What we learned about the prospects for peace in Ukraine at the Munich Security Conference

These talks have noticeably intensified since the election of Donald Trump as US President, and after the telephone conversation between the American leader and Russian President Vladimir Putin last week, peace talks, which have not yet begun, have become the main topic in the world media.

However, from the content of the panel discussions and discussions on the sidelines of the Munich Conference, it can be concluded that on the path not only to peace, but also to the start of full-fledged peace negotiations, there are still many obstacles.

And it is not at all a fact that they will be overcome only thanks to the zeal of the US administration headed by Donald Trump himself, which has set itself a strict timeframe for ending the war in Ukraine.

 

 

Perhaps the main fear of the Ukrainian – and not only Ukrainian – participants in the Munich Conference before its start was that they would be presented with some ready-made plan by Donald Trump to end the war in Ukraine at this event. For example, on the eve of the opening of the conference, as Bloomberg reported, citing its sources.

Since the US administration did not conduct any substantive consultations regarding this plan either with Kiev or with the Europeans, such a “Trump plan” could only have been prepared based on the results of the US president’s consultations with the Russian leader. And this would mean that the final document could contain provisions that would, to put it mildly, disappoint Kiev and its European partners.

In fact, it turned out that the Americans do not have a single plan, but there is, as one of the members of the Ukrainian delegation said in an interview with the BBC, “a cloud of ideas, parameters and plans that sometimes contradict each other and are put forward by different people with varying degrees of closeness to Trump.”

 

Keith Kellogg, the US President's special envoy for Russia and Ukraine, explained that work on this plan is currently underway. Moreover, his participation in the Munich Conference is also part of this work. According to Kellogg, the plan is being prepared in several directions. He himself is responsible for the Ukrainian track and the track of work with European allies. Donald Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, who flew to Moscow the other day, is engaged in the Russian track. Kellogg and Witkoff are working simultaneously and in parallel - "so that the work goes faster."

 

After completing the preparatory part of their mission, they should share their findings with the president and, based on them, develop the framework of the Trump plan, with the help of which the American president will probably end the war in Ukraine.

This preparation, as it now seems, continues in a rather chaotic mode. This is evidenced, for example, by the contradictory comments of representatives of members of the American administration about how peace will be achieved. Or the loud statement of Donald Trump himself, who announced that on the opening day of the Munich Conference, thanks to the efforts of the Americans, the first meeting of the Ukrainian and Russian delegations on their side since 2022 would be held.

In fact, it turned out that there was not a single participant at the Conference, even remotely related to the current Russian government, and the reason for this strange statement by Trump remained unknown.

In Munich, Keith Kellogg described the principles on which the American approach to the peace process will be based using the most general phrases, and to more specific questions such as what security guarantees Washington offers to Ukraine, he responded in the style: "Only President Donald Trump can make this decision."

 

 

The discussions in Munich showed that the US and Ukraine may have different definitions of the ultimate goal of the peace process. That is, representatives of the US administration would, of course, like their efforts to end with the establishment of a stable and lasting peace in Ukraine.

 

But, judging by the statements of the same Secretary of State Marco Rubio, they assume that the stated goal will have to be achieved in stages, and the first step on this path will be a ceasefire on the current front line.

On the other hand, Ukraine is convinced that a pause in hostilities that is not ensured by any additional measures will play into Russia's hands, and therefore Zelensky has no intention of agreeing to a "simple" ceasefire without resolving the remaining important issues of a peaceful solution - primarily, in terms of security guarantees. Many European partners support him in this.

 

"What do you do as a military medic [with a wounded person]? You stop the bleeding and only then work on the shock. Now we are trying to stop the bleeding, and then we will deal with the shock," metaphorically explained the logic of the US administration by Keith Kellogg.

The benefit of a "just" ceasefire for the US administration is obvious: it would allow to demonstrate a quick result of the settlement. And for the Trump team, speed is clearly a priority: contrary to campaign promises, the new US president failed to achieve peace in Ukraine in the first 24 hours of his term, but now, according to Bloomberg sources, the White House wants to achieve a ceasefire by Easter, that is, from April 20.

European leaders warn of the dangers of this approach.

"If such a pragmatic approach of the US administration ends with a ceasefire, turning, unfortunately, into a comparison of the Minsk agreements, it will become a frozen conflict... If this becomes reality, it will be a defeat, and not only for Ukraine. It will be a defeat for the entire international community and everything we stand for," said Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković.

"I don't believe that Russia wants to stop. I haven't seen any signs of that... In my opinion, there is a big risk that something that looks good on paper will give Russia an opportunity to mobilize and continue the war. Maybe in Ukraine, maybe somewhere else," Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said, agreeing with him.

Volodymyr Zelensky spoke with similar rhetoric in Munich. It follows from his words that the pause in hostilities will only help Vladimir Putin to prepare 15 new divisions of the Russian army, which, according to the Ukrainian president, will be deployed in Belarus allegedly for training. From there, Zelensky continued, these troops can attack Poland or the Baltic states already this summer.

 

Who is at the table?

 

Probably the most heated issue in Munich during the discussion of a potential peace process was who exactly should participate in it.

The reason for the misunderstandings in this regard is quite clear: the current stage of resolving the war in Ukraine was provoked by the call of US President Vladimir Putin. After that, Donald Trump informed the world that the Russian president wants to end the war as soon as possible.

The White House host did not warn anyone in advance about this telephone conversation with the Russian leader, and Western leaders and Volodymyr Zelensky probably only have a general idea of the details of this conversation. Therefore, it is quite logical to assume that Donald Trump will conduct future negotiations on ending the war through his boss Zelensky and the Europeans, who will learn about the very fact of these negotiations after they are completed.

In any case, even on the eve of Munich, theses about the inadmissibility of negotiations with Putin behind their backs have become commonplace in the comments of European politicians. And Volodymyr Zelensky has directly stated several times that Ukraine will not accept any peace agreement created without its participation.

In Munich, Keith Kellogg tried to dispel these fears of his partners - but only partially.

 

According to his logic, the negotiations to end the war should involve the warring parties - the Ukrainians and the Russians - and mediators: this is how Kellogg describes his country's role.

Will there be a place at the negotiating table for the Europeans? Trump's envoy answers philosophically: depending on what exactly we consider a table. Kellogg said that his mission during his current stay in Europe is to communicate with as many local leaders as possible. Trump's envoy must convince them that America will protect their interests during the negotiations and that in this sense Europe will be represented at the table.

And expanding the circle of negotiators with the help of the Europeans is unproductive and ineffective, Kellogg said:

"We definitely do not want large group discussions... Pay attention: you will not find any monument to the working group, monuments are erected only to the leaders." European politicians sharply criticize this approach - at least because, according to the stated position of the US administration, Washington sees its role in resolving the conflict in Ukraine as concluding some kind of agreement with Russia, and Europe's mission will be to guarantee its implementation.

"It is difficult to expect Europe to take on obligations in the development of which it did not participate," German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius diplomatically commented on the situation.

 

He also questioned the effectiveness of the negotiating strategy chosen by the Americans in the dialogue with Moscow. Perhaps, Pistorius said, the statements that Ukraine would not become a member of NATO as a result of the peace agreement or that it would not return to the 1991 borders, made by representatives of the Trump team even before the start of the negotiations, weakened the position of the United States, and therefore the position of the entire Western world, not to mention Kiev.

Other politicians recalled that it is Europe that should take on the main financial burden of strengthening Ukraine's defense capabilities and reconstruction after the end of active hostilities, and that only for this reason should it influence the content of the peace agreement.

"We must be in the negotiating room, because we will deal with their consequences. Negotiations are just empty words if there is no money on the table, and we will put money on the table," said Lithuanian Defense Minister Dovile Šakalene.

On the other hand, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, who many call one of the European politicians Donald Trump can listen to, called on his colleagues not to complain about not being invited to participate in the negotiations, but to develop concrete proposals that could be put forward at those negotiations.

Moreover, it seems that it is the Americans themselves who are giving Europe such an opportunity. Reuters reported that Washington sent a "questionnaire" to EU countries regarding their possible contribution to security guarantees for Ukraine. One of the six questions in this questionnaire concerned the readiness of these countries to send their military contingent to Ukraine and its size.

It is likely that this questionnaire referred to the remark made by Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Stenergard to Keith Kellogg at the “Ukrainian Lunch” organized by the Viktor Pinchuk Foundation on the sidelines of the Munich Conference: “I understand that you now expect us to answer the question of whether we can send soldiers “into the field” after establishing some kind of peace in Ukraine, but to answer that, we certainly need to be at the negotiating table.”

 

Willingness to compromise

 

Even at the current stage, when politicians are discussing only the basic parameters of the peace talks in Ukraine, Kiev is showing its readiness to make maximum compromises in this process. At the same time, it sometimes deviates from the “red lines” that it declared inviolable at the initial stage of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

“We are ready for any structure that would stop Putin,” Volodymyr Zelensky said about this.

Addressing reporters on the first day of the Munich conference, he noted that the only such “red line” is the legal recognition of the loss of its territories.

On the other hand, not everything is so clear here either.

“I think there will be an agreement on the potential loss of [Ukrainian] territory. But listen, you don’t have to admit it,” Keith Kellogg said in an interview with Fox News last week.

And already in Munich, he recalled the experience of post-war German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, who dreamed of unifying his country, but was forced to play the long game, and the experience of the Baltic states, whose legality of joining the Soviet Union was never recognized by the United States.

As for another fundamental demand of Kiev for the peace process – granting Ukraine membership in NATO – things are also not easy. On the one hand, Zelensky declares that he “will not remove the issue of NATO membership from the negotiating table”. On the other hand, he states that “today America and Trump are not ready to talk about us in NATO”, and therefore calls “building NATO in Ukraine” an alternative to inviting Ukraine to the North Atlantic Alliance.

 

Namely, it follows from his words that in order not to be afraid of a new Russian invasion, Ukraine should increase its army to one and a half million people and equip it with modern Western weapons. In particular, the President of Ukraine says that the Armed Forces should have at their disposal 150-160 F-16 bombers and more than 25 Patriot air defense systems.

The presence of such an army, it follows from Zelensky's words, would actually remove from the discussion the potentially problematic issue of placing a foreign military contingent in Ukraine. In such a scenario, Zelensky would see Western countries as Ukraine's allies, primarily the United States, which, it should be understood, would provide financial assistance and material support to this powerful army.

 

In this context, many observers draw attention to a certain discrepancy: although representatives of the US administration state that the path to a peaceful solution in Ukraine lies through concessions from both sides of the conflict, they say very little about the concessions that Russia could make during such negotiations.

Keith Kellogg was asked this question during one of the panel discussions in Munich. He suggested that it could be about certain "territorial concessions", political statements about refusing to use force, as well as about reducing the size of the Russian army - "we will try to force them to do that". However, it is worth noting that Donald Trump's envoy answered this question very uncertainly.

 

It's just getting started

 

Although many people said before the Munich conference that the war in Ukraine would be the main topic of the event, there was no progress in the discussion of a peaceful solution. And this, according to the BBC's interlocutor in the Ukrainian delegation, is quite good for Kiev, because they are convinced that any solution that could be reached quickly would hardly suit Ukrainian interests.

 

The second thing is that now the developments on the peace path will most likely accelerate significantly. This week alone will see significant events for the peace process in various parts of the world.

On Monday, February 17, the leaders of European countries will gather in Paris for an emergency security summit convened by French President Emmanuel Macron.

 

The first result of this meeting, even before it began, was the statement of the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Keir Starmer, about his readiness to send British military personnel to Ukraine, if necessary, to ensure the implementation of the peace agreement. It is possible that other countries participating in the event will present similar initiatives at the meeting in Paris. Other steps can be expected from the summit that will demonstrate Europe's readiness to take its own security seriously in the face of the United States' withdrawal from the role of security guarantor on the Old Continent. Volodymyr Zelensky immediately arrived from Munich on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates, from where, according to a long-approved plan, he should go to Saudi Arabia. The piquancy of the situation lies in the fact that on Tuesday the first negotiations between representatives of Russia and the United States since 2022 will be held in this country. Volodymyr Zelensky said in Munich that he does not plan to meet with either the Russians or the Americans during his tour. Representatives of European countries have not been invited to these negotiations either.

 

This week (the exact date has not yet been specified, but Ukrainian media, citing sources, reported on February 20) US President's envoy Keith Kellogg will arrive in Kiev. After communicating with representatives of the Ukrainian authorities, he will probably be ready to present his findings regarding the US strategy for a peaceful solution in Ukraine to Donald Trump.

Finally, in his speech at the Munich Conference, Volodymyr Zelensky said that on February 24, on the anniversary of the beginning of Russia's full-scale aggression against Ukraine, he would convene a meeting of Ukraine's allies.

"We are working to ensure that on February 24... we can gather in Kiev live and online. All European leaders. All key partners who protect our security. From Spain to Finland. From Great Britain to Poland. From Washington to Tokyo. This meeting should provide a clear vision of our next steps in terms of peace, security guarantees and the future of our common policy," Zelensky said.

The list of participants of this meeting and its agenda are currently unknown.