Turkish officials hosting ceasefire talks between Ukraine and Russia in Instanbul, led by Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, announced significant progress today in the evolving structure of a ceasefire and peace deal. Russia announced it is “fundamentally” scaling back military operations in outside Kiev in a good faith gesture to help spur Ukraine into making the concessions necessary to stop the 34-day war, started Feb. 24 when Russian President Vladimir Putin decided to invade. Putin had massed over 100,000 Russian troops on the Ukraine border, sending a loud message to the White House and NATO to cease-and-desist in arming Ukraine to the teeth with lethal weapons. Putin asked 79-year-old President Joe Biden to renegotiate security arrangement for Ukraine and Eastern Europe for over a month before the war started. Biden told Putin that his requests were “non-starters.”
In the run up to the Feb. 24 invasion, Biden was given plenty of advance notice that things in Ukraine could not continue to go on without risking a Russian invasion. Putin and his 72-year-old Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said many times that Ukraine threatened Russian national security, especially the U.S. and NATO arming of Ukraine. Ukraine’s 44-year-old President Volodymer Zelensky spent his three years in office from May 20, 2019 begging for NATO membership, something that provoked Putin. Putin asked Biden to assure that Ukraine would not join NATO, a clear red line for the Kremlin. Yet instead of sitting down a working out a deal, Biden and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said they could not stop Ukraine from applying for NATO membership without violating the NATO charter that has an open-door policy to extend membership to anyone seeking it.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken showed skepticism over new developments in Istanbul. “There is what Russia says and there is what Russia does, and we’re focused on the later,” Blinken said, who’s been one of the most belligerent White House voices making a bad situation wore. Blinken and 45-year-old National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, have said nothing good about Russia, accusing Putin of trying to takeover all of Europe. White House officials have excluded themselves from taking part in peace talks because they’ve funded the war and armed Ukraine for years with offensive weapons over Kremlin objections. So when Turkish President Recep Tayyp Erdogan, 68, decided to step in an broker a ceasefire, he had the confidence of Russian and Ukraine, both with friendly relations to Turkey. U.S.-Russian-relations hit rock bottom under Biden.
Deputy Defense Minister Alecander Fomin said things were different in Istanbul, after several failed ceasefire attempts in Belarus. “Negotiations on preparing an agreement on Ukraine’s neutrality and non-nuclear status, as well as on giving Ukraine Security guarantees, are turning to practical matters,” Fromin said, dealing with the most thorny issues, including the fate of Crimea and Donbass, where Russian-speaking separatists fought for their independence for the last eight years. In the emerging ceasefire agreement, the U.S., Britain, France, Turkey, China and Poland agreed to afford Ukraine security to prevent any future conflict with the Kremlin. Vladimir Mendinsky, who heads the Russian delegation, said Ukraine’s proposals are a “step to meet us halfway, a clearly positive fact.” Zelensky had been adamant about not agreeing to cede Russia any Ukrainian territory in Crimea or Donbass.
When you consider the role the U.S. played in provoking Putin into the Feb. 24 invasion, the Biden White House ignored any Putin’s attempts to avoid the conflict. Medinsky sees progress but it must be followed up with real concessions on both sides to complete the ceasefire agreement. “We know now how to move further toward compromise. We aren’t just marking time with talks,” Medinsky said, showing that Putin’s ready to end the conflict, not out of coercion but legitimate agreements by Ukraine to no longer threaten Russian national security. For the last month, Zelensky has showed no willingness to consider Putin’s conditions for a ceasefire, including (1) declaring neutrality, (2) recognizing the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk and (3) agreeing that Crimea is a part of Russia. On that issue, Putin’s willing to concede a long-term lease for his naval base in Sevastopol.
White House and Pentagon officials want to talk about Putin’s failure in the 34-day war to conquer Kiev in 48 hours. They tout Ukraine’s resistance against Russian forces when the Kremlin’s aim was always demilitarizing Ukraine, not installing a puppet government in Kiev. Only the Feb. 22, 2014 CIA-backed pro-Western coup was given the right to topple the Kremlin-friendly government of Viktor Yanukovych. When Putin invaded Crimea March 1, 2024 after the coup, it was to protect his Sevastopol naval base. Contrary to White House and press reports, Putin wasn’t aiming to replace Zelensky’s government, nor was he interested, as Zelensky said, to takeover the rest of Eastern Europe. Putin’s Ukraine War was about U.S. and NATO cutting a deal with Ukraine to arm the country with offensive and defensive weapons. Now that the Instanbul talks move forward, the White House is all sour grapes.
