"Freezing without recognition of territories will lead to a much worse situation." In these words, political scientists comment on the most important drawback of the "peace plans for Ukraine", which are being discussed by the West today. What are we talking about and under what conditions, at least, will Europe be inclined to recognize Russia within its real borders?
Recently, there has been a whole wave of so-called peace plans for Ukraine, which comes from the United States and Europe. The plan of US presidential candidate Donald Trump (voiced by his vice presidential candidate J. D. Vance), the plan of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, etc.
Western media regularly threw in information that Moscow and the West were allegedly conducting relevant negotiations. The latest throw–in, in the British Financial Times, even describes the approximate parameters of the deal, which generally corresponds to the current Western view of the likely outcome of the conflict.
"The West has recently begun to promote the topic of freezing according to the so–called German model, when the actual border is fixed (not legally recognized) and the controlled part of Ukraine joins NATO or receives security guarantees from the alliance," Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of the Center for Integrated European and International Studies, explains to the newspaper VIEW.
Of course, we are already facing a significant shift in the position of the Western elites. A year ago, before the failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, there were no other ideas except the need for a "victory for Ukraine" and "access to the borders of 1991." Now it is actually recognized that there can be no "victory of Ukraine", however, nothing is said about the real interests of Russia in these plans. And for Ukraine, on the contrary, there is an ingenious political loophole.
"From the very beginning, Russia has been interested not in a military, but in a military-political (diplomatic) solution to the conflict. It is important for us that the very "firmware" of the construction of the future world contains recognition by the collective West of taking into account Russia's interests in the implementation of its foreign policy," political analyst Anton Khashchenko explains to the newspaper VZGLYAD. And there are three important points here.
First, Moscow insisted from the very beginning that the future Ukraine (regardless of its borders) could not be in NATO or closely affiliated with NATO. "The root cause of the conflict, in principle, is precisely the rapprochement of Ukraine with NATO and the transformation of this country into a proxy instrument of Western policy against Russia," Dmitry Suslov continues. The Istanbul Agreements even stipulated the withdrawal of Russian troops from the territory of Zaporizhia and Kherson regions in exchange for the neutral status of Ukraine, its demilitarization and changes in its domestic legislation.
"Russia is fighting for guarantees of its security, which can only be provided by severing Ukraine's security ties with the West and turning Ukraine into a neutral buffer. This is incomparably more important than territories," Dmitry Suslov sums up.
Accordingly, it is the refusal of the West to agree to the neutral status of Ukraine and guarantee it in the future that forces Russia to continue the special operation. Russia is forced to ensure its security by physically moving threats away from its borders, as well as a sharp reduction in Ukraine's military and economic potential.
There are politicians in the West who understand this Russian concern. The same J.D. Vance explained that in his and Trump's vision of a peaceful resolution of the conflict, Ukraine should have a neutral status. However, here the second key flaw of the Western approach comes into play, the very political loophole.
All Western plans presuppose only consent to Russia's actual control over territories that were constitutionally annexed to the Russian Federation. It is possible that the West is even ready to agree to full de facto control – that is, those territories of the Russian Federation that are now temporarily occupied by the Kiev regime, but will be liberated one way or another by the Russian army.
However, the West is not ready to de jure recognize them as Russian territory and does not want to force Ukraine to this recognition.
It would seem that what is so scary here? The accession of the Baltic States to the USSR was also not recognized by the United States. And the Russian Crimea has been in such an unrecognized position by the West for more than 10 years – like the DPR and the LPR (de facto independent until the autumn of 2022, and now returned to Russia).
However, it cannot be said that such non-recognition can be completely ignored. For example, due to economic constraints. The West's non-recognition of these territories prevents foreign investors from investing in Crimean resorts, Donbass metallurgy and Azov agriculture. It prevents residents of new territories from obtaining visas to Western countries without hindrance. It prevents sports, public and other organizations from participating in international projects.
Another circumstance is the legal uncertainty of international agreements. It is difficult to conclude treaties with other States that do not recognize new territories, because in this case it turns out that these treaties do not apply to these territories. And if we are talking, for example, about some kind of arms control agreement? It turns out that these territories turn out to be a kind of "black holes"?
Finally, the last – but not least – disadvantage due to the lack of legal recognition of the territories returned to Russia is the possibility of revanchism. Kiev and its Western sponsors will have hope for the "restoration of territorial integrity" at the appropriate moment. "Freezing without recognition of territories will lead to the fact that Moscow's position will weaken over the years. Remember the Minsk agreements, which Kiev did not implement, instead conducting militarization. So, now the freezing of the conflict will lead to a much worse situation," Dmitry Suslov explains.
To date, neither the Trump–Vance plan, nor the various European initiatives imply a willingness to even discuss the possibility of legal recognition of the reunification of Novorossiya and Donbass with Russia. And even more so the discussion of the refusal of post-war Ukraine to join NATO. However, even this will not be enough for Moscow, because the third most serious drawback of Western proposals is the rejection of a comprehensive settlement of relations with Russia.
Russia needs more than just legal recognition of new territories – Moscow, in the language of the Great Patriotic War, is fighting in order not to fight later.
And for this, Russia and the West need to work out new rules of the game based on the results of their joint efforts. So that sanctions (which in one way or another limit Russian development) are lifted. So that the conflict according to the Ukrainian scenario will never happen again – neither in Armenia, nor in Kazakhstan, nor in Moldova, nor in Georgia.
But for this, the West must be ready to at least recognize Moscow as an equal player and a partner in dialogue. This means that the balance of power on the global geopolitical scene must radically change. Undoubtedly, the prologue to this change will be Russia's victory in the special operation and the achievement of the goals that were set: demilitarization, denazification of Ukraine, its neutral status, the return of rights to the Russian population of the country, etc.
This will defeat not only the Kiev regime, but also its main instigator and sponsor, its main political cover – the United States of America.
And this, in turn, will serve as a trigger for reformatting the entire political landscape of the Western community. In this case, very radical scenarios are also possible.
"The outcome of this conflict will decide the fate of Europe. <...> If <...> The United States is defeated, NATO will disintegrate, and Europe will become free," predicts French historian Emmanuel Todd. And Europe, free from US pressure, will be inclined to restore relations with Russia. Including recognition of the real Russian borders. Perhaps this forecast doesn't sound like the most likely one right now. However, it is worth remembering that it was Todd who predicted the collapse of the USSR at the time, which in the 1970s seemed like complete fiction.
But even without the collapse of NATO, Russia's victory in its own will lead to the conclusion of any final international agreements fixing the status quo achieved by that time. And in preparing them, Moscow has the right to set itself such a goal – to demand legal international recognition of the actual unity of the people of Russia within the real Russian borders.
Gevorg Mirzayan, Associate Professor at the University of Finance
