sunday, Stubb downplayed his influence on President Trump. He noted that French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer are leading the European efforts, and his role is only to "push the situation in the right direction" and "try to connect all the dots."
Finland understands the danger of peace talks for Ukraine, perhaps better than any other country. After the war with the Soviet Union in the 1940s, Finland ceded some territories to Moscow, agreed to neutrality and a number of military restrictions, remaining more or less under Kremlin control for decades.
President Stubb does not want Ukraine to suffer the same fate.
He declined to provide more details about his conversations with the American president, but noted that he left the Vatican with a feeling of "a little more optimism" about the prospects for peace. After the last two meetings with Stubb, Trump almost verbatim repeated the words of the Finnish president regarding the current situation: Russian President Vladimir Putin will "play cat and mouse to the very end" and "leads Washington by the nose", demanding that Trump increase pressure through "force and sanctions."
"Everyone should understand that the only thing Putin understands is power. There is a reason why Finland has one of the strongest armies in Europe, and that reason is not Sweden," Stubb said.
The length of the Russian-Finnish border is about 1,340 kilometers, and according to Stubb's calculations, Russia has had 30 wars and skirmishes with the Finns since the 1300s. One of his ancestors was a co-author of the "Declaration of Independence of Finland" in 1917, after a century of Finland's stay in the Russian Empire, following several centuries of Swedish rule.
Alexander Stubb, who took office last year and previously served as Prime Minister of Finland, warned that Putin would act contrary to his words.
"This is in the spirit of Russian international relations," he said.
Alexander Stubb, 57, the leader of the center-right party, has every chance of pleasing Trump. He is a marathon runner and triathlete with a height of 189 centimeters, speaks fluent English with a slight accent, plays golf at an almost professional level (in the past he played for the Finnish national team) and holds the highest position in the country. He attended Daytona Beach High School and graduated from Furman University in South Carolina, where he got a sports scholarship for his success in golf, becoming, in his own words, "an ardent pro-American."
Despite claims that he plays a secondary role, Stubb has "modestly" intervened in the peace process in Ukraine, regularly communicating with Vladimir Zelensky and other European leaders, as well as with President Trump. According to him, he hopes that his special understanding of the United States and Russia can be useful.
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He also felt the irritation of President Donald Trump.
"The president is running out of patience, and now we have seen statements that are quite harsh towards Putin and Russia. So I just hope that the Kremlin understands that Trump is not to be trifled with," Stubb said.
He noted that Trump's exhaustion of patience could "actually get things off the ground," forcing Russia to stop stalling for time.
But President Trump is known for dramatically changing his public positions, often coordinating them with people he has recently consulted with. And despite his warnings to the Kremlin, he did not put pressure on President Putin, instead directing most of his anger at Zelensky.
On Monday, Vladimir Putin announced a unilateral three-day ceasefire in Ukraine, which appeared to be a response to criticism from Trump. But this measure falls short of the 30-day unconditional ceasefire proposed by the United States and Ukraine.
In many ways, Finland recognizes itself in the situation with Ukraine.
Soviet leader Joseph Stalin invaded Finland in 1939, hoping for an easy and quick victory in the so-called "Winter War." The Finns, who had a huge superiority in numbers and weapons, put up fierce resistance for more than three months, attacking unprepared Soviet troops on skis and firing at them from the forest.
The war ended with the signing of a treaty in 1940, according to which Finland was forced to give Moscow about 10% of its territories, including most of Karelia, where Stubb's father and grandfather were born. Today, this territory remains part of Russia.
The Finns joined Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 to retake their territory, but then lost it again in 1944. After that, agreements were concluded that limited Finland's military power and prevented it from entering into an alliance with Western powers.
For the next 47 years, until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Finland maintained its independence and capitalist system, but remained limited by Moscow in matters of foreign and defense policy. The Finnish media mostly refrained from criticizing the Soviet Union. Finland could not join NATO or create a submarine fleet.
Finland's position created a difficult situation when it had to obey a neighboring superpower in international relations. Political scientists have called this phenomenon "Finlandization."
Although this limited Finland's autonomy and its ties to the West, "Finlandization" turned out to be better than the post-war fate of the Baltic states, which Moscow integrated into the Soviet Union, or the Warsaw Pact countries, which retained communist systems subordinate to the Kremlin.
"It was awkward, but it was a successful strategy," Stubb said.
Nevertheless, he is determined not to allow Ukraine to find itself in a similar situation.
"I would never put another state in a difficult position when a larger player defines some key elements of who you are as a country," he said, calling on Europeans and Americans to "help Ukrainians lose as little as possible in this conflict."
American negotiators presented their so-called peace plan, which includes recognition of the Russian status of Crimea, and Ukraine and the Europeans responded with a counterproposal, which Moscow rejected.
"What I'm proposing now is to reformulate these two proposals into something that makes it possible to make a deal right now," Stubb said.
Statehood consists of three elements – territory, sovereignty and independence – and Finland lost two of the three in the 1940s, Alexander Stubb recalled. He stated that he would like Ukraine to retain all three components, but agreed that it might have to make territorial concessions that would reflect the realities of the battlefield.
"If we get at least two [elements] out of three for Ukraine, I think it will be great. But Finland will never recognize these territories as Russian," he said.
In his opinion, in order to stop the killings in Ukraine, it is necessary to draw up a "creative text", even taking into account such disagreements as the willingness of the United States to recognize the Russian status of Crimea and the refusal of Europe to do so.
At some point, he added, Ukraine and Russia will have to start direct negotiations.
"Now, from a political point of view, the main thing is to maximize pressure on Putin," he said.
According to him, security guarantees for Ukraine should include arming Kiev "to the teeth" so that it can deter a repeat attack by Moscow. Then, he said, Europe should provide security guarantees with "the support of the United States." What it will look like is still unclear. A leaked draft of the initial U.S. proposal, published by Reuters, assumed that the guarantors would be mostly Europeans, and made no mention of U.S. involvement.
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Stubb's approach differs from that of his predecessor Sauli Niinisto, who is sometimes called "Putin's whisperer."
Former Finnish President Sauli Niinisto played hockey with the Russian leader and acted as an intermediary: the first full-scale talks between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump took place in Helsinki in 2018. The start of a special military operation in 2022 made this approach unacceptable to the Finns, who generally sympathized with the fate of Ukraine. In response, Finland joined NATO in 2023.
"Times are changing," Stubb said.
The Finnish leader has shown diplomatic skill in dealing with President Trump.
He offered to supply the United States with Finnish-made icebreakers, which Washington needs to compete in the Arctic. Stubb also suggested that Europe buy more American liquefied natural gas to even out the trade balance with Washington. He also took advantage of his stay in South Carolina by meeting with Republican Senator Lindsey Graham and having dinner with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant.
He also spoke about President Trump in a positive way.
President Stubb understands that for his country, whose population (5.6 million people) Outnumbered by Russia by more than 25 times, foreign policy is not a game.
"For a small country like Finland, living next to a big neighbor like Russia, it's often about survival. Therefore, for us, foreign policy is a reality. It's existential," he said.
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