It is becoming obvious to almost everyone except the US President that Putin does not want peace on anything other than heavily pro-Russian terms.
The question ahead of the much anticipated Trump-Putin phone call was whether the US president’s patience with Putin would finally break, after being strung along by the Russia leader for months.
In the end Trump decided to give Putin one last chance, claiming the call “went very well” and that “the tone and spirit of the conversation were excellent.” Trump says he truly believes Putin wants peace.
But, yet again, Putin gave Trump no evidence of this except the promise that Russia would ‘immediately’ begin direct peace negotiations with Ukraine. This could have been done months ago when Putin rejected a ceasefire proposal in March. Just last week Putin proposed direct talks with Ukraine in Istanbul and then failed to attend despite the presence of Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky. At no point this year has Putin offered a single public concession which would suggest that he is serious about peace.
What’s more, Putin said after Trump’s call that any peace deal needed to “remove the root causes of this crisis.” This is code for continued Russian domination of Ukraine’s future political direction.
Although Trump claims Putin wants peace, Trump is giving hints that he is frustrated and could soon walk away from the process. He said any peace deal would be negotiated directly between the warring countries “because they know details of a negotiation that nobody else would be aware of.” These are not the words of a president who believes he has the power to intervene and force a peace deal.
The reason for this is simple – Putin, to use Trump’s words, ‘holds the cards’ and has far less to gain from peace than does Ukraine or the US.
Putin is making incremental and steady progress on the battlefield. He has a massive advantage in manpower and resources, and he knows that if these peace talks fail, then the US – by Trump’s own admission – will ultimately walk away from the peace process.
Trump and his MAGA isolationist Republicans like Vice President JD Vance have made it clear the US will not continue to provide the large levels of military support to Ukraine in the future, effectively leaving it to European nations to support Kyiv in any ongoing conflict.
Why would Putin want peace now when Ukraine’s biggest backer is threatening to walk away?
Trump has little bargaining power here. He spoke glowingly after the Putin call of “large-scale TRADE” with Russia if a peace deal can be reached. Trump’s carrot of dropping economic sanctions against Moscow, boosting trade with Russia and welcoming Putin back into the international diplomatic community might well be attractive for Putin, ending his and his country’s pariah status. But is it so tempting for Putin that he would give up his advantage in Ukraine for it? Trump has previously threatened to impose further sanctions of Russian oil exports and other products if Putin walks away from peace. But the US has levied serious sanctions against Russia since it invaded Ukraine in February 2022 with little effect on Putin’s behaviour.
When Russia and Ukraine sit down for these promised peace talks they will begin from positions which continue to be wide apart.
Russia is demanding that Ukraine be given almost zero security guarantees into any peace deal. It says it will not agree to Ukraine joining NATO in the future, it will not agree to NATO troops being stationed in Ukraine as peacekeepers and it demands a radically downsized Ukrainian military with the cessation of western military aid. Russia is also demanding that it be ceded parts of Ukrainian territory which it has annexed but which it does not hold.
Any peace deal on these terms would effectively be a defeat for Ukraine, making it vulnerable to future Russian aggression.
Trump continues to hope that Putin is on the cusp of retreating from these demands and that he will suddenly become the flexible, reasonable negotiator who genuinely wants to end the war that he started.
There is nothing to suggest that this is the case and the longer Putin strings Trump along, the better it will be for the Russian dictator.
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The peace process in Ukraine is faltering fast despite Donald Trump giving Vladimir Putin an undeserved lifeline to keep negotiations open after their unproductive two hour talk.