Security guarantees. It\u2019s the phrase Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky used countless times during an explosive clash with US President Donald Trump and Vice-President JD Vance at the White House last week \u2013 and since. <\/p>\n
How can Ukraine be assured that Russian President Vladimir Putin would abide by any ceasefire deal \u2013 and not resume fighting in a year or two, Zelensky asks. And how can Ukraine be protected from the unyielding ambitions of its more powerful neighbor? <\/p>\n
Trump has been openly dismissive of Zelensky\u2019s preoccupation with such guarantees. \u201cSecurity is so easy, that\u2019s about 2% of the problem,\u201d he said during Friday\u2019s Oval Office showdown. <\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s answers to the wider issue of Ukrainian security have been vague, beyond claiming the Europeans will handle it and that there\u2019ll be no need for a US backstop. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt should not be that hard a deal to make,\u201d Trump said Monday, hours before he announced a pause in shipments of US military aid to Ukraine. <\/p>\n
He also suggested that the presence of American companies exploiting Ukraine\u2019s rare-earths and other minerals would be enough to keep Russia at bay. \u201cI don\u2019t think anybody\u2019s going to play around if we\u2019re there with a lot of workers,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
There were plenty of US companies operating in Ukraine on the day before Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion of 2022. <\/p>\n
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio might have a more realistic take. In a Fox News interview last week, he said that \u201cwhat Ukraine really needs is a deterrent \u2026 to make it costly for anyone to come after them again in the future.\u201d He added that this \u201cdoesn\u2019t have to just be America. I mean, the Europeans can be involved in that.\u201d <\/p>\n
Other US officials have said the US won\u2019t be part of that deterrence. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said European troops in Ukraine would not enjoy protection under NATO\u2019s principle of collective security. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz has said the matter of security guarantees is \u201csquarely going to be with the Europeans.\u201d <\/p>\n
European leaders met in London on Sunday to begin to search for some answers for Ukraine as well as longer-term solutions to the unravelling of transatlantic relations. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a once-in-a-generation moment for the security of Europe,\u201d British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said, calling for a \u201ccoalition of the willing.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cEurope knows one thing: the deal, if it happens, is not simply about carving up Ukraine or securing a quick ceasefire \u2026 it is about a lasting and secure peace agreement, about existential security issues for all of Europe,\u201d Wolfgang Ischinger, a former German ambassador to Washington, wrote in Foreign Affairs. <\/p>\n
But Claudia Major and Aldo Kleemann at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs said in a recently published paper that the Europeans \u201clack both the necessary military capabilities and the political will and unity\u201d to shoulder the burden. <\/p>\n
French President Emmanuel Macron optimistically suggested negotiations would take \u201cseveral weeks and then, once peace is signed, a (troop) deployment.\u201d The deployment would have to be agreed with Russia. <\/p>\n
Macron acknowledged, however, that a truce along the 1,000-kilometer (6,200 mile) front line would be \u201cvery difficult\u201d to enforce. Peacekeepers would have to operate in a landscape of forests, fields and the wreckage of industrial towns, surrounded on three sides in some areas, with poor or non-existent roads. <\/p>\n
The UK and France have expressed a willingness to be part of a post-conflict force to maintain the peace. Australia has also said that it is open to discussing a role. <\/p>\n
But the response of other Europeans has been underwhelming. Outgoing German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said it \u201cwill require an effort that many are not yet really sufficiently prepared for.\u201d Other allies evaded questions about their readiness to join a peacekeeping mandate. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said that deploying Italian troops \u201chas never been on the table.\u201d <\/p>\n
Starmer says other countries are ready to contribute but has not identified them. But the UK prime minister also said that the \u201ceffort must have strong US backing,\u201d which is far from assured. <\/p>\n
Estimates for the size of this proposed force vary as wildly as ideas for its mission and powers. Is it a small tripwire force that deters because it is backed by a more robust response to any violation? Is it a fully equipped mission able to defend itself? <\/p>\n
But they warn that \u201ca \u2018bluff and pray\u2019 approach that deploys too few troops and relies essentially on the hope that Russia will not test it would be irresponsible.\u201d <\/p>\n
Zelensky pressed the same point in London over the weekend, insisting on the need for \u201cvery specific security guarantees and with very specific providers of these (guarantees)\u201d that would make \u201c100% impossible any kind of opportunity for Russia to come with another aggression.\u201d <\/p>\n
A full-fledged peacekeeping force would need to be at least 100,000-strong, an overwhelming commitment for European armies alone, especially when necessary rotations are included. By comparison, the peacekeeping mission that began in Kosovo in 1999 had 48,000 soldiers. Ukraine is more than 50 times the size of Kosovo. <\/p>\n
Analysts also say that such a force would require a substantial demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating the combatants and a constant liaison with both sides to handle violations. <\/p>\n
There would need to be a Line of Control and the withdrawal of heavy weapons to a minimum distance of 40 kilometers (around 25 miles), they say. And neither side could fly drones in the DMZ. <\/p>\n
There is also the issue of drones. Intervening in a conflict where drones and missiles have changed the nature of warfare, the peacekeeping force would require \u201celectronic warfare, counter-drone and counter-intelligence capabilities,\u201d Mick Ryan, the author of the blog Futura Doctrina, said. <\/p>\n
There are countless escalation risks, too. If Russian forces were to drop long-range shells on an outpost of French or British soldiers, would that put NATO states at war with Russia? That might even be tempting for the Kremlin. If it targeted European troops near Ukraine\u2019s front lines, NATO\u2019s European members might find themselves at war with Russia without US support. <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, a lightly policed ceasefire is unlikely to cut it. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt best, a highly unstable situation would obtain, where a renewal of hostilities would be easily possible or even likely,\u201d Marc Weller, a professor of international law at the Cambridge Initiative for Peace Settlements, said. <\/p>\n
Up to 100,000 peacekeepers, alongside a Ukrainian land force of some 200,000 soldiers, might suffice as a deterrent, he said. That would amount to roughly one-third of the Russian force deployed in or around Ukraine. <\/p>\n
Starmer insisted that the \u201ceffort must have strong US backing.\u201d <\/p>\n
Even a well-equipped peacekeeping force would require US airlift capabilities, satellite coverage and missile defenses to deter fresh Russian offensives, all assets the Europeans lack. <\/p>\n
Zelensky asserts that the \u201cbest security guarantee is a strong Ukrainian army and a strong Ukrainian army that has enough numbers.\u201d <\/p>\n
Ukrainian capabilities would also have to include longer-range Western missiles that would allow Ukraine to go after Russian supply lines and logistics hubs, as well as far more potent air power, in the event hostilities resume. <\/p>\n
But unless the Kremlin is forced to negotiate, this is all a pipedream. The Russian Foreign Ministry has already said that the presence of NATO troops in Ukraine, whether under the Alliance banner or not, would be \u201ccategorically unacceptable.\u201d <\/p>\n
Official Russian news agency RIA Novosti quoted the Foreign Intelligence Service on Tuesday as saying that a force of 100,000 peacekeepers \u201cwould amount to the de facto occupation of Ukraine.\u201d <\/p>\n
Russia \u201chas made maximalist demands and will prove very difficult to budge,\u201d Ischinger wrote. \u201cIt is an illusion to believe that a durable peace with Russia will break out simply by enshrining the line of contact in eastern Ukraine.\u201d <\/p>\n
By Putin\u2019s theory of war, Russia is winning. It\u2019s making incremental gains that may be accelerated if Ukraine loses critical US military hardware. The Institute for the Study of War said Putin\u2019s priorities are to \u201cprevent Ukraine from acquiring and sustaining the manpower and materiel needed to stop gradual but continued Russian advances.\u201d <\/p>\n
With Trump in the White House, the Kremlin sees Zelensky as isolated, and the Europeans as left to fend for themselves. Russia has no incentive to compromise on its demands, which include possession of all four eastern regions of Ukraine that have been illegally annexed (even if Russia doesn\u2019t occupy all of them); strict limits on the size and capabilities of the Ukrainian military; and Ukrainian neutrality. <\/p>\n
\u201cUkraine should adopt a neutral, nonaligned status, be nuclear-free, and undergo demilitarization and denazification,\u201d Putin told an audience last summer. By Moscow\u2019s logic, Zelensky must go, because Russia cannot sign a deal with an \u201cillegitimate\u201d leader. <\/p>\n
When push comes to shove, would the Trump administration turn the screws on the Kremlin? Trump and other senior US officials have said that Russia will be expected to make concessions, without providing details. <\/p>\n
Under international law, recognition of Moscow\u2019s rule over the four eastern regions of Ukraine would break every precedent, so the territorial question would have to be deferred, as has been the case in the Korean Peninsula for more than 60 years. <\/p>\n
As the Trump administration indicates that a defense review will lead to an eventual reduction of the American military footprint in Europe, and in the wake of its decision to pause military aid to Ukraine, all eyes are on European leaders\u2019 next moves. <\/p>\n
Europe can only contribute to the security guarantees that Ukraine needs through developing its own defense identity, combining joint research, production and training. This will not happen overnight, but steps to resuscitate Europe\u2019s defense industries are already underway. Now they need to be turbo-charged. <\/p>\n
The European Commission has been bullish about developing a fund for the defense industries, and on Tuesday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed allowing EU countries to draw up to \u20ac150 billion in loans and unlocking up to \u20ac800 billion of additional defense spending over the coming years. <\/p>\n
She said EU members could \u201cpool demand and to buy together and, of course, with this equipment, member states can massively step up their support to Ukraine.\u201d The goal: to turn Ukraine into a \u201csteel porcupine\u201d that proves \u201cindigestible for future invaders.\u201d <\/p>\n
Looming over any prospect of a ceasefire deal, however, is the question of Russia\u2019s long-term intentions \u2013 whatever the Kremlin might publicly agree to. <\/p>\n
The 1994 Budapest Memorandum included an assurance that Russia, along with the UK and the US, would \u201crespect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine\u201d in return for Ukraine giving up Soviet-era nuclear weapons it had inherited. <\/p>\n
Moscow repeatedly undermined the Minsk process designed to resolve the status of territories in eastern Ukraine\u2019s Donbas region that were seized in 2014-15 by pro-Russian militia. Putin persistently insisted Russia had no intention of invading Ukraine, until it did. <\/p>\n
Ukrainian Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko recalled Monday how the ceasefire deal for Donbas signed by Russia in Paris in 2019 was violated by Moscow within weeks. <\/p>\n
\u201cThen, on February 18, 2020, Russians launched one of the largest assaults of the war. This is the Kremlin\u2019s pattern: deception, false promises, and escalation,\u201d Svyrydenko said. <\/p>\n
More than Zelensky\u2019s demands for security guarantees, that pattern is the greatest obstacle to peace. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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