The White House announced this Tuesday that Ukraine had accepted the peace plan renovated by Marco Rubioalthough perhaps, as usual, he is selling the bear’s skin before hunting it.
The Trump Administration was also convinced that Zelensky had said yes to the original 28 points when in reality he only committed to studying them. In this case, after the Geneva meetings, the Ukrainian president showed cautious optimism… but warned that “there was still work to be done.”
Likewise, the Ukrainian delegation insisted on a new meeting between Zelensky and Trump to clarify those small disagreements that are still on the table.
The problem is that neither Zelensky nor Trump started this war and, strictly speaking, neither of them can end it.
They are relationship has gone through more downs than ups since the Ukrainian came to power in 2019 and the pressure he suffered from Trump to investigate the businesses of Hunter Biden, the son of the former vice president during the Obama Administration. That led to a congressional investigation and a frustrated impeachment attempt.
If it were up to Trump, Zelensky would be out of the Government and would negotiate only with Putin. What saves Zelensky –“his letters”, to follow Trump’s jargon- is European support, which has remained intact since February 24, 2022.
Es It is this support that prevents the White House from cutting ties and leaving Ukraine to its fate.. As much as the president and, above all, Vice President Vance hate Europe, they know that they are allies of great commercial and strategic value. They can’t do without them.
Hence, a few hours after Zelensky’s distressing message to the nation in which he made public the drama of having to choose between the dignity of his country and the relationship with the United States, all the important European leaders came out to publicly support him.
That was the key so that the 28 points have been reduced to 19, the ultimatums have disappeared and Marco Rubio had to travel in person to Switzerland to rebuild negotiations that had been derailed thanks to the clumsiness and pro-Russian submission of Steve Witkoff and Daniel Discroll, Secretary of the US Army and close friend of JD Vance.
Little hope in Abu Dhabi
Precisely, Discroll, who has already gone through the ordeal of having to demand that Zelensky accept a crazy plan, met this Tuesday with a Russian delegation in Abu Dhabi.
In principle, it is there to present them with the new plan, but it still sells them a version that is more in line with their expectations. It is something that the Trump Administration has already done, for example in Gaza.
It must be taken into account that, no matter how leaning towards the Russian side the original proposal was, the Kremlin never showed the slightest enthusiasm. Almost, on the contrary.
At first, Putin said yes, that he had read the memo and found it interesting.…but then he clarified that, in reality, he had only taken a look at it with a diagonal reading.
Then, he complained that the text had not reached him directly, that is, that, according to the Kremlin, they had learned of it from third parties and not from the US administration itself; something really strange, but that seems to have become the official version. Maybe you read it in the press.
Hours before the meeting in Abu Dhabi, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Lavrovinsisted that Russia not only would not accept a cut in the original 28-point proposal, but that He was confident that these could better adapt to what was discussed in Alaska between Putin and Trump.
It’s difficult to know exactly what they talked about because very little was revealed to the press, but it couldn’t have been exactly a great success if the subsequent meal was cancelled, Putin left early and then refused to meet Trump in Budapest as the American president had proposed.
Magical conviction in the Russian army
In any case, we must insist as much as necessary that Russia is not interested in any kind of ceasefire or lasting peace. It may be worth a intermediate point, that is, something similar to the Minsk agreements of 2015, that they stop the war long enough to rearm again and continue it when they see fit. Now, Putin continues to believe that, although this is the most likely end to this part of the conflict, the necessary conditions do not yet exist to sit at the table and reach compromises.
Why do you think so? because it has an almost magical conviction that the Russian army will sooner or later occupy everything that Ukraine refuses to give up beforehand.
A conviction that he has managed to convey to Trump, who repeated that argument last week on FOX News, when he presented the famous Thanksgiving ultimatum.
Ukrainian soldiers fire a self-propelled howitzer at Russian troops near the city of Pokrovsk, on the front line.
Reuters
The Three-day war is now approaching its fourth year and from time to time the same mantras are repeated: Ukrainian troops are exhausted, there are hardly any replacements, desertions are increasing and they will not be able to hold out for long.
Reality, on the other hand, is stubborn. It is estimated that So far in 2025, Russia has managed to invade 1% of Ukrainian territory…in exchange for losing, between dead and wounded, more than 100,000 men.
The accounts do not add up, although a war is not linear and the front can change abruptly at a given moment, as already happened in the summer and autumn of 2022, with the recovery of Kherson, the capital, and a good part of northwest Kharkov. For this winter, Putin is once again relying on the cold and undermining the resistance of civil society.
Witkoff, again, in Moscow
It is true that scandals are beginning to surround Zelenskycon too many cases of corruption in his surroundings and the accusation of wanting take advantage of the war to remove governors and mayors frome the opposition and place people from his party in charge of the different regions that were hostile to him in the 2020 elections.
The recent case of Mayor of Russian origin of Odesa, Genadadi Trujanov, It has raised many blisters.
Now, to talk about a division of the Ukrainian people or its political class would be saying a lot. Putin is convinced that it will end up happening and that this will allow him to place the current Yanukovych in power. Meanwhile, he is in no rush for any agreement.
Although Trump insisted this Tuesday on his social network, Truth, that he was going to continue fighting for peace and that would send Witkoff to Moscow to meet with Putin and Discroll back to kyiv to speak with Zelensky – no sign of who nominally remains the president’s special envoy for the Ukrainian war, General Keith Kellogg-, everything drags a uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu.
Even Mitch McConnell, leader of the Republican majority in the Senate, came out to criticize the lack of forcefulness of Trump and, above all, his team. Round and round to get nowhere and, as everyone meets everyone, the missiles fall on civilian targets in kyiv.