Donald Trump’s victory in last week’s US presidential election sent shockwaves across the globe – but they will likely be felt most acutely in Ukraine. Trump has famously said that the Russia-Ukraine war would never have started had he been president and claimed he could bring the conflict to an abrupt halt – without ever revealing his plans for doing so. Now, as leaders across Europe and Russia wait anxiously to see what direction the Trump administration might take, there are mounting concerns that Trump could push for a hasty ceasefire requiring Ukraine to cede significant portions of its territory – even as Kyiv’s European partners vow to back its armed forces for ‘as long as it takes’. His vice president-elect, JD Vance, has already sketched out a possible peace framework, while Trump’s son Don Jr mocked Volodymyr Zelensky with distasteful social media posts about the Ukrainian President ‘losing his allowance’ from Uncle Sam.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration is scrambling to bolster Ukraine’s defenses in its dying days before Joe hands over the keys to the White House, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken heading to Brussels this week for an emergency meeting with European allies. With Trump’s inauguration just two months away, MailOnline examines what the once-and-future president’s ceasefire plan could entail and explores the myriad problems it is likely to face. What could a Trump-negotiated deal look like? ‘I can’t give you those plans because if I give you those plans, I’m not going to be able to use them.’ That was Trump’s response during his campaign when pressed to reveal how exactly he intended to stop the war in Ukraine, which by the time he enters office will be seven weeks shy of its third year. Since winning last week’s election, Trump has spoken with Zelensky via phone – a conversation characterized by the Ukrainian leader as ‘excellent’ – and claims to have spoken with Putin despite denials by the Kremlin.
But in September, the Republican’s running mate and now vice president-elect JD Vance offered former US Navy Seal Shawn Ryan an outline of how peace may be brought about in Ukraine under Trump. ‘What it probably looks like is something like the current line of demarcation between Russia and Ukraine becomes like a demilitarized zone, heavily fortified for the Russians don’t invade again,’ Vance told the former Seal on his podcast. ‘Ukraine remains an independent sovereign. Russia gets the guarantee of neutrality from Ukraine. ‘It does not join NATO and some other allied institutions. Germans and other nations have to fund Ukraine’s reconstruction,’ Vance added. That telling, albeit vague, description of what a Trump-negotiated end to war in Ukraine could look like was subsequently echoed by a Wall Street Journal report that emerged days after the election last week. Citing three sources ‘close to the president-elect’, the WSJ claimed Trump’s transition office is considering one proposal that would prevent Kyiv from joining NATO for at least 20 years in exchange for lucrative arms deals.
In the meantime, the conflict would be halted by the implementation of a large demilitarized zone (DMZ) that would effectively freeze the fighting in place and force Kyiv to relinquish up to 20% of its territory as part of an ‘800-mile DMZ’. But the sources offered no insight into how such a buffer zone between Russia ‘s border and unoccupied Ukraine would be monitored or managed, other than to say it would not be staffed by American peacekeepers. This suggests troops from other NATO nations, including the UK, would be tasked with manning the DMZ. ‘We can do training and other support but the barrel of the gun is going to be European… and we are not paying for it,’ one source was quoted as saying. ‘We are not sending American men and women to uphold peace in Ukraine… Get the Poles, Germans, British and French to do it.’ The proposal draws comparisons with the DMZ that has divided North and South Korea since the armistice agreement that brought the Korean War to an end in 1953. But the Russia-Ukraine conflict is vastly different, leading observers and analysts to warn that implementing a DMZ in Eastern Ukraine would face huge resistance.
What problems would the deal face? Several obstacles must be circumvented before the conflict can be frozen and a ceasefire introduced – starting with the evident lack of enthusiasm from those expected to agree to and uphold the proposal. Days before Trump secured his election victory, Volodymyr Zelensky openly declared that making any concessions to Putin would be ‘unacceptable for Ukraine’ and ‘suicidal for Europe’. The Ukrainian President has made countless similar declarations since Russia’s February 2022 invasion. In addition, Zelensky’s foremost European partners Britain, France and Germany have already vowed to support Ukraine’s armed forces in their fight against Moscow ‘s troops ‘for as long as it takes’. Those sentiments were echoed this week by the European Union ‘s designated foreign policy chief, former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, who is expected to succeed Josep Borrell as the EU’s top diplomat.
An ardent critic of Russia, Kallas told a confirmation hearing today: ‘The situation on the battlefield is difficult. ‘That’s why we must keep working every day. Today, tomorrow and for as long as it takes and with as much military, financial and humanitarian help as needed.’ This messaging suggests that most European leaders – with the notable exception of a few individuals such as Hungary ‘s Prime Minister Viktor Orban – are united behind the Ukrainian war effort. They would not be enthused by the prospect of shouldering the responsibility of funding, staffing and managing a demilitarized zone that is proposed but not backed by the White House. Implementing this so-called buffer zone would also be extremely difficult from a logistical standpoint. Firstly, the DMZ would need to span the 800-mile length of Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia and the frontline in disputed territory, from the northernmost Ukraine-Russia border town of Senkivka in Chernihiv to the city of Kherson in the south, from which Putin’s forces withdrew across the Dnieper River in late 2022.
Secondly, the conflict in Ukraine is very much in a state of flux, with frontlines being redrawn almost daily. Moscow’s men are pushing back Zelensky’s defensive lines in Donetsk, while Ukraine’s armed forces continue to hold a considerable pocket of Russian soil in the western Kursk region. Various reports suggest North Korean troops have been drafted in to fight alongside Putin’s soldiers there. Both sides are likely to make a push to maximize the territory held in an effort to improve their bargaining position ahead of negotiations. Russia and Ukraine this weekend also conducted the most intense exchange of drone strikes the war has seen so far. By contrast, the DMZ that split the Korean peninsula in half measures just 155 miles – a much smaller buffer zone that was only made possible by the US deploying boots on the ground and maintaining a military presence there long after the conflict had subsided. Prior to the armistice deal, South Korea enjoyed full Western military support in the conflict and a ceasefire was reached only after millions of troops and civilians had been massacred.
What would the fallout be? Given Ukraine’s disdain for the prospect of ceding any territory to Russia and Europe’s apparent commitment to backing Kyiv for the long haul, it is difficult to see how a ceasefire deal as outlined by Vance and the WSJ could be pushed through. Failing an exceptional feat of diplomacy by the Trump administration, the only remaining option looks to be strong-arming Kyiv into making a deal with threats of withholding sorely needed US military aid. This would force Kyiv to capitulate – unless European partners, along with the likes of Australia, Japan and Canada – agree to maintain an adequate supply of arms to Ukraine’s armed forces. This seems nigh on impossible, with many analysts arguing that the current flow of military aid even with US support is not enough to hold back the Russian onslaught. ‘Trump does have a legitimate point about European allies having underperformed in defense and over-relied on Uncle Sam to protect them for too long, and this is a huge wake-up call to the West,’ Dr Russell Foster, Senior Lecturer in British and International Politics at King’s College London, told MailOnline.
‘But Europe, Canada, and Australasia have let their defense spending stagnate for so long, they have nowhere near the industrial base and military infrastructure to help defend Ukraine and themselves from further aggression without American help. ‘We are likely to see major calls for defense spending and investment across NATO – but this will take years to build up and be hugely expensive at a time of economic stagnation. The future of Western defense is now looking very bleak.’ Ed Arnold, Senior Research Fellow for European Security at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) think tank, added: ‘The immediate crisis within Europe will be how to continue diplomatic, military and humanitarian support to Ukraine without the US. ‘Whichever mechanism it comes through – NATO, the EU, or bilaterally – it will be incredibly expensive.’
Beyond the sheer economic toll, an effort by the Trump administration to force Ukraine into accepting a peace deal would dramatically undermine Washington’s relations with all of Europe and call into question the legitimacy of NATO. Some analysts and politicians have cautioned such a move could even embolden the likes of China to capitalize on the West’s perceived disunity and seek to expand its influence in the Pacific. Finally, in terms of the human cost, forcing Ukraine to squander territory to Russia will seal the fate of millions of Ukrainians currently living under Russian occupation. A study published in September by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) estimated that in January 2022, nearly 6.4 million people were living in territory now occupied by Russia following the full-scale invasion.
Around 2.9 million people are believed to have fled the region, either to seek refuge in Western Ukraine or to gain asylum in Europe. But that still leaves roughly 3.2 million people living in occupied territory, the SWP concluded. Russia’s Interior Ministry reported that by September 2023, around 2.8 million passports had been issued to residents of occupied territories as Moscow continues its efforts to assimilate residents into the Federation. While some citizens living in the occupied territory may have accepted their predicament, freezing the conflict and implementing a DMZ would leave untold numbers of Ukrainians trapped under Putin’s rule.
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