Trump 2.0 brings hopes of peace in Ukraine in 2025, but challenges remain

February 20, 2025
Posted by: Maj Gen Jagatbir Singh
Categories: Russia, Ukraine, USA

While Ukraine and the West may want Russia to return all territories occupied, including Crimea, this maximalist position is unlikely to be acceptable to Russia, and neither will Russia accept Ukraine being part of NATO

The New Year has brought to the fore the possibility of an end to the war in Ukraine with President-elect Donald Trump set to take over the Oval Office from January 20. In direct contrast to President Joe Biden, whose policy was one of unwavering support for Ukraine, Trump has long made clear his intention to bring the two sides to the negotiating table soon after he takes office. Within weeks of his election victory, he named General Keith Kellogg (Retd) as the special envoy for Russia-Ukraine, underscoring the priority he will place on bringing the curtains down on the war.

This shift in the US approach to the war could revive negotiations that were last held in April 2022.The negotiations in Turkey produced the Istanbul Communiqué. A provisional agreement was reached then, whereby the Russian forces would withdraw to the pre-invasion line and Ukraine would commit not to seek to join NATO in exchange for security guarantees from a number of countries.

In the run-up to and since Trump’s election, however, there have been signs that both Kyiv and Moscow might be ready to return to the table. The war has resulted in both countries paying a price in terms of loss of manpower, damage to infrastructure, loss of territory, and economic costs of war, though the price paid by Ukraine is much higher.

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Defining a Credible End State

The challenge for any meaningful negotiation is not merely stopping the conflict but defining a credible end state. A cease-fire agreement that does not address the underlying drivers of the conflict is unlikely to work. Indeed, a deal that just ends the fighting would probably be unacceptable to both nations.

It is imperative to formulate a comprehensive endgame for the war that identifies core issues and crafts a strategy for addressing them. That means not only setting out a road map for a durable cease-fire but also identifying ways to assure Ukrainian security and laying out a strategy for normalising Russia’s relations with the West.

A defined state is the key. The Biden administration has made it a matter of policy not to define a US objective for the war in Ukraine but rather to support Ukraine for “as long as it takes” and to defer to Kyiv on the details of the desired outcome.

So far, China has dominated the international conversation about ending the war and has even penned a twelve-point peace plan. But the fact is that no peace plan is likely to work without the US being in the driver’s seat, as they have the leverage over Ukraine to shape the outcome. No wonder US Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated that “A peace in which the aggressor gets everything that it sought, and the victim does not have its rights upheld, is not a recipe for a lasting peace, and certainly not a just one”.

Trump’s Plans

Presently, while Trump has advocated ending the fighting, there is no map to get there. “I can’t give you those plans because if I give you those plans, I’m not going to be able to use them. They’ll be unsuccessful. Part of its surprise,” Trump said in a podcast interview with Lex Fridman in September.

However, what has been revealed in reports regarding Trump’s plans for a truce in Ukraine involves delaying Kyiv’s NATO membership by 20 years. Further Vice President designate JD Vance, in an interview in September, said the current line of demarcation between Russia and Ukraine would become a “demilitarised zone”, fortified so Russia would not invade again. The Wall Street Journal also reported that this demilitarised zone would span nearly 1,290 km (800 miles). While it remains unclear who would monitor the zone. Vance also suggested that under the plan, Ukraine would have to cede some of its occupied territory to Russia, including parts of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.

In response at his annual press interaction on December 26, President Vladimir Putin said while he does not know specifics of Trump’s plan, current President Joe Biden made a similar suggestion back in 2021, to defer Ukraine’s admission by 10 to 15 years. “In terms of historical distances and timeframes, this is a moment. What difference does it make to us—today, tomorrow, or in 10 years?” he asked rhetorically, in response to a journalist’s question, according to a Kremlin transcript of the interaction.

Then, on December 29, TASS quoted Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov as stating, “We are certainly not satisfied with the proposals made by representatives of the president-elect’s team to postpone Ukraine’s membership in NATO for 20 years and to deploy a peacekeeping contingent of ‘UK and European forces’ in Ukraine.”

In June 2024, Keith Kellogg had presented a plan he co-authored with the former CIA analyst Fred Fleitz that proposed halting the delivery of US weapons to Ukraine if Kyiv didn’t enter into peace talks with Moscow but also warning Moscow that if it refused to negotiate with Kyiv, Washington would increase its support for Ukraine. In other words, it’s a question of leverage the US needs to get both sides to the negotiating table.

Key Features for a Peace Plan

At its most basic lie a few key features: a well-designed cease-fire agreement, a credible guarantee of Ukraine’s postwar security architecture, rebuilding of damaged infrastructure, return of displaced persons, and measures to normalise relations between Russia and the West.

Each of these has multiple subparts, the fine print of which is challenging. As regards control of territory, the line of contact, perhaps with some small adjustments, will probably remain where it is on the date of the ceasefire. While territorial control is extremely important to both sides, ultimately it is unlikely to be a core concern in light of the broader issue of security guarantees for Ukraine without it being part of NATO.

The reality is that while Ukraine and the West may want Russia to return all territories occupied, including Crimea, this maximalist position is unlikely to be acceptable to Russia, and neither will Russia accept Ukraine being part of NATO. In purely military terms, these can be defined as the ‘terms of reference’ for progressing further.

To avoid renewed fighting, a peace initiative must include measures to deter Russia, assure Ukraine, and provide incentives to both sides to maintain the cease-fire. Security guarantees for Ukraine that are directly tied to the cessation of hostilities can advance all three of these objectives. If Kyiv is convinced that its security is guaranteed, it will be able to focus on its economic recovery.

While Ukraine may be seeking security guarantees in the form of accession to NATO. But preventing Ukraine from joining NATO has been a Russian policy objective for decades, and it was among Russian President Vladimir Putin’s core motives for attacking Ukraine in 2022.

Hence, membership in NATO cannot be a viable instrument for ending a war. Further, accession would require the approval of 32 parliaments and thus take months at best, and it would be contingent on Ukraine implementing many reforms that have nothing to do with conflict resolution.

Options for Security

In fact, there are other, potentially more effective ways to provide a security guarantee to Ukraine in the context of a negotiated end to the war. On multiple occasions since World War II, the US has made bilateral security commitments to allies and partners in comparable post-conflict situations. South Korea after the Korean War and Israel after 1973 stand out. These approaches, which helped produce enduring periods of relative stability and peace, could provide models, but the templates vary and cannot be applied across the board.

Another kind of security guarantee that is being written about by various analysts is Ukraine’s eventual EU membership. Article 42.7 of the Treaty on European Union, known as the EU’s mutual assistance clause, states that if a “Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power.” But the EU cannot defend its external borders without NATO. That dilemma has long been a theoretical one, but Ukraine’s march towards membership could make it real. Russia had earlier agreed not to stand in the way of Ukraine’s EU membership during the 2022 talks.

Whether or not Ukraine gets binding external commitments to its security, it will need deterrence in the form of strong-armed forces. The Biden administration and numerous NATO allies have already laid the groundwork for providing Ukraine the necessary training, arms transfers, and intelligence cooperation to create this deterrent. But Ukraine’s partners need to consider how best to arm Ukraine to ensure a sustainable peace.

The other option is the stationing of United Nations troops, but having seen the role that the UN has played during this conflict and the fact that Russia is a permanent member of the Security Council, this proposal is unlikely to be on the table.

The Challenges

The size of the front is extraordinary and presents challenges of its own. If you take into account the undisputed areas along Ukraine’s borders with Belarus and Russia, as well as the line of contact in Ukraine, the front extends nearly 1,200 miles (1,931 km). If it is only the border of Russian occupation in Ukraine and Ukraine’s incursion in Kursk, the requirement of troops decreases.

Monitoring such a line would require thousands of peacekeepers if Russia and Ukraine agree to allow such a force, which is highly unlikely. Nonetheless, unmanned systems and sensors could be leveraged to establish an effective monitoring system. Such a system would likely require third-party oversight to assess the information coming in and to arbitrate disputes. Accountability mechanisms also need to be built in to ensure there are no violations.

Another crucial issue is the feeling in the West that Russia should not come away with the impression that it has paid no cost for its aggression. The West can impose those costs by maintaining some sanctions or utilising the Russian state assets that are already frozen in Western countries for the reconstruction of Ukraine. But this cannot be done unilaterally and will need Russian consent. Moscow is likely to demand in return that Ukraine relinquish further monetary claims on Russia for damages done during the war.

Russia will also need some positive incentives to comply with a settlement. Assurances that Ukraine will remain non aligned, that foreign forces and infrastructure will not be deployed in Ukraine, and that mutual understandings can be reached on the limits of Western military aid are some of the aspects that may be deliberated upon.

Further, Russia is unlikely to agree to end the fighting without talks on NATO-Russian issues that go beyond Ukraine, such as the conventional force balance and long-range strike capabilities on the continent. Agreeing to a consultation process to address these issues in parallel to talks on the war itself could be part of the arrangements to end the war. Eventually any durable settlement will require managing broader Russian-Western tensions.

Finally, prior to the talks commencing, there needs to be an atmosphere of trust created in the form of some de-escalation measures. Two such efforts saw significant progress but no closure: a Turkish-brokered agreement to avoid strikes on civilian shipping in the Black Sea and a Qatari-negotiated deal to avoid strikes on energy infrastructure. Additional such measures could include prisoner-of-war exchanges and commitments to not strike beyond a certain distance from the line of contact. If some of these steps begin to bear fruit, consultations could begin on multiple tracks.

Although the coming to power of a US president who pledges to quickly end the war raises the possibility of a breakthrough, it also poses major challenges. High-stakes negotiations, mostly between two embittered belligerents in a war that has killed tens of thousands and maybe hundreds of thousands on both sides, are not easy.

Conclusion

The extent of the enmity between Russia and Ukraine and between Russia and the West and the dearth of communication among the parties over the past few years compound matters regarding arriving at an agreement quickly.

While NATO members have assured that Ukraine is on an “irreversible” path to joining the alliance, they are wary of admitting Ukraine while it is still at war with Russia due to the mutual defence clause. Hence Ukraine’s admission into NATO would imply that all NATO members are at war with Russia.

Therefore NATO membership cannot remain the core of what President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been pushing as his peace plan. But while he might be willing to compromise on NATO membership, President Zelenskyy would not compromise on the question of Ukraine’s security. Ukraine has to be assured that under any deal, Russia cannot just invade again. That means cast-iron assurances that will give Ukraine all the tools needed to defend itself.

For most countries in the world, it is imperative that the war be brought to a close, as its effect has transcended the countries directly engaged in conflict. There is a crying need to bring an end to this horror and the growing risks it poses to the broader world. A positive outcome, moreover, will now reverberate across the globe.

The author is a retired Major General of the Indian Army. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.

Trump 2.0 brings hopes of peace in Ukraine in 2025, but challenges remain

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