LOS ANGELES.–Ukraine’s 46-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky offers a new fake peace plan before pressure mounts to end the conflict with Russian Federation. Zelensky hopes to push 81-year-old President Joe Biden to adopt his new plan, only months before Biden finishes his term in office. Zelensky’s last proposal in Nov. 2022 called for 71-year-old Russian President Vladimir Putin to be prosecuted for war crimes in The Hague’s International Criminal Court. Zelensky also called for Russia to pay war reparations to Ukraine and to remove all troops from Russian territory, including the Crimean Peninsula. Offering his 10-point plan in 2020 was a non-starter from the beginning, because it ignored Russian demands that Ukraine not be fast-tracked to NATO membership, something still pushed today by Zelensky. Zelensky wants to keep the U.S. cash flowing into Kiev.
Zelensky sees a hobbled Biden on whom to prey before he’s no longer in the picture after the Nov. 5 presidential election. If Vice President Kamala Harris gets elected, it should mean a continuation of the Biden policy of perpetual war with the Kremlin. Zelensky shows no compromise when it comes to ceding Ukraine’s sovereign territory to Moscow but knows no settlement can be reached on the Ukraine War without compromise. “One part of the plan that is already performed in the Kursk region,” Zelensky said, referring to the Aug. 6 Russian invasion where the Ukrainian military controls some 100 kilometers of Russian territory. “The second part is Ukraine strategic place in the world’s security infrastructure,” Zelensky said, still pushing for NATO membership. NATO’s 65-year-old Secretary-Gen. Jens Stoltenberg has denied Kiev fast-track members giving many excuses.
Zelensky doesn’t accept NATO’s excuses why Ukraine is not ready for membership. Zelensky says that Ukraine meets all of NATO’s requirements for membership except for the fact Ukraine is at war with the Russian Federation. NATO prohibits membership when any country is at war because it would trigger Article 5, requiring all NATO countries to join in the defense. NATO also rejected Ukraine for membership because they don’t meet the democracy element of holding free-and-fair elections. Zelensky suspended all elections due to martial law because of its war with the Kremlin. “The third part is a pressure package, powerful package to force Russia to end the war diplomatically,” referring to the U.N. demanding the Russia get out Ukraine. But Zelensky knows that China and India do not take the West’s position on conditions for ending the Ukraine War.
Zelensky’s new peace plan is no plan at all but a wish list to pressure Russia to get out of Ukraine. Russia defends Russian speaking enclaves in Ukraine’s Donbas region that wants no part of the pro-Western Kiev government. War in Donbas, specifically the Peoples Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, started in 2014 when a CIA-backed coup toppled the duly elected Kremlin-backed government of Viktor Yanukovych. Before Ukraine’s 1991 independence, Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, stationing its Black Sea fleet in Sevastopol, Crimea. Once the Feb. 22, 2014 took place, Putin annexed the Crimean Peninsula to assure safety of Russian naval assets in Crimea. Ukraine’s former President Petro Poroshenko could have offered the Kremlin a long-term lease in Crimea.
Zelensky wants to use the U.N. General Assembly in September to pressure Russia into signing on to his new peace plan. But like other past peace plans, they don’t take into account Russian battlefield gains in Ukraine. Zelensky wants all Russian troops out of Ukraine before he considers any peace plan. But Zelensky knows that his war with the Kremlin is wholly dependent on U.S. government largess. If Trump gets in office, Zelensky knows that he’s won’t get more U.S. funding unless he goes along with former President Donald Trump’s peace plan that won’t be too favorable to Kiev. Trump wants to end the war because it threatens world peace and global security. Zelensky wants to fight the Kremlin indefinitely until he forces Russia to surrender and get out of Ukraine.
Chances of Zelensky getting his way with Russia are slim and none. He operates under the illusion, maybe delusion, that because he currently operates in Russia territory, it’s going to last forever. Putin keeps hitting Zelensky’s infrastructure around Kiev and Kharkiv, two of Ukraine’s biggest cities, because Ukraine’s military currently operates in Russian territory. Zelensky can’t have in both ways, naming conditions for peace talks while, at the same time, continuing to invade Russian territory. Putin said recently he was ready for peace talks in Ukraine as long as they recognize facts on the ground, including Russia’s seized territories in Ukraine. Trump believes the Ukraine War threatens world peace and would end the war at the earliest possible time over Zelensky’s objections.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in the national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of DodgingThe Bullet and Operation Charisma.
