While a general ceasefire benefits both sides more or less equally, an energy ceasefire benefits Russia far more than it does Ukraine, because that hits Russia's revenue and thus war funding - critical in the absence of a credible or at least demonstrated capability of Ukraine to meaningfully hit Russia's MIC.
Except as was previously discussed here the damage they cause “hitting Russia’s revenue” is smaller than the margin of error (something like 0.5% or less as was outlined), so there is no credible demonstrated capability to meaningfully impact the revenue that Russia receives from hydrocarbon exports. It’s an easy target for “epic videos” and propaganda, but no real effect of any kind.
The damage Russia causes to the Ukrainian infrastructure is certainly much higher in magnitude and causes much more hardship for the Ukrainians. I think this couldn’t be more clear.
I think that Ukrainians want a ceasefire for 30 days to be allowed to receive a few more weapons from European partners, maybe one or two more F16 and regroup. Of course Russia would do this as well but it's more critical for Ukraine.
Which is why it will never happen. The fact that Ukraine uses it as some kind of “we accepted it but Russia didn’t” angle to say that it is Russia that doesn’t want to end it is extremely weird.
Russians to gain things in an agreement without fighting.
That’s kind of how things work though. In other words, they will keep fighting until they get something acceptable as compared to the marginal costs they would have to incur to achieve a more acceptable outcome. Or until they can’t fight anymore. Hence ->
It’s not a stalemate. It’s only a stalemate until Ukrainian forces have the resources to hold the line while Russia keeps advancing. The rate of advance can increase suddenly and rapidly for various reasons (it can also remain the same or slow down even more, of course). When Russia can longer advance or find the marginal costs (or pace, which can be argued to be the same thing) of further advances to be too high and Ukraine has no resources to counterattack in order to take back territory (which is the case), that will be a stalemate.
Consider what Ukrainians are fighting for here at this point and how they are doing it. They are heavily compensating for the lack of infantry via the use of drones to counter the Russian attacks. The question that begs to be answered is to what end? Would continuation of hostilities provide better results than real negotiations (I actually perceive what is happening now is about as real as it gets)? Can they recapture any land they are currently losing and had lost previously? No, they cannot; they do not have resources to mount any meaningful counteroffensive and Russians can likely defend against it if they could anyway. Crimea is never coming back. They will never be a part of NATO and this is not because Trump said so, but because it goes completely against the NATO’s main objective (which is not protection of Ukraine or going to war with Russia). And so on.
Trump's peace proposal looks more like an ultimatum to give Putin almost everything he wanted from the very beginning while giving nothing to Ukraine in compensation
Not even close. If you think this is what Putin wanted from the very beginning, I have a bridge to sell you.
We do not yet know what compensation Ukraine will get, if any. If you are implying that Ukraine should be getting some kind of better deal than what is offered here… well, to paraphrase Trump, they do mot have the cards. My guess is the final agreement will be something similar to what it is now (if it stops “now”) and Europe will follow suit. This whole idea of ending it on Ukrainian terms is quite idiotic at this point. It would never end on Ukrainian terms, at any point of this war. There were times when they could negotiate better terms for themselves, but those time are not even visible in the rearview mirror anymore. This isn’t some Russian narrative, this is the reality.
Not join NATO and not take steps to get closer to NATO membership. The spirit of this last point is that Ukraine will not be able to closely cooperate with NATO countries to better integrate their defence with their allies.
The point that everyone is missing, or so it seems, Ukraine was never prevented from joining the EU. In turn, the EU has, presumably, much more solid security guarantees. NATO membership does not obligate any state to go to war if another member is attacked (in fact, if Ukraine was a part of the NATO, it is not guaranteed that the support they are getting now would be different from the support they would be getting then). According to the article 42(7), on the other hand, the members of the EU must do so - that is, go to war. Unsurprisingly, Russia has no issues with that, or so it appears (it’s a separate discussion, but I believe I discussed it here on more than one occasion as well).
There is clearly no incentive for Ukraine to accept because it would put Ukraine in a very weak position
Would it put them in a position better than they are in today? I mean they have the Russians exactly where they want them now and it is going great.
Russians would be able to legally anchor their fleet in Sebastopol and sail around Crimea in their new national waters.
They can do it today if there is a meaningful purpose to it, but there isn’t one at the moment. They can launch their missiles (and do so) from the Black Sea Fleet to Odessa from where they are stationed now. There is nothing Ukraine can do to counter it today, aside from reaching some sort of tangible peace agreement (or the Black Sea ceasefire?).
Not joining NATO would be useless for Putin if in reality, everything is as if they were in NATO.
This is very inaccurate, in my opinion. The main problem Russia has with NATO membership is the presence of the American troops and bases on the territory of the member states. And again, if Ukraine joins the EU, the security guarantees are much more solid on paper than they would be if they joined NATO. The problem, of course, is that the EU membership is almost as distant as the NATO membership. Not quite as distant, but…
Putin would certainly not agree to let European allies provide sufficient security guarantees to Ukraine. He has already made it clear several times.
The fact that Russia did not oppose to the Ukrainian EU membership says otherwise. Should they not accelerate the process and welcome Ukraine as a EU member and provide those guarantees (by definition) as soon as the war ends?
non-US military support + Ukrainian domestic production could make up for the loss of US aid within one year.
This is complete nonsense. If that were the case, we would not be having this discussion. Ukrainian domestic production will not make up for the loss of US aid in decades from today (likely never, in fact). Replacing the American support would require significant investment by the Europeans and it will take years or decades. This is just the reality of it.
Not 100% of course, because some weapons would not be available.
Like lack of air defense, for example. Or HIMARS. And so on. What if the US imposes a ban on export of the “American stuff” (includes components, of course) to Ukraine? This is not a far-fetched scenario at all -> see Trump refusing to sell Patriots to Ukraine as one example.
Intelligence would also suffer.
This is also irreplaceable at this time.
But the basic weapons and ammunitions they will have will be enough to keep on fighting against Russian expansion.
This is nonsense again. And I really mean it. What is “basic weapons and ammunition”? If they lose intel, HIMARS, and air defense and only these three things, they will not be able to keep fighting (rather meaningfully resisting) for an extended period of time. Again, this is reality.
Trump makes a mistake by thinking that Ukraine will collapse immediately if he cuts weapon supplies.
I don’t think this is the case. In fact, he said that Ukraine (well, he said Zelensky) can fight for three years and then lose the entire country. You are making way too many assumptions about what others think or say even. In my opinion, they will not last three years without the American support. Something else people do not seem to be paying attention to: even if the US allows purchases of the American AD interceptors and other missiles, equipment, etc in order to supply Ukraine, none of that stuff will be delivered until years from now because that is where we are today. It’s like trying to find masks, gloves, and hand sanitizer during covid, but worse.
He also makes a mistake by over estimating the power of Russia.
Does he though? You are making assumptions again. We don’t really know what he thinks of Russia. To me, his approach is pretty clear. He is probably wrong and won’t achieve what he is looking to achieve, but I hardly doubt he has much illusion about the “power of Russia”. We can discuss it in much greater detail if you like.
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