Long Slog Ahead in Ukraine
Author: Greg Valliere
March 19, 2025
THERE WERE SOME GLIMMERS OF HOPE YESTERDAY — more talks are likely — but there was nothing that would produce a Ukraine cease fire and a settlement any time soon. The war will continue into the summer, in our opinion.
VLADIMIR PUTIN HOLDS THE HIGH CARDS, as his troops head westward, and Western leaders — especially Donald Trump — seem too eager for a deal.
PUTIN KNOWS the West wants a deal soon but he’s in no rush, as thousands of North Korean conscripts are thrown into the meat grinder.
NEVERTHELESS, TRUMP DESCRIBED yesterday’s talks as “very good and productive,” which may have highlighted differences more than agreement, as David Ignatius writes in this morning’s Washington Post.
THIS FIRST ROUND, HE SAYS, confirmed what intelligence officials had predicted to him: that Putin hasn’t given up his desire to dominate Kyiv. He hopes to win in negotiations what he hasn’t been able to get on the battlefield.
PUTIN MADE SWEEPING demands yesterday. To prevent “escalation of the conflict,” he said the United States and its allies must accept “complete cessation of foreign military aid and the provision of intelligence information to Kyiv,” according to Russia’s account of the phone call. Those steps would hobble Ukraine’s military and could make it vulnerable to a devastating Russian attack.
IGNATIIUS WRITES THAT in his pursuit of peace, Trump now faces a dilemma. He could embrace Putin’s hard-line positions and attempt to bludgeon Ukraine into accepting them, but that would infuriate Britain and France, historically two of America’s closest allies.
ALTERNATIVELY, TRUMP could pressure Putin to make concessions, with new sanctions that would jeopardize Trump’s goal of “an END to this very horrible War,” as Trump wrote yesterday.
THE HARDEST ISSUE in this negotiation, Ignatius says, is security guarantees for Ukraine that would deter Putin from resuming his assault after a deal is reached. Kyiv has insisted on such protections.
BOTTOM LINE: Trump will either confront Putin and get concessions that could frame a lasting deal, or he’ll back off and ‘risk a bad deal that might be only a temporary pause in this terrible war.”
WHAT ABOUT TRUMP’S vow that he could end the war on one day? “I was being sarcastic,” Trump said recently.
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