Ukrainians have withstood their hardest winter of the war and are still standing, both willing and able to keep fighting. During a visit to Kyiv last week for the Yalta European Strategy (YES) Conference, timed to the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion, and in several days of talks with officials and civilians, it was clear that Ukrainians are determined to continue their fight for national survival and will not give up, even after their suffering this winter. My colleagues and I from the Atlantic Council heard from senior Ukrainian political leaders, soldiers, and entrepreneurs, all offering sound reasons for continuing to fight, even as they work with the United States and European leaders on a sustainable, negotiated end to the war.
Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure have reduced the country’s electric power production by about 80 percent, one official told me. That has meant rolling blackouts throughout the country and other forms of electricity rationing, and we heard stories of families in icy apartment buildings. But life in wartime Kyiv was going on, with traffic, restaurants open, food stores with food in them, and generators humming to make up for some of the shortfalls of the electricity grid. With temperatures rising, Ukrainians — officials, soldiers, and civilians — kept referring to the past winter as something that they had survived. Kyiv’s electric trollies resumed running while I was there, and heat was coming back online.
The stalemate on the battlefield continues. But senior Ukrainians in a position to know as well as soldiers — senior and otherwise — and experienced Ukrainians out of government expressed confidence that the stalemate works to their advantage, not Russia’s: “a good sign” said one of the most senior Ukrainians. Russia is still attacking, seeking to capture the whole of Donetsk Province. So far, they have failed. The ruined city of Pokrovsk is mostly in Russian hands, Kupiansk less so, and other cities are being fought for. But the Russians have been unable to mount any breakthroughs, and over the past weeks Ukrainian counterattacks have had some local success as well, liberating between 200-300 square kilometers (about 125-180 square miles), senior sources said. Elon Musk’s decision to turn off Russian access to Starlink has helped, some said. And, Ukrainian officers pointed out with satisfaction, the Russian-to-Ukrainian casualty ratio vastly favors Ukraine and has been moving in a better direction. Russian casualties, Ukrainians said, were now running at 30,000 per month and climbing.
Advances on Drones
The battle front is partly trench warfare but more and more dominated by drones, and the Ukrainians have made impressive advances in mastering an effective drone cycle — R&D/production/battlefield deployment/assessment/& more R&D — that may outshine anything in the West and probably beats the Russians. It’s not just the technology but the whole system of rapid response that is making the difference. The Ukrainian drone masters — some career military, but often outsiders both in uniform and civilians — said they were eager to work with Westerners but, with some exceptions, found that Western officials were still stuck in “drone tourism”: showing up, having a meeting and then showing up again in a few months to ask the same questions. Referring to drone development, one very young Ukrainian civilian who looked more like a Silicon Valley engineer/hipster than a defense industry bureaucrat said, “You [meaning: the West] had better learn fast.” He had been embedded since the start of the big invasion with a military unit, keeping the Ukrainian drone advantage real.
The determination of Ukrainians to fight on is neither empty bravado nor mere elan running on fumes. They are past being dismayed about the cutback in U.S. government assistance and the long difficulties the European Union has in getting money for Ukraine out the door. They expect that support will continue in some form and are acutely aware of Russia’s battlefield difficulties and economic vulnerabilities. They kept saying that they can fight on.
The Ukrainians are also serious about a negotiated solution to the war. They don’t trust Russian President Vladimir Putin’s promises and insist that he doesn’t merely want this or that province but wants Russia to dominate all of Ukraine. But they also take the negotiations seriously not because they think Putin wants to end the war but because they think the United States does.
The State of the Talks
At the end of the YES Conference in Kyiv, U.S. negotiator Steve Witkoff addressed the attendees via video, outlining in general terms the state of the negotiations. He emphasized that “strong security protocols” for Ukraine have been drafted, including with the input of NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander, U.S. General Alexus Grynkewich. These, Witkoff said, could include an “Article 5-like treaty with Ukraine” (referring to the mutual defense clause of NATO’s North Atlantic Treaty). Witkoff added that progress has been made on important implementation issues for an agreement, and that various creative ideas about territory were being discussed.
Well-informed Ukrainian sources later confirmed essentials of Witkoff’s points, which have been echoed by other Europeans in the know and occasionally by U.S. sources. The major issues for a settlement have always been security for Ukraine and the location of the ceasefire line (or demilitarized zone). The talks so far indicate that post-conflict security for Ukraine would start with international monitoring along whatever line of contact (or zone) is established. The United States would play an active role in that monitoring, probably through remote means. The critical factor for the success of monitoring, Ukrainians stressed, would be who plays the role of “adjudicator” — the person or group with a mandate and will to call out violations in unambiguous language in real time — and that has yet to be nailed down.
Under the texts drafted between the United States and Ukraine, and between Ukraine with key Europeans, dealing with potential new Russian incursions after a ceasefire or peace deal is reached — or even yet another Russian invasion of Ukraine — would be the task in the first place by Ukrainians themselves. Ukrainians told us they accept that and believe the agreed upper limit of Ukrainian forces of 800,000 is large enough. The Ukrainians would not stand alone. Forces from the French-British led Coalition of the Willing would back up the Ukrainians, and U.S. forces would back up the Europeans, probably mostly with air power. The details had been outlined in documents already drafted that Ukrainians characterized as “powerful.”
Ukrainian interlocutors thought these arrangements could work and were impressed with the U.S. input to the security planning. Contingents of French or British forces on the ground in the right place could act as a deterrent to Russian attacks, they added. But the Russians, they said, remained obdurate that no European forces could be present in Ukraine, and without the Europeans on the ground, the U.S. backup would not materialize. The Russians were thus blocking the security arrangements that were essential to ending the conflict.
Hardline Russian Negotiating Positions
That’s one problem. The second obstacle to concluding a peace deal is the hardline Russian position on territory — that Ukraine must withdraw from the entirety of Donetsk Province, including the fortified line of cities that block Russian advances to the West. The Ukrainians will not surrender territory that the Russians have been unable to take in four years of war. The Ukrainians could, they say, consider a wider demilitarized zone, but that would have to involve reciprocal pullbacks of Russian and Ukrainian forces and insertion of international/U.S. monitors sufficient to maintain respect of the ceasefire line. And that zone would have to remain under Ukrainian civil administration.
The Russians were holding fast to their territorial demands, promising their Ukrainian interlocutors all sorts of wonderful things that could happen if only Ukraine surrendered the rest of Donetsk Province. Ukrainians said they didn’t take such happy talk seriously but regarded it as a sign that Russia’s demand for more territory had outstripped Russia’s power to achieve it militarily so that they have fallen to blandishments.
Witkoff has often been criticized for saying that an agreement is within reach. But he is right: the outline of a deal has taken shape and much of the detailed work to flesh it out is done. The Ukrainians have been playing ball. The major obstacles include the Kremlin’s insistence on being awarded territory that Russia has not and may never gain on the battlefield, and its insistence that no European forces be in Ukraine to act as a deterrent and as backup to Ukrainian forces. That latter demand is a whopper given Russia’s spectacular failure to observe its previous promise to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity in exchange for Ukraine giving its Soviet-legacy nuclear weapons (in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum signed by the U.S., the U.K., Ukraine, and Russia).
Russia is asking too much: failing to prevail in battle, it apparently expects the United States to help it finish the job by pressuring Ukraine to accept surrender of territory and weak security.
If the Trump administration wants a deal by July 4th, as it has reportedly told European counterparts most recently (after previously setting one for June), it might be better advised to use its existing leverage on Russia rather than on Ukraine. This may be underway. The United States and France have already seized at least three shadow fleet oil tankers serving Russia, and on February 28 Belgium said its special forces had seized another in the North Sea, apparently with France’s help. The United States and willing Europeans could seize more. The U.S. and Europe also could impose secondary sanctions on countries that purchase Russian oil (perhaps with carve-outs for reductions of purchases), enforce technology transfers going through third countries, and hit Russia with a general financial embargo (with exceptions for medicine, food, and selected other items). Such actions and more, and maybe even private warnings, could capture the Kremlin’s attention in a new way. So would provision of additional, high-end weapons such as Tomahawk missiles, though these may be in shorter supply due to U.S. military operations against Iran.
There is no guarantee that Russia will agree to the settlement that Witkoff is brokering. But we won’t know unless the United States (with Europe) uses the available tools of pressure. The Ukrainians have withstood the Russian onslaught and, thanks to Europe, have managed despite the reduction of U.S. military assistance. Putin’s ritual condemnation of U.S. action against Iran may – and hopefully will — convince President Donald Trump, at last, that Putin is hostile to the United States. Whether Putin can withstand the United States using its available leverage on him is well worth testing. If Trump uses that leverage seriously, he might just end the Russia-Ukraine War on sustainable terms.
