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The lack of progress on the front, domestic issues and allies’ fatigue may push Ukraine towards a peace with Russia. This would lead to a break with the West and fuel Moscow's imperialist ambitions.
Internal and external pressure could push Ukraine towards a “historic peace” with Russia
The Ukrainian political scene is on the verge of great transformations, under the pressure of several factors. The first is related to President Zelenskiy's risky attempt to keep the military out of politics and to keep himself out of their competition, given the popularity of some of them among soldiers and the population. The second is related to the multiple corruption affairs marring the army and the political system of Ukraine. So far, with the exception of former defense minister Oleksiy Reznikov, who was forced to do so, none of the figures in Ukraine's leadership have taken responsibility for the situation created.
Adding to this is the diffuse pressure coming from the "old" West, for the conclusion of a peace, which is not too clear where it can lead. The official declaration of the stalemate of the war, both by President Zelensky, who has just admitted that the Ukrainian offensive did not bring the expected results, and by the Chief of the General Staff, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, suggests that both camps are looking for a political platform to address the future of the war with Russia. The big dilemma, however, is generated by the fact that both Zaluzhnyi’s "trenchocrats" and Zelensky's politicians are almost forced to resort to the only solution available to them.
In the absence of a clear path for Ukraine, which only the US can provide, in full agreement with the EU and Ukraine's neighbors, the "solution" will consist of a "historic reconciliation" between Kyiv and Moscow, obviously on an anti-Western platform.
The strained relations with Hungary, then with Poland, and finally with Robert Fico's Slovakia, only provide arguments for the theory of an organic rejection of Ukraine by the West. It is no less true that the Ukrainians, led by President Zelensky, have proven to be almost incorrigible in uninspired foreign policy statements, often combining excesses with a kind of condescension, partly justified by the ungrateful position the country is in. In this case, less enthusiastic verbally, but somewhat more constant in actions and demands, Bucharest's policy proved to be more effective for both sides, although it did not lead to a decrease in the number of Romanians who continue to view Ukraine as a potential enemy.
Despite a bellicose rhetoric, Russia still has high-ranking officials who could negotiate a reconciliation with Ukraine
In Russia, despite the Kremlin's unchanging discourse about "fascists" and "historical enemies," there are still a number of figures close to Putin who have not compromised themselves through an irreconcilable anti-Ukrainian rhetoric. When the time comes, people like Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, the mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, or even Nikolai Patrushev, who rather accused the transformation of Ukraine into a "US puppet" and less the Ukrainians, will be able to plead for the "historic reconciliation" between the two peoples, without being too harshly accused of "changing their shoes in the air", as a Russian witticism says.
Russia’s willingness to give in, making sure that Ukraine remains in its sphere of influence, is much greater than it seems at first glance, going as far as negotiating a solution providing for dual sovereignty over Crimea. The integration of Crimea into the Russian Federation, as an autonomous republic, leaves wide open the prospects of a Russian-Ukrainian condominium, and the "republics" of Lugansk and Donetsk, like Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, could quickly become part of a unified state that would also include Belarus, in addition to Ukraine and Russia.
The tactic of fueling anti-Western Ukrainian nationalism, including by annexing territories taken from its neighbors, is one long practiced by Russia, especially after Lenin's Bolsheviks realized that a Soviet Ukraine was impossible without some national concessions made to the western Ukrainians. Not only the Russians have such a historical precedent. The famous "historical compromise" of 1867, between the House of Habsburg and the Hungarians, which led to the incorporation of Transylvania into the Kingdom of Hungary, but also the "small compromise" between the Croats and the Hungarians, were also the result of a defeat administered to Austria by Prussia on the battlefield. Somehow, the empire survived for another half a century, hopelessly frustrating those on whose backs it was built - the Romanians and the Czechs - but even so it took an entire lost world war for it to disappear.
A capitulation in Ukraine will fuel Russian imperialism, will discourage domestic opposition in Russia and will be perceived as a betrayal by Ukrainians
The West, on the other hand, has no excuse for some politicians' attempts to force Ukraine into peace by keeping its military in a state of arms purgatory. The Ukraine that is fighting Russia today did not appear under the shadow of German and Austro-Hungarian bayonets, as in 1918. Nor is there any longer the French obsession of maintaining the territorial integrity of the Russian Empire, which only helped the Bolsheviks to win The Civil War.
Moreover, those who in Russia oppose Putin and his expansionist policies, and who today are either in various "remote districts", i.e. detained in prisons, or are simply silenced by repressive legislation and aggressive official propaganda, urgently need a big Ukrainian victory on the front. Only a military disaster can awaken from their lethargy the Russians used to obey and die when the Power demands it, without really understanding why. Only then will the majority of Russians understand that the Ukrainians are a different people, and only such a defeat will lead to a critical absorption of Putinism.
Any middle solution, negotiated to leave Putin and his cronies the opportunity to claim victory, even partial, will only fuel the Russians' revanchist imperialism, thus transforming Putinism from a personal regime into a system capable of replication and perpetuation, even after the disappearance of the one who created it.
For Ukrainians, such a solution will mean a new "betrayal of the West", a perception so widespread in Eastern Europe after the war. Unlike the peoples who remained then in the sphere of Soviet influence, who were Western not only in aspirations, but also in structure and foundation, in the case of the Ukrainians the situation is much more complicated.
The Westernization of all Ukrainians can only be the result of a historical shock, the results of which can only be strengthened by lasting transformations. This shock has happened, and the strengthening of their break from the "Russian world" can only be done if there is constant and firm Western support for this mutation. Ukraine has no time to evolve. Unlike the Republic of Moldova, it does not have such a well-defined historical precedent, and the Ukrainians do not have "brothers", but only neighbors, more or less benevolent towards their cause. As long as Russia is led by people with visions similar to the one that Putin managed to impose, the scenario of a Ukraine suspended between West and East, the famous "bridge" between the two, is almost excluded. As things stand today, Ukraine will be Western or Russian. Tertium non datur.
Freezing the conflict in Ukraine will not stop Russia, which is determined to rebuild its empire
Those who hope that the freezing of the war, in anticipation of better times in Russia, are sorely mistaken and mostly on the account of the Ukrainians and the other peoples of Central Europe. Boris Yeltsin established Transnistria, with the blessing of the West, at a time of deep crisis for Russia, when it seemed that the country's priorities were completely different. Then too, in Moscow, there was talk of "fascism", "Nazism" and the "denial of the rights of Russians". Despite the fact that the US and the EU were formally drawn into the "peace process", the anti-Moldovan, anti-Romanian and anti-Western underpinnings of this "creation" were evident from the beginning. All happened immediately after the collapse of the USSR, when Russia was in full idyll with the USA and the European "Great Powers", and however open to various solutions Moscow may have been, it has never considered liquidating Transnistria, but only using it as well to keep Moldova prisoner.
The freezing of the war in Ukraine, with Zaporizhzhia, part of Kherson, Luhansk and part of Donetsk region under Russian control and with Ukrainians convinced that they have been "betrayed" by the West, a perception that Russian propaganda would only fuel, however, would not repeat the scenario in Transnistria, of a long-term "freeze". Understanding what is to be understood, namely that the agreement to preserve the positions won in Ukraine is nothing more than proof of the weakness of the West, sooner than expected, Russia will try to finish what it started on February 24, 2022. Only that this time, it will no longer be lulled into the illusion that the Ukrainians will welcome them with flowers and a demoralized army, and the objectives regarding the countries of Central Europe will be much more blunt.
There is no consensus on the new spheres of influence in Europe, which would allow the stabilization of the situation, along a political border between East and West, crossing Ukraine. And if the question of such a consensus is seriously raised, it is hard to believe that Russia will be satisfied with the occupied regions or that it will try, for the first time in history, a sense of security with only a "neutral" Ukraine. Even if it doesn't admit it publicly, the Kremlin has come to have a kind of respect for the Ukrainians that defeats on the battlefield command. Towards the other peoples of Central Europe, up to the borders of Germany, with the possible exception of the Finns, the Russians have no such respect, nor do they even regard these states as capable of political will in international relations. A Russia that will consider itself only temporarily halted in its march to rebuild the empire will certainly begin "peace" negotiations under the condition of having a zone of neutral states between Ukraine and the old Western Europe .
Putin’s demise, as long as at least part of his legacy continues to be used by those who might take his place, will not change the situation. Victory on the battlefield, which would restore both the West's belief that it has the power to resist dictatorships and the dictatorships' belief that democracy is not an easy prey, is the least risky of the solutions available to decision-makers. Historical experience has shown that peace can never be saved in the long term by concessions made to those who actually want war, and if Putin has done anything truly important for the world it is the fact that he has brought us all back to the 20th Century.
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