Yes, because this so called peace agreement will be agreed under Russian blackmail, after hundred of thousands have died, and only to stop Putin killing even more people. It would be a just thing that Ukraine retakes territories stolen by Russia whenever it's possible.
It will be the same kind of agreement that France had with Germany in 1940, under the Vichy government. Did France do something wrong by retaking territories under German occupation despite the agreement made with Germany? Of course not.
It's not blackmail since it's not a case of Russia threatening to reveal damaging information about Ukraine. It's a war where Ukraine faces either the prospect of continued Russian aggression or a peace that costs them territory some foreign policy options.
Same situation here.
Anyway, it's not going to happen because Russia will rearm ASAP after the end of hostilities.
Except Russia's economy needs tending, and the collective west, without overly straining themselves can outproduce Russia on a long enough timeline and on a massive scale. The EU could do it even without the US. Russia will attempt to re-arm but they will have to deal with other issues too. And the kind of things Russia can produce at scale and cheaply are less and less impressive. A BMP-3 looked good in the 90's, ok in the 2000's, outdated in the 2010s, and we're in the 2020s. This applies to much of what Russia can pump out in volume.
Russia is not going to collapse as Nazy Germany did.
Nazi Germany didn't collapse. They fought until the bitter end, and the end was bitter. The Soviet assault on Berlin was a massive and bloody undertaking. Nazi Germany was defeated by the combined forces of the USSR (not Russia), the USA, and a whole alliance of other countries.
However, Russia may one day return territories to Ukraine voluntarily in exchange of normalised commercial relations, gas and oil transit, economic partnership, trade agreement with the EU,... after a change of regime, in a far future.
This is extremely unlikely. The demographics of these territories have already changed, and Russia isn't the USSR. They won't go out of their way to preserve languages and cultures. It's very likely that if Russia keeps these territories, within a couple of generations their population will be assimilated.
The Russians didn't respect the Misk agreement because they never let the Ukrainians hold the referendum in Lugansk and Donetsk. And also because the ceasefire was never respected by any party, because these agreements are not worth the paper they are written on.
The Mink Accords had an order of implementation. Poroshenko in 2016 and later Zelensky attempted to execute on those agreement but faced resistance within their own government and ultimately gave up and openly admitted they weren't going to follow through on it. Since then Germany has stepped forward and openly claimed that the Minsk Accords were negotiated in bad faith. Presumably this refers to the EU side of it. Had Ukraine implemented the parts that came earlier and it had gotten to the referendum, and had Russia at that point failed to hold one, you would have a point. But that's not the way events unfolded. And playing around with the implementation order of the Minsk Accords is a favorite trick of Ukraine's propaganda machine. This has all been done to death. Ukraine failed to implement and after a half-hearted effort led by their president they gave up and openly stalled.
And it will be the same with Trump's song and dance: Putin and Zelensky will never agree to a ceasefire. It's not going to happen. They will fight until one or the other is completely exhausted and capitulates. Either Putin sees his troops advancing and has no reason to hurry up for a peace deal, or Zelensky sees his troops advancing and will not hurry neither.
Maybe. But there's an advantage to negotiating an end to the war when you have the option of continuing instead of waiting to be defeated or win. Ukraine can sit down and if they don't like the deal, get back up and walk away. Russia can sit down and the same applies.
Actually the front line seems to have stalled, but it's only temporary. Both sides think that the other is on the verge of exhaustion. Zelensky may accept a bad deal in order to stop losing even more territories, but I don't think that Putin would if it's him who loses ground.
I don't think the front line has stalled. Ukrainian reinforcements with a series of counter-attacks have halted the envelopment of Pokrovsk, but Russia continues to advance in other areas. I think Ukraine has correctly identified where they need to put their reinforcements and have directed their counter-attacks appropriately which is why it's been effective. But it only addresses that section of the front.
Ukrainians don't give a damn what Corn Flakes or Hoggseth is saying. As long as Putin is bombing Ukraine with Shaheds, cruise missiles and large callibre artillery, they have no choice but organise their defence, no matter what people in other countries are saying.
Did Putin stopped his night attacks on Ukrainian cities after talking with Trump on the telephone? No.
So what Trump's influence is on this matter? Zero.
Do you think that Putin will stop bombing Ukraine if Trump stops providing weapons to Zelensky? Of course not.
More over, Europeans also don't care about what the US may decide. And it seems that the idea of deployment of European NATO troops in Ukraine after the peace agreement is a higher and higher probability. It's even possible that they would deploy already after a ceasefire. In fact being or not being in NATO is irrelevant. What is relevant is the bilateral engagement from western partners to help Ukraine militarily. Putin doesn't want Ukraine in NATO? OK, he just forgets that bilateral defence agreements can be more biding than NATO. In fact the NATO's mutual assistance is very loosy. Putin, however, agrees that Ukraine joins the EU (because in his mind, the EU is ruled by degenerates who will only weaken Ukraine)? OK: He doesn't know that mutual military assitance in case of agression is much more biding among EU members than among NATO members. ==> Huh!!!
It seems like you yourself have pointed a great way forward for Ukraine post-war. Rely on non-NATO mutual defense arrangements. I also think this is the way forward for Ukraine. There's no reason an EU-member Ukraine can't be just a safe with mutual agreements for defense in an EU framework as they would be in a NATO one.
Good question: First of all, Nobody is going to ask Putin's opinion on the subject. There might be a promise that Ukraine won't join NATO, but that would be purely symbolical, only flattering Putin's ego.
If it's part of a peace treaty you expect Russia to agree to then you will have to ask Putin's (or whoever's in charge) opinion.
In reality, no matter the peace deal, Ukraine will become fortress #1 and if some western countries want to deploy contingents in Ukraine, there will be nothing that Putin could do about that. There won't be any agreement of non-deployment.
Putin could decline the peace treaty and keep fighting until Ukraine is either willing to go with a neutral status as part of the peace treaty or is completely defeated.
The goal for Ukraine and Europe is to prevent any further Russian attack or invasion. To reach this goal, foreign deployment may be necessary. Maybe, maybe not, but if it's necessary they will.
If it's necessary, and if they accept it's necessary, it could play out this way.
Putin's goal is of course the opposite: To secure in the peace agreement all the conditions to allow one more invasion of Ukraine once he will be ready.
I'm not sold that this is true.
Secondly, as I said above already: An agreement with Putin will be just as valid as an agreement with Adolph Hitler in 1940.
This seems to be your personal view of the subject and it implies you think any negotiations that take place from the part of the west and Ukraine will be by default in bad faith. Maybe that's true. But again it simply suggests that Russia shouldn't accept any deal. If Ukraine is defeated but relatively intact, and with plenty of western support, they can re-arm and try again. But if Ukraine is defeated so badly that they're left with less than half of their pre-war population, all their major industries destroyed, their already horrible demographics in utter shambles, and generational trauma from a 6 year long unwinnable war, will they be willing to try again? There's a level of damage to Ukraine as a society and as a nation-state that precludes any attempt at reconquest within the forseeable future even if Ukraine retains independence. If you're right in your estimation of Ukraine's and the EU countries' negotiating position, then that's the only real option for Russia. Pound Ukraine into sawdust until only sawdust is left.
