Almost everyone wants the fighting in Ukraine to stop. Yesterday’s meetings in the White House were about demonstrating to Donald Trump the obvious fact that Vladimir Putin, not Volodymyr Zelensky, is the obstacle to this. The question remains whether a ceasefire is achievable on terms that are acceptable to Ukraine, the victim of Russian aggression. Let us step back from Trump’s theatre of the absurd to look at what a viable ceasefire might involve.
Before the Alaska summit last week, Trump appeared to believe that land swaps were the key to a ceasefire. There are several basic flaws in such an approach. The first is that land swaps imply that each side gives up something belonging to them to secure something more important. But all the territory involved belongs to Ukraine.
The second problem is bigger. A “land for peace” deal assumes that the conflict is primarily about territory, and that a full peace deal is available. There will be no successful land for peace deal with Putin.
The first rule of dealing with Putin is to listen to what he says. He has been telling us for many years what the conflict is about. It is about his idea of Russia as an imperial Great Power; its place in the world as an equal of the United States and China; the injustices done to Russia, as Putin sees it, after the demise of the USSR; and about his determination to assert what he views as Russia’s rights.
Those “rights” are incompatible with the existence of a sovereign, democratic Ukraine; with the post-Cold War security order in Europe; and with a US that does not accommodate Putin’s views.
None of these questions will be resolved by Ukraine surrendering control over parts of its territory. Ukraine may at some stage accept de facto loss of territory to secure a ceasefire. But the risk is that this compromises Ukraine’s security and political stability. Nevertheless, after the Alaska summit, Trump announced that Zelenskyy “can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight”.
Zelensky could indeed end the war—by capitulating. So could Putin, by ceasing his war of aggression. So might Trump, and Ukraine’s European supporters, by forcing that choice on Putin.
The heart of the matter is not land swaps but whether Ukraine can get security commitments from its western allies that would allow it the option of agreeing a ceasefire. A land for peace trade-off will not deliver peace, but a land for security trade-off might deliver an acceptable level of security.
Putin’s war aims have not changed. A bad peace, imposed on Ukraine, would help him achieve them. Putin will demand territorial concessions in exchange for a ceasefire, alongside the other demands he has made since 2022. The purpose of these is not only to maximise the Kremlin’s territorial gains but to weaken Ukraine’s ability to defend itself in future, and to fatally compromise Ukraine as an independent state.
Security guarantees will only be effective if they deter Russia from future aggression. Any promises from Putin, even if written into Russia’s constitution, are worthless. Western security guarantees cannot be contingent on Russia agreeing to them—we would be asking Russia to agree to Ukraine defending itself against Russia. Despite what Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said after the Alaska summit, there is no world in which Putin will agree to a Nato Article 5-type arrangement with Ukraine, unless he has a veto over its operation.
So, any security guarantee given to Ukraine will be against Putin’s wishes. That is because its purpose would be to deter Putin from attacking Ukraine again. Deterrence is something that is directed against Putin, not agreed with him.
That in turn leads to the question: why would Putin agree to a ceasefire? Putin will only agree a ceasefire when all the alternatives are worse for him. That means playing to his weaknesses not his strengths: arming Ukraine, doubling down pressure on Russia’s economy and not allowing Putin to set the agenda. The opposite of what happened in Alaska.
That presents Ukraine’s allies with a stark choice. They can force Ukraine to give Putin what he wants, in the certain knowledge that this will not make Putin less dangerous. Or they can ratchet up the pressure on Putin so that all alternatives to a ceasefire are worse and will worsen further over time.
No one, apart from Putin, wants the war to continue. The purpose of military, economic and political support to Ukraine, and pressure on Russia, is not to prolong the war but to end it.
