LOS ANGELES (OC).–Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko pleaded for a negotiated solution to the Ukraine War, careful not to step on 47-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky’s toes while he’s posturing before 79-year-old President Donald Trump meets in Alaska for a summit Aug. 15. Putin’s long-awaited meeting with Trump looks to put a pause on the air war in Ukraine, so both sides can do the hard work to bring about a permanent peace deal. For three-and-a-half years, Ukraine and Russia have battled each other with Putin taking some 25% of Ukraine’s best sovereign territory. Zelensky talks like he can keep the war going indefinitely as long as the U.S. or European Union pays for it. Klitschko is clearly heir apparent to become the next Ukrainian president, when Zelensky gets ousted for making disastrous decisions for the last three-and-a-half years. Trump wants Zelensky to compromise.
When it comes to negotiating a final settlement, Zelensky says it violates the Ukrainian Constitution to cede land to a foreign power. So, he admits that since Russia has occupied Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea for the last 11 years, he and his predecessor, Petro Poroshenko, have violated the Constitution. Zelensky makes every excuse under the sun why he cannot negotiate an end to the war, hoping the EU gives him a blank check. French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer all say that Zelensky must decide what his country is prepared to do in any peace deal. Zelensky has already grumbled that he’s not included in Trump upcoming summit with Putin, even though it’s inappropriate for him to be there. Trump wants Putin to agree to a pause in the air war so both sides can work toward a permanent peace.
Klitschko walks a fine line agreeing with Trump that in any final settlement there must be land swaps of some kind. Trump wants Putin to make his own concession on territory seized over the last three-and-a-half years. When the war started Feb. 24, 2022, Putin offered Zelensky to end the conflict if he recognized the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk and Russian sovereignty over Crimea. Putin seized Crimea March 1, 2014 when a CIA-backd, pro-Western coup toppled the Kremlin-backed Kiev government of Viktor Yanukovych. Putin hosted the Sochi Winter Olympics at the time, fearing that the coup threatened his Sevastopol, Crimea naval base. So, when Zelensky came to power May 20, 2019, Putin had considerable forces in Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea. Zelensky wants all Russian forces out of Ukraine but it’s not going to happen anytime soon.
Trump has a practical approach to deal making, knowing that Putin has most the cards in any negotiation since he’s essentially won the war over the last three-and-a-half years. Zelensky resents Trump for seeking improved diplomatic relations with the Kremlin, something different that former President Joe Biden. Biden treated Putin as an enemy, giving Zelensky a blank check when it came to his government and funding war with the Kremlin. Trump ran in 2024 on a platform to end the war at the earliest possible time. Trump does not believe no matter how much cash-and-arms Zelensky receieves, he can vanquish the Russian Federation. When Trump met Zelensky in the Oval Office Feb. 28, he urged him in the strongest possible terms to cut his losses, compromise and end the war. Zelensky threw a fit and was asked to leave the Oval office.
Klitscho is the closest high-ranking Ukrainian official to call for diplomacy and negotiation. He says Zelensky has some “difficult decisions” but hoped he would let diplomacy prevail instead of the status quo. “Some people will never be willing to cede part of the country to Russia,” Klitschko said but hoped logic and common sense would prevail. Zelensky, for his part, vacillates between accepting Trump’s role as mediator in the conflict and admonishing him for not including him in the upcoming summit. “The President of the United States has the levers and the determination,” Zelensky said in a video address. What he’s referring to is anyone’s guess. Zelensky wants Trump to push Putin around, something so unrealistic, so preposterous that it makes no sense. Trump hosts a summit with Putin to honor Zelensky’s requests to stop the air war.
Trump’s meeting with Putin promises to put all the pressure on Zelensky to do something now that he’ll have a pause in the air war. Zelensky doesn’t know what to say about ending the Ukraine War. “Ukraine as supported all of President Trump’s proposals, starting back in February,” Zelensky said. So, why did Zelensky throw a fit in the Oval Office Feb. 28? Did Zelensky support Trump running to Macron, Merz and Starmer, telling them that Trump was trying to sell Ukraine a raw deal? Zelensky doesn’t support Trump’s idea of trading land-for-peace, swapping parts of Ukraine now under Russian control, to return back to Ukraine. Zelensky doesn’t know what to do now that he’ll be faced, as Klitskcho points out, with some “difficult decisions,” largely to bargain with Putin to get as much sovereign land back and, at the same time, end the war.
About the Author John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation C
