ROCKY ROAD TO A ‘PEACE DEAL’

The new US Administration has started the ball rolling. Special Emissary to Ukraine, Ambassador Keith Kellog, has been given 100 days – the end of April – to resolve the war. After that choices will have to be made as to how the US proceeds. I don’t believe for a second Putin thinks it can all be done and dusted by Easter, and I don’t think he wants to resolve it by then anyway. Too many of his inner circle and those close to the Kremlin seriously believe that they are now in the best position they have ever been in militarily, but the red alert of economic malfunctions are ringing in everyones ears.

Internally, Russia doesn’t believe it can win the war by the spring, but it thinks it can make sufficient breakthroughs that it will have forced the issue by the autumn – it believes Ukraine cannot survive another winter of war and it will sue for peace come late September.

Because of who occupies the White House now, there is inevitably, always going to be positive and negative comment over what is said and the way it’s been said. Likewise the way it’s reported can get more than a little emotional. We need to set that aside and look at what is really being said rather than what is spoken for the masses to spit feathers over, good or bad.

1). Ambassador Kellog has been given 100 days to get a deal – nobody is looking to blame him if he doesn’t. What he will come back with is that Ukraine has been doing everything it can that’s reasonable to achieve it, and that the Russians either have embraced it fully (which I doubt), they’re playing for time (which is most likely), or they’re just not being reasonable. As long as Ukraine looks like it’s being completely above board and reasonable it will stay on the right side of the President. Putin on the other hand will not, in the end, play ball, and the US president knows Putin has a weak hand.

There’s all sorts of reasons Putin won’t agree – he sees the war as good as won now, despite the private naysayers who doubt him but don’t have the balls to challenge him over it. His recent same day as the inauguration teleconference with Xi, where they announced the ‘intensification’ of their alliance was pointed in the extreme. It was designed to emphasize to the Americans that they are not the only decision making centre now, the new world order is Chinese and Russian as much as it is American. It is a multi-polar world and America’s ‘Golden Age’ whatever that is, means nothing beyond its own borders. To them the whole idea of renaming the Gulf of Mexico, grabbing the Panama Canal or Greenland is the sort of behavior they agree with. To them America is becoming more like them, not less. You would be forgiven for thinking they feel they see a fight as almost inevitable at some point.

2. Marco Rubio, former Senator and now Secretary of State, was confirmed by the Senate 99-0 (he can’t cast a ballot in his own favor and had to resign his seat, which will be filled by a Florida Governor de Santis appointee until the next election cycle in November 2026.

Rubio’s first big television interview shows you how careful we have to be when hearing and seeing what has been said. Social media cut it up in away that was surprisingly negative. The reality of the full interview was surprising.

Firstly, he accepted Russia started the war. Secondly, he was clear that it had to end and that this was now official policy. Thirdly he made it clear that the US would use the carrot and stick approach. Talk now, Russia, cut a deal that’s meaningful and end the war. If not, then far harsher sanctions and penalties would follow.

3. There has even been talk that the concept of the Lend-Lease agreements will be ramped up. There will not be anymore aid to Ukraine Biden style. Instead, if Russia doesn’t come to the table, the US will create a situation of open credit – where Ukraine can buy with US loans, whatever it needs and have it delivered for as long as it takes. This works brilliantly for the US, as it props up the defense industrial base, gives Ukraine what it needs to win – actually win – the war. Afterwards Ukraine either buys outright through repayment what its used or gives some of it back. As potential collateral it will in effect mortgage off its resources with preferential deals for US companies. This type of deal is one that suits the new administration’s transactional profile.

4. There has already been suggestion that the US, in the short term will continue to support Ukraine with ammunition. There has been no termination of cooperation with the Ukrainian military on intelligence or otherwise, and that doesn’t seem to be something that’s intended.

5. Zelensky understands exactly what he has to do. He must keep the administration on side. He has to state what he thinks is right and what Russia needs to do – namely withdraw, but the Americans wont penalize him for saying that – unless it gets in the way of ending the fighting.

Zelensky has offered in the past to put Ukrainian resources up for effective mortgage to get the material to end the war favorably. He has even offered the Americans the option to use Ukraine as its military policeman – with its huge army as part of the peace deal securing Europe while America is occupied elsewhere.

Zelensky knows he simply has to keep the US president on-side and clearly the White House sees it that way. “Zelensky’s told me he wants a peace deal, that means it’s up to Russia”. As long as the Americans see it that way and know who is to blame for it not happening – that it is undoubtedly Putin’s fault no deal happens, then Ukraine is on a home run.

6. Failure to negotiate a deal for Putin will be a risk of huge proportions. He will have to be convinced in his own mind, that Russian victory is just down the road, in the fullest and most compete sense of the word. The problem with that is the temptation to go for it after everything he has put Russia through, is nigh on overwhelming. How can he back away from it now?

Even so there will be that gnawing doubt that those imbued with absolute power always have, quietly praying on his mind, that if he fails he is most surely setting up Russia for a terrible fall that will include his termination as President. But the ‘eye on the prize’ mentality, when its so apparently tantalizingly close, its too much to ignore.

He will not just steam ahead. He will see what’s on offer first, and if he can gain more from that than he expects to win fighting he will go with it. A lot of that will depend on how bad the economy really is at the point he has to make an irrevocable decision.

7. If Putin chooses not to take the route to peace, then the Americans are more than happy to ramp up the already punishing sanctions on the oil industry and shipping, spreading their tentacles deeper into payment systems and transaction methods of the sanctions busters. They’re already causing China and India to baulk at taking delivery of Russian oil shipped on grey tankers. That should have happened far sooner.

There are dozens of ways the US could make life difficult for the traders and smugglers taking contraband into Russia. Western industries know that they’ve seen ludicrous spikes in orders for key equipment and vehicles going to the UAE, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan to name the worst. That can be stopped.

8. Ukraine itself has a role to play and it is already doing so. Its strategic drone and missile attacks on the oil, electronics and military industrial facilities are ramping up every day. More and more strikes on the entire oil and gas infrastructure are decimating the Russian military capabilities in resupply and mobility. Russian domestic fuel production is its lowest in years and its most expensive. There’s no money to repair the damage and even if they did it would just get destroyed again. The pressure on the military support systems feeds through slowly and is only tangible when it reaches the front. Yet it does – and Russian behavior and the way they attack – or don’t attack at all – soon becomes very telling.

If Ukraine were to become the beneficiary of a full-scale ‘Lend-Lease deal until victory’, Russia is in no position to compete. Just as Russia is reaching the high tide of its advances – as so often in the past in many wars, it has exhausted itself doing so. It’s all down hill from here.

9. What we must watch for is that the negotiating positions aren’t used to build up an offensive capability on the Russian side, while Ukraine gets nothing. Putin must know that if he he makes the US president appear like a fool after he has offered Putin peace, the gloves are off. North Korean troops increasing in number – especially if they enter Ukraine which they have very noticeably not yet done, will be another marker of bad intent. Putin must tread carefully if he’s going to seek a deal – and if he is not. If he gets this even slightly wrong, it’s all over. His window of opportunity has lasted three years and he’s screwed it up. As the window starts to close – and it’s gaining momentum day by day, his options narrow.

10. The ball is in the Americans court, it is theirs to play. Do they understand this is a once in a lifetime opportunity? -The President must see that, he long coveted the Nobel Peace Prize because Obama had one. Russia is weak – Putin is weak and the President knows it, making it quite clear that the war was clearly far from won after three years. He knows Putin is in the worst position regardless of how much land he occupies.

Putin must be looking over his shoulder as the economy spins ever more out of control, his ego is already interfering in seriously vital interest rate decisions. Once you start tampering here and influencing there, you have no idea what you might cause to happen. He must know that another round of harsh sanctions and biting financial restrictions – especially on the energy sector – can bring the whole economy down.

We have seen it all before. The Soviet Union collapsed because of the strain of the war in Afghanistan, the humiliation of retreat, the abuse of veterans, the infrastructure failure and systematic state cover ups over Chernobyl, economic hardships and as much as anything the failure of the system to deliver what it had for decades promised. Putin is delivering nothing but economic pain and military failure. What have Russians really gained?

The Americans are offering an off-ramp, he can grasp it and try and get the best from it, or he play for time and his mythical chimera of a victory. Will his pride and ego override his common sense? Will the need to establish his legacy – Russian imperialism and the proof that we live in a multipolar world Russia has a say in, be too much for him to ignore? I say yes. He’ll play the negotiating card of course, but it will be for time.

There can eventually only be one conclusion. Putin chose to live by the sword, he will surely end by the use of one. Someone else will have to pick up the pieces.

Ultimately Ukraine will be restored after it wins. I do believe that, and always have. They are in the right. They may come to see the American president in the way he would want to be seen. If it means Ukraine is restored, and a giant on the European stage that it deserves to be, then let the American president take all the credit he wants. A defeated Russia, a victorious Ukraine, a weakened and more cautious China, an enfeebled Iran, with Kim in The North put back in his box. Could there be a better ending to this chapter of the first quarter of the 21st Century? Now all we have to do is make it happen.

The Analyst

MilitaryAnalyst.bsky.social