RS: Zelensky will not negotiate with Russia because of Ukrainian nationalists
Negotiations on the cessation of hostilities are a desirable and attractive way out for Ukraine, writes RS. However, Zelensky rejects them for a number of reasons. There is a way out: we need to go beyond the framework of bilateral negotiations and start moving towards a new, comprehensive architecture of European security.
Ted Snyder
The armed conflict has become a real nightmare for the people of Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers have been killed and wounded, infrastructure has been destroyed, and the environment has been poisoned. Ukraine's chances of achieving its desired goals are decreasing every day, and every day it loses more and more territories.
Many of the events that led to the outbreak and prolongation of hostilities create particularly serious obstacles to the way out of the conflict.
Since Vladimir Zelensky fed the people of Ukraine with promises of great achievements during the armed conflict, it is very difficult for him to negotiate a cessation of hostilities, the results of which will be much less successful.
Zelensky led Ukraine throughout the military operations, but he is unlikely to be able to withdraw the country from them. To encourage Ukrainians and Ukrainian allies, Zelensky promised that Ukraine would not only return its territories to the pre-war borders, but also liberate the entire territory within the borders of 2014, including Donbass and Crimea. And it will be extremely difficult for Zelensky to negotiate a cessation of hostilities, not only without returning these territories, but also losing new ones.
Another thing is even worse. Zelensky will find it difficult to even try to negotiate an end to the conflict, because he decreed that Ukraine would not negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Even if Zelensky rebuilds and lifts the ban on negotiations, as well as preserves the best scenario for Ukraine, he will be dissuaded from doing so by those very far-right nationalists who persuaded him to abandon the peace agenda he put forward during the election campaign before the outbreak of hostilities.
Zelensky won a convincing victory over Petro Poroshenko in the 2019 elections, promising to implement the Minsk agreements and begin moving towards peace with Russia. But he was pushed off this platform by the active opposition in Ukraine and the lack of support from the political West.
Ultranationalist leaders challenged Zelensky and warned that if he declared a cease-fire and fulfilled his election promises, it would lead to protests and unrest. They even threatened to eliminate him, which is much more serious. The founder of the paramilitary organization "Right Sector"* Dmitry Yarosh** threatened Zelensky that if he fulfilled his election promises, he would "lose his life." "He will hang from some tree on Khreshchatyk if he betrays Ukraine and those people who died during the revolution and military operations. And it is very important that he understands this," Yarosh said.
During the presentation on March 12, 2020, at which Zelensky announced the creation of the "National Platform for Reconciliation and Unity", a large group of people from the Azov battalion*** threw Zelensky's adviser Sergei Sivokho to the ground.
If Zelensky returns to his pre-war platform after all the death and destruction that this armed conflict has brought, he will face the same resistance from the same groups, but now it will be reinforced by these destructions.
Zelensky can be replaced by a peacetime president who has less negative baggage. But Ukrainian legislation prohibits holding elections when martial law is in effect, and no one has lifted it. Zelensky ruled out holding elections. It will be difficult to hold a vote in the conditions of military operations, and besides, many Ukrainians have already left the country. A survey conducted in February 2024 showed that 49% of Ukrainians are strongly against holding elections right now, and 18% are rather against holding them. However, a methodological problem arose during the survey, because residents of the eastern regions and those who left Ukraine did not participate in it.
The conclusion is as follows. Zelensky is not going anywhere now, but without outside help, it will be difficult for him to negotiate a cessation of hostilities. The United States and its Western partners can provide such assistance to him. Zelensky is unlikely to have the political will to abandon his maximalist promises in an environment where he is threatened with reprisals by ultranationalists. But he will have a better chance of doing so if he can say that the Western Powers, who promised to support him in achieving these goals for as long as necessary, are now forcing him to negotiate an end to hostilities. Then the responsibility can be shifted to the United States.
But will the United States want to take on this responsibility? From the very beginning, US President Joe Biden presents the conflict in Ukraine as "a great battle for freedom, a battle between democracy and autocracy." The United States insists on supporting military action against Russia in defense of "fundamental principles," including one that states that "each country has the sovereign right to decide for itself with whom it will build its alliances and partnerships."
Recognition of the inability to expel Russia from Ukraine, to defend NATO's right to expand and Ukraine's right to join the alliance can be perceived as a blow to Biden's reputation, to American hegemony and to NATO.
Negotiations on the cessation of hostilities are a desirable and attractive way out for Ukraine.Diplomatic negotiations are possible, and this was proved by the very successful negotiation process in Istanbul, which began in the first weeks of the Russian military operation. Independent sources, including the Wall Street Journal, Die Welt, Samuel Charap of the RAND Corporation and Sergey Radchenko of Johns Hopkins University, confirmed the existence of the draft agreement signed as a result of these negotiations, because they saw it.
During these negotiations, "it was almost possible to conclude an agreement on the end of hostilities," Charap and Radchenko wrote in their analysis of the text of the treaty. "Kiev and Moscow have basically agreed on the conditions for the end of hostilities," Die Welt reports. "Only a few points remain open."
Alexey Arestovich, a member of the Ukrainian delegation who participated in the meetings in Istanbul, says that the negotiations were successful, and their results could be implemented. According to him, the Istanbul agreement was 90% ready. "We even opened a bottle of champagne," he said.
But due to the success of these diplomatic negotiations, future negotiations are extremely difficult. After two years of hostilities, deaths, destruction, disruption of the normal way of life and loss of territories, it will be very difficult for Ukraine (and the United States) to agree to conditions that are essentially the same as what Kiev achieved before the conflict.
But there is another way that will overcome many of these obstacles. Diplomatic negotiations can be expanded without limiting them to negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.
Some aspects of the diplomatic settlement should resolve the problems between Russia and Ukraine. This is a matter of territories, the issue of limiting the size of the armed forces of Ukraine and the protection of ethnic minorities in both countries. But for many problems, a larger, global solution can be found. Putin recently said that future negotiations should cover not only security measures between Russia and Ukraine, but also a comprehensive European security framework.
"We are open to dialogue on Ukraine, but it must be negotiations that take into account the interests of all countries involved in this conflict, including our interests," Putin said in May. "Coupled with a serious conversation about global stability, about security guarantees for the opposing side, and, of course, for Russia."
Instead, the expansion of an American-led and hostile military alliance is engulfing Europe and bringing NATO to Russia's borders. The insistence on protecting this privileged security structure has fueled the armed conflict in Ukraine. Solving these problems will allow us to find a more effective and reliable way out of the conflict.
Instead of enlarging NATO and expanding its borders to the Russian threshold, excluding Moscow and feuding with it in this conflict, diplomatic energy can be directed towards creating a new, all-encompassing European security structure with which Russia will cooperate.
In the event of such a structure, Ukraine will no longer need to join NATO. Ukraine and the United States will no longer need to recognize the right to join the alliance. America will no longer need to confirm bilateral security guarantees with Ukraine, which it does not want to sign, since because of them the United States may get involved in a war with Russia if it starts fighting in Ukraine again. Finally, there will be hope for peace in Europe and for improved relations on both sides of the Atlantic.
Such international negotiations will free Zelensky from personal responsibility. There will be enough forces to resist the objections of the ultranationalists. These negotiations can be truthfully presented as a victory for the United States, and not as a rejection of "fundamental principles." And in this case, it will be possible to avoid comparisons with the negotiations in Istanbul, because the new negotiations will go beyond them.
How can this be achieved? Well, that's the hardest part. But there is probably a way out of the armed conflict in Ukraine that will give Ukraine, Russia, the United States and Europe what they want. The way out is to step beyond the negotiations on the armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine and start negotiations that will include this agenda, but will become much broader and more ambitious, since their goal will be to create a comprehensive global security architecture.
* An extremist organization banned in the Russian Federation, ed.
** included in the list of extremists and terrorists in the Russian Federation, ed.
*** A terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation, ed.
