A flurry of recent diplomatic activity has seen two competing peace plans for Ukraine emerge.
The first, widely touted as a US plan, was apparently hashed out between Kremlin insider Kirill Dmitriev and Steve Witkoff, President Donald Trump’s Russia point-man.
The second, hurriedly drafted by the United Kingdom, France and Germany, is based on the 28 points in the US plan, but with key modifications and deletions.
Following the release of the US plan, Trump accused Ukraine of showing “zero gratitude” for US assistance in the war effort, and demanded Kyiv accept the terms by Thanksgiving in the United States – November 27 – or face being cut off from US intelligence sharing and military aid.
Unlike the US plan, the European counter-proposal places the blame for the war squarely at Russia’s feet. It proposes freezing Russian assets until reparations are made by Moscow. It also seeks to freeze the conflict in place, leaving the question of which party retains which part of Ukraine contingent on subsequent negotiations.
Speaking about the peace proposals, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen made it clear the European Union was committed to several key positions:
- that Ukraine’s borders cannot be altered by force
- there cannot be limitations on Ukraine’s armed forces that would leave it vulnerable, and
- the EU needed to have a seat at the table in any agreement.
Comparing the two plans, it is clear Russia and Europe remain as far apart as ever on Ukraine’s future. That much is unsurprising.
What should be more shocking to Western observers is just how much the US plan echoed Russian demands that have remained largely unaltered since President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022.
Lacking logic and specifics
Put simply, the US plan would have had as much credibility if it had been written in crayon.
For starters, it has wording that appears to make more sense in Russian than English (or perhaps AI-translated English).
And it seems more focused on bringing about a new era of friendly Russia-US economic cooperation than a serious attempt to resolve Europe’s biggest land war since the Second World War.
Typical of Trumpian robber-baron foreign policy, the document foresaw large cash grabs for the US, amounting to little more than attempts at extortion.
In return, Ukraine was offered a murky NATO-style security guarantee that could be reneged upon under flimsy pretexts.
The plan also demanded:
- large territorial concessions from Kyiv
- a limited army
- a pledge enshrined in Ukraine’s constitution that it would never to join NATO, and
- a promise to hold elections in 100 days.
And while it expected Ukraine to strategically emasculate itself, the document made only vague suggestions about what Russia is “expected” to do, with no means of enforcement.
No multinational force was put forward to monitor the peace. And Ukraine was required to give up key defensive positions by ceding the territory it still controls in the Donbas region to Russia. That would leave the centre of the country defenceless against future Russian attacks.
Accepting those terms, as originally written, wou