President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign boast that he could finish the war in Ukraine in 24 hours has increased expectations of an imminent ceasefire. But without credible Western security guarantees agreed beforehand, a ceasefire would be a prelude to a bigger disaster.
Proponents say that Trump’s threat to halt or decrease military assistance to Kyiv, while simultaneously warning Russia that he could give Ukraine all it needs on the battlefield, will bring both sides to the negotiating table. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy repeated in a recent interview that Putin is afraid of Trump, and that peace can be achieved through strength.
Support for ending the war
Among Ukrainians, support for ending the war is growing. The proportion willing to concede territory in exchange for peace has risen to 32 per cent from 10 per cent in 2022, though 58 per cent still reject the proposition. The problem is finding a viable pathway to a just and durable peace.
In Ukraine, trust in the Russian regime is non-existent. Moscow has broken multiple agreements by invading Ukraine, not least the Budapest Memorandum, also co-signed by the US, UK and France. The shadow of the more recent Minsk Agreements also looms large. Since 2014, Ukraine has agreed to over 17 ceasefires with Russia, all of which were violated. The Minsk Process was used to subvert Ukraine using political means: to pressure Kyiv to recognize Russia’s fomented Donbas enclaves and give them veto power over Ukraine’s future.
If external pressure mounts on Zelenskyy and he agrees to a ceasefire deal quickly, the implications would be far-reaching. Leaving Ukraine in limbo, with no defence treaty or meaningful collective security arrangement, will constitute political suicide for the president. Zelenskyy would face a strong backlash from Ukrainian society considering the high price it has paid in the war.
Ukrainians know that if the ceasefire has no viable mechanism of enforcement and Ukraine stands alone against the same militarist Russia, it would create a time-bomb for Ukraine’s future and a pause before a new and possibly wider war. That is why Ukrainian intellectuals are beseeching the West not to succumb to appeasement.
The Georgia playbook
If Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to a ceasefire now, it would be to buy time to readjust his economy and reconstitute his military.
Russian ground forces have lost more than 700,000 troops either dead and wounded without even fully gaining control over the Donetsk region. Nor have they dislodged Ukrainian forces from Kursk. But there is no sign of de-escalation by Moscow as Putin puts the economy even further on a war footing.
Putin will try to claim victory if the frontlines are frozen roughly along current positions. His army indeed occupied an additional 4000 square kilometres of land and gained a water supply to Crimea. The Kremlin can spin disinformation that an attack on Ukraine was preventive and succeeded in protecting Russia from a bigger disaster.
But he is likely to agree to a ceasefire only if he is confident he can ‘finish the job’ of bringing the rest of Ukraine under his control. He would likely seek to do so by manipulating the ensuing elections – as Russia did in Georgia after first invading and occupying 20 per cent of its territory in 2008 and last year hijacking its EU integration through a political process.
If martial law is lifted in Ukraine, elections could be held within six months. Moscow’s aim would be to install a puppet candidate in Kyiv, flooding Ukraine with disinformation about Zelenskyy’s ‘treason’, Western ‘betrayal’, and how Ukraine ‘was drawn into the war against its people’s will’.
Hints of this betrayal narrative are already visible in Ukrainian public opinion, where around 80 per cent believe that Ukraine can succeed if only the West provides adequate military support and continues sanctions on Russia.
The threat to reconstruction
If Ukraine were to revert to a grey zone once again, with a war possibly restarting at any time, it would mean certain death for its European dream and EU membership.
The country desperately needs investment to rebuild its economy. Reconstruction will cost at least $500 billion. Without credible security arrangements, this will not come. Since 2014 the country’s population has dropped by ten million to 36 million people. Putin is achieving his goal to depopulate the largest country in Europe.
A ceasefire along current lines would also leave Russia in control of key assets, thwarting Ukraine’s economic potential. Since 2022 Russia has occupied the largest nuclear power plant in Europe in Zaporizhzhia, cutting it off from Ukraine’s energy grid.
The country’s industrialized east was a powerhouse of its economy and could jump-start post-war growth. If, say, Pokrovsk is occupied, Ukraine will lose Europe’s largest source of coke and face a collapse of its metallurgy industry.
Critical minerals are another battleground. Ukraine possesses one-third of all European lithium deposits, and two mines are currently under Russian occupation.
