US mediation between Russia and Ukraine earlier captivated the world with hopes it could lead to a breakthrough, but expectations have since been tempered with a recent toughening of America’s negotiating stance towards Russia.
Latest developments have seen Ukraine and the West demand Russia’s compliance with an unconditional ceasefire, to which Russian President Vladimir Putin responded by offering the unconditional resumption of bilateral talks with Ukraine instead.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s response was to declare that he’ll visit Istanbul on Thursday (May 15), the place and day that Putin suggested for resuming bilateral talks, though it’s unclear whether the Russian leader will attend.
The spring 2022 peace process that Putin mentioned in his video address on Sunday (May 11) morning only involved their delegations, not direct talks between their presidents (plus, Putin considers Zelensky to be illegitimate now). Putin’s also unlikely to meet Zelensky unless he agrees to significant concessions ahead of time.
Therein lies the problem as Zelensky refuses to budge on Putin’s demands that Ukraine restore its constitutional neutrality, demilitarize, denazify and cede disputed territories. And Trump won’t coerce him into doing so either.
The only outcome from the US mediation efforts thus far has been talk of a US strategic partnership with Russia, likely built upon energy and rare earth cooperation. From Russia’s perspective, it looks like the US wants to buy it off, not resolve the core issues of the Ukraine conflict.
The US is arguably the only country with enough leverage over Russia and Ukraine to influence them into compromising as part of a grand deal, leverage that other potential mediators like China and Turkey lack. Yet America’s approach has been uneven.
The US is now threatening Russia with more sanctions and possibly even providing more military aid to Ukraine, while all that Kyiv has been threatened with is the US walking away from the conflict. Though the US just approved a new missile package for Ukraine, so even this might be a bluff.
If the US doesn’t soon change its approach to evenly pressure Russia and Ukraine, then third-party mediation will likely reach its limit.
In that event, an escalation might be inevitable, either due to Russia initiating it through the potential expansion of its ground campaign into new regions and/or the US defiantly doubling down its support for Ukraine if Trump blames Putin for the peace talks’ collapse.
Putin hasn’t signaled yet that he’s willing to freeze the conflict and thus tacitly drop all his other demands, which could also create space for the Europeans to possibly deploy uniformed troops to Ukraine during an unconditional ceasefire. So, Putin’s bound to stay on Trump’s bad side unless something changes.
If Trump “escalates to de-escalate” on these terms, then he risks a hot war with Russia, while walking away from the war could make him responsible for one of the West’s worst geopolitical defeats if Russia then steamrolls Ukraine.
Trump is on the horns of this dilemma due to his unwillingness or inability to coerce Ukraine into Russia’s requested concessions.
It would likely be better for Trump to make a clean break from the conflict than to escalate US involvement, but the Ukraine minerals deal and subsequently announced weapons packages suggest he’s more likely to double down.
If so, then Trump would ruin his desired legacy as a peacemaker, however, and undermine his planned “Pivot (back) to Asia” for more muscularly containing China.
This article was first published on Andrew Korybko’s Substack and is republished with kind permission. Become an Andrew Korybko Newsletter subscriber here.
