Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday night that he was willing to cede territory to Russia to end the war for the first time on condition that Ukraine is admitted to NATO “fast”. The Mail has more.
In an interview with Sky News, the Ukrainian President suggested he was prepared to end the “hot phase” of the war in exchange for membership of the bloc.
He said if the Ukrainian territory he controls was taken “under the NATO umbrella”, he could return the rest, which is currently under Russian occupation, in a “diplomatic way”.
Zelensky has previously suggested that the war would not end until his country is returned to its internationally recognised borders.
“If we want to stop the hot phase of the war, we need to take under the NATO umbrella the territory of Ukraine that we have under our control,” Zelensky said.
“We need to do it fast. And then on the [occupied] territory of Ukraine, Ukraine can get them back in a diplomatic way.”
The Ukrainian leader was answering questions on what President-elect Donald Trump’s desire to end the war would mean for his country.
It has been reported that one of the Republican’s plans to achieve this would involve Kyiv ceding the land taken by Russia in exchange for Ukraine’s Nato membership.
Mr. Zelensky’s concessions follow a series of disappointments on the battlefield for Ukraine. Russia has taken six times as much Ukrainian territory in 2024 as it did last year.
And the pace of the Kremlin’s advances has forced Ukraine to send thousands of reservists to reinforce vulnerable areas in the east.
The Kremlin’s so-called ‘meat grinder’ tactics have resulted in Russia’s daily casualty figures breaking 2,000 for the first time, according to figures released on Friday.
Troops are ordered to charge at gunpoint towards Ukrainian defensive positions, leading to territorial gains but increasingly high losses through death, injury and fleeing from the frontline.
Zelensky’s comments also come after an alliance chief assured last month that Ukraine will become a NATO member in the future – but was unable to say when the country might join.
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte reiterated on October 17th that the war-torn nation’s place is among NATO’s ranks.
“Ukraine will be a member of NATO in the future,” Rutte said. “The question is exactly about the ‘when’. I cannot answer that now.”
Worth reading in full.
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This is a statesmanlike offer from the Ukrainian President.
President Trump will no doubt back it.
But what will Putin do?
You know the rest…..
Zelensky’s masters know damn well that Putin won’t accept Ukrainian membership of NATO, it’s a cynical gesture, the conflict will continue, you know the rest…
“statesmanlike”… Give me a break.
And no, I am not a fan of Putin either. Nor am I a fan of the hawks on our side.
It is what is called a ‘negotiating position’; opening bid.
Both Ukraine and the U.S. know Putin will not come to the negotiating table until it is made worth his while, one way or another.
Ukraine is, as any fule kno, not eligible for NATO membership while its borders are in dispute.
Who do you regard as ‘hawks’? I see only those trying and failing to live up to Britain’s security assurances given to Ukraine in 1994 in return for Ukraine’s surrender of its nuclear warheads.
Because we have failed in that regard, and because Ukraine cannot join NATO, that country’s emergence as yet another nuclear power (it already has ballistic missiles and plenty of uranium), unless good progress towards peace and firm security commitments backed up on the ground are made quickly, will be inevitable and extremely dangerous for the peace that you and so many others like you think that your ideas will expedite.
They will not.
And Russia’s “opening bid” will be unconditional surrender now, or be ground to rubble.
The U.S. already knows Russia’s position
‘Nato to remove any troops or weapons deployed to countries that entered the alliance after 1997, which would include much of eastern Europe, including Poland, the former Soviet countries of Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and the Balkan countries.
Russia has also demanded that Nato rule out further expansion, including the accession of Ukraine into the alliance, and that it does not hold drills without previous agreement from Russia in Ukraine, eastern Europe, in Caucasus countries such as Georgia or in Central Asia.
Those proposals are likely to be viewed extremely negatively by Nato countries, in particular Poland and the Baltic states. They have warned that Russia is attempting to re-establish a sphere of influence in the region and view the document as proof Moscow is seeking to limit their sovereignty.’
These demands are in breach of Russia’s OSCE commitments within the Helsinki Accord…..not to be taken seriously.
Putin is simply holding out for a major bribe…….
How about the USA allowing Russia to locate Russian military presence in Cuba as part of the deal? But what will Trump do? You know the rest….,,,
There is no chance of the Russians accepting Ukraine membership of NATO.
NATOs advance eastward has been a precipitating factor in this war. A factor that has been continually ignored in the West.
This war was provoked by the West and the young men of Ukraine and Russia pay the price.
The old men of Ukraine too; the pressganging of the 40 and 50 year olds and the disbled into the Ukrainian army has started to fail and they are now being pressed by the Americans to take youngsters too.
Or not really……
Recommended reading:
Intent to Destroy: Russia’s Two-Hundred-Year Quest to Dominate Ukraine
Eugene Finkel,9 2024
‘The full story of how and why Russia has tried to violently subjugate Ukraine across the centuries, and how Ukrainians have resisted. Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 shocked the world.
And yet, to Ukrainians, this attack was painfully familiar, the latest episode in a centuries-long Russian campaign to divide and oppress Ukraine.
In Intent to Destroy, political scientist Eugene Finkel uncovers these deep roots of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
Ukraine is a key borderland between Russia and the West, and, following the rise of Russian nationalism in the nineteenth century, dominating Ukraine became the cornerstone of Russian policy.
Russia has long used genocidal tactics–killings, deportations, starvation, and cultural destruction–to successfully crush Ukrainian efforts to chart an independent path.
As Finkel shows, today’s violence is simply a more extreme version of the Kremlin’s long-standing policy. But unlike in the past, the people of Ukraine–motivated by the rise of democracy in their nation–have overcome their deep internal divisions. For the first time, they have united in favor of independence from Russia.
Whatever the outcome of the present war, Ukraine’s staunch resistance has permanently altered its relationship to Russia and the West.
Intent to Destroy offers the vital context we need to truly understand Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II.’
Eugene Finkel is Kenneth H. Keller Professor of International Affairs at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
Two hundred years ago Russia had conquered Ukraine and it was Russian territory until 1991 – there was no “quest”.
If Russia still wanted Ukraine why agree to its independence?
Because at that time, in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union, and face of widespread calls for independence of the former components of the Soviet empire, there probably was no viable alternative for the new Russian leadership.
The Ukrainian war of independence, also referred to as the Ukrainian–Soviet War in Ukraine, lasted from March 1917 to November 1921 and was part of the wider Russian Civil War.
It saw the establishment and development of an independent Ukrainian republic, most of which was absorbed into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic between 1919 and 1920.
In 1922, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was one of four Soviet republics (with the Russian SFSR, the Byelorussian SSR, and the Transcaucasian SFSR) that signed the Treaty on the Creation of the Soviet Union.
Nothing to do with Russia.
Sounds like a good deal to me.
This duplicitous little sh** knows full well that it was the encroachment of NATO that has been one of Putin’s concerns since they (NATO) started their eastward move decades ago.
It is long past time for the Ukrainians to be asked to vote for a legitimate President to replace the current squatter.
“Zelensky Says He’ll Give up Ukrainian Territory to Russia to Achieve Peace”…. Or in other words, he lost, and it was a complete waste of a million lives, all those billions,and all that destruction..
Never mind, gave Monro something to get off on..
For reference, this is the deal on offer:
‘A formal U.S. policy to seek a cease-fire and negotiated settlement of the Ukraine conflict.
The United States would continue to arm Ukraine and strengthen its defenses to ensure Russia will make no further advances and will not attack again after a cease-fire or peace agreement.
Future American military aid, however, will require Ukraine to participate in peace talks with Russia.
To convince Putin to join peace talks, President Biden and other NATO leaders
should offer to put off NATO membership for Ukraine for an extended period in exchange for a comprehensive and verifiable peace deal with security guarantees.
If participating in peace talks, Russia could be offered some limited sanctions relief.
Ukraine would not be asked to relinquish the goal of regaining all its territory, but it would agree to use diplomacy, not force, with the understanding that this would require a future diplomatic breakthrough which probably will not occur before Putin leaves office.
Until that happens, the United States and its allies would pledge to only
fully lift sanctions against Russia and normalize relations after it signs a peace agreement acceptable to Ukraine.
Levies will be placed on Russian energy
sales to pay for Ukrainian reconstruction.
By enabling Ukraine to negotiate from a position of strength while also communicating to Russia the consequences if it fails to abide by future peace talk conditions, the United States could implement a negotiated end-state with terms aligned with U.S. and Ukrainian interests.
Part of this negotiated end-state should include provisions for a long-term security architecture for Ukraine’s defense that focuses on bilateral security defense.
Including this in a Russia-Ukraine peace deal offers a path toward long-term peace in the region and a means of preventing future hostilities between the two nations’
In short, the U.S. strategy, initiated by President Trump, of weakening Russia so that it can no longer invade its neighbours has succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.
Putin will tell Trump and his disastrous new war-mongering colleagues to get lost, or he will simply not answer the phone. The idea that Trump/NATO will be able to set up some type of buffer zone in Ukraine is illusionary. I have no idea how the war will end but US/NATO/EU need to first of all recognize that their attempt to destroy Putin’s presidency and break up Russia has failed dismally.
NATO troops in Ukraine? Hmmm… I can just see Mr Putin falling for that.
The thing about “buffer zones” is they can have long lives. See Cyprus, Korea.
I would not trust the US to live up to its pledges.
Russia will reject any idea of Ukraine joining Nato and rightly so.
The US has been pumping money into Ukraine since 1991, even into the education system to brainwash future generations to hate Russians.
Russia will achieve their SMO goals on the battlefield NOT by negotiating with the duplicitous West.
Yes ok. What then is the solution?
Let Russia annex the whole of Ukraine? That’s unrealistic.
Give Russia guarantees that Ukraine will never join NATO? That’s just not possible. There are no guarantees verbal, written or otherwise that Russia will accept And NATO will not in any case give any such guarantee. It would signal subservience to Russia.
There are no easy solutions.
The solution is for Russia to defeat Ukraine and to give referendums in all areas on who the Ukrainians want to be governed by.
Those in the west of Ukraine that want closer ties to the EU will be demilitarised and remain neutral and Russia will make sure they don’t join Nato.
The solution is simple: US/NATO must back off and stop attempting to achieve a regime change in Russia together with a break-up of the country to plunder its natural resources. There is no other reason for this conflict.
Nobody can seriously believe that USA or NATO care about ‘democracy’ or whether Ukraine is governed by a Russian or Ukrainian government. They only care about US hegemony and subjection of any dissidents to ‘Western rules and values’.
The hypocrisy is clear. Russia invades Ukraine and all hell breaks loose: USA blows up Nord Stream (and the subservient EU promises to buy LNG from USA); US orders NATO, UK and EU into action; everybody promises to support Ukraine sacrificing only Ukrainian citizens “for as long as it takes”.
Israel invades Lebanon and bombs Syria, Irak, Iran: silence.
Russia will not back down. The country has lost too many of its own citizens willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. It is NATO that is continually expanding, not Russia. Russia wants/wanted to economically benefit from a close relationship with the West. It was USA that could not, and still cannot, disassociate itself from its Cold War attitude to Russia.
If Russia was capable of defeating Ukraine, they would have done it by now.
Instead, the U.S. strategy of weakening Russia so that it can no longer invade its neighbours has been a great, if unprincipled, success.
Russia could have nuked every major Ukrainian city and the war would have been over in 2 minutes. But Putin is not so primitive and he knows the problem is not the Ukrainian people but their disgusting and criminal leaders, and the fact these have been bought outright by the completely ‘unprincipled’ USA.
Russia has immense resources and so much could have been gained with a normal and civilized relationship between the West and Russia. But no, USA demands dominance and UK and EU comply. Even now the EU has its French-born puppet as the President of Georgia, inciting the Georgian people to rise up against their newly democratically elected government. Why? Because that government is not interested in joining the EU under the conditions it was offered. So now the West is trying to create a second Maidan: a wonderful opportunity to open a second front against Russia. Utterly shameful behaviour.
The billionaire tyrant Zelensky is losing the war so he wants to give back to Russia
what was theirs anyway
If it happens, it will be just another rearrangement of a border on the European mainland; no shortage of those over the last few centuries, unfortunately.
Putin will not come to the negotiating table……
Unless it is made worth his while…….
President Trump knows what he is dealing with.
https://www.icij.org/investigations/panama-papers/
It is often said that the U.S. is not a country; it is a business.
Many say the same thing about Putin’s Russia
‘Unlike most other governments, Russia’s is not there to serve the people, but to enrich senior officials through endemic corruption. The more senior you are, the richer you get. And the most senior person, Vladimir Putin, has become the richest.’
‘As anyone who follows Russia knows, Putin loves money. But because he’s president, he can only earn his official salary (which is around $300,000 a year), and he can’t hold any assets beyond those he accumulated before he was in government.’
‘Therefore, Putin needed others to hold his money so that no paper trail led back to him. For this, he needed people he could trust. In any mafia-like organization, these people are rare birds. There is no commodity more valuable than trust.
Roldugin was one such person for Putin.’
‘The Panama Papers revealed Roldugin had acquired a 12.5% stake in Russia’s biggest TV advertising agency, Video International, which has annual revenues of more than £800m. He also owned 3.2% of Bank Rossiya, a St Petersburg private bank has been described as Putin’s “crony bank”.’
The only question is: how big will the inducement have to be?
“Unlike most other governments,
Russia’s(USA’s/UK’s) is not there to serve the people, but to enrich senior officials through endemic corruption. The more senior you are, the richer you get. And the most senior person,Vladimir Putin, (Biden etc) has become the richest.’”I love the USA but there is no doubt that there is bribery and corruption there and in the UK. Biden and relatives, Pelosi etc won’t leave power poor, they are just called multi millionaires or billionaires not oligarchs. Plus although ‘conspiracy theories’ are plentiful about CIA and Clinton etc, how often do ‘conspiracy theories turn out to be true?
How much money have our successive Prime Ministers since WW2 made whilst in office?
Take a wild shot in the dark….
And Putin….
Come on!
Do you have intimate details of Putin’s financial position or only accusations?
The truly sad fact is the number of people killed and vast expenditure of wealth on trying to defend a country that has never really existed except under Soviet control, so in many ways it is a similar tragic story to those who believe that there has ever been an independent Palestinian state. The reality is that
Ukraine is and always has been at least two countries often ruled by two separate empires, occasionally by one empire. Yes the early Soviet Union tried to wipe out much of Ukrainian nationalism but it also ceded territory such as Crimea to make it seem like the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was a viable entity. Since the failure of the Soviet Union, pro Russians have tried to rule and now pro EU Governments are trying to keep the facade of a single country. How tragic that at the start the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic could not have peacefully divided as Czechoslovakia managed with a pro Russian east and pro EU west. I despise Putin but the reality is he hasn’t tried to occupy lands in Western Ukraine, he has never pulled the trigger on the Byelorussian border, because he doesn’t want to fully invade, but merely regain the native Russian territory and protect those people from what has been a very oppressive period from Kyiv and to push back on NATO and EU expansion that was promised would never happen.
i agree except that i really like putin !
Russia will never agree to Ukraine in NATO. President Putin has made it clear. That in large measure is what the war is about.
However since Russia occupies what it wants already, and Zelensky has little left of a military force, degraded infrastructure and ruined economy, it is hard to see what he has to offer other than surrender.
Trump won’t continue cash and military aid next year, EU governments haven’t got the cash, European citizens are against further involvement.
Russia has committed and risked too much, lost too many, it’s cost too much to accept a ceasefire, buffer zones and vague promises about future NATO membership. it most likely will want unconditional surrender and then impose its terms.
Remember: it’s a proxy war USA plus EU v Russia. Russia is winning.
the whole point of the war is for the Ukraine to NOT join nato, im all for putin and russia from the beginning and it was the u s , as usual, who started this in 2014 by installing who they wanted instead of the president elected by the ukrainians,
rfk jr has a great video explanation much clearer than me!. so many russian and Ukrainian lives lost and all for the military industrial complex! and bio weapon labs in the Ukraine too thanks fauci,
If only Merkel had helped to implement the Minsk Agreements, instead of using the time to build up the military … and Johnson had implemented a better Brexit, instead of interfering in Ukraine …
And, and, …. we do need to flush out the dregs, this side of the Atlantic as well.
Russia now occupies less of Ukraine than it did immediately after its invasion. The Russian Army uses its soldiers private cars to resupply front line troops. Russia depends on poor quality North Korean ammunition because it cannot produce enough itself as a consequence of corruption. Massive stores of ancient Soviet equipment now lie empty. Casualties now are rapidly approaching one million.
The lead story on the front page of Tuesday’s edition of Moskovskij Komsomolets, a major state-run newspaper in Moscow, is the uproar over the rising price of potatoes.
One lawmaker is calling on the country’s prosecutor general to investigate the surging cost of this household staple, which is nearly as essential to Russian diets as bread.
According to Russia’s statistics agency, Rosstat, the price of potatoes has gone up 74 per cent since the beginning of the year. Butter has risen by more than 25%, leading to reports of a string of thefts.
Persistent high wages will bankrupt some companies, and, in the long run, Russian businesses, including its entire technology sector, will be stunted by its isolation from the West and so will the standard of living for Russians.
There are many on here who seem to think that all adds up to a winning hand.
It does not.
Russia are also now getting a good stuffing in Syria.
The Kremlin on Friday said it hoped Syria would quickly “restore order” in Aleppo, while Tehran has blamed the offensive on an American-Israeli plot to destabilise the region.
Turkey has demanded an end to “attacks” on the rebel enclave of Idlib in Syria, where Syrian and Russian warplanes launched air strikes.
“In the next few days, if (rebels) can sustain their gains it will be a test to whether or not Turkey will go all-in’
Rami Abdul-Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, states that Assad’s troops were unprepared for the rebels’ assault on Aleppo.
Abdul-Rahman expressed surprise at the regime forces suffering such heavy blows, despite having Russian air support and early signs indicating that HTS was planning the operation.
As a result, according to the Turkish agency Anadolu, individuals close to Assad’s regime are fleeing from Aleppo to Damascus.
Regarding the Syrian dictator himself, unconfirmed reports suggest he has urgently traveled to Moscow.
Yes, Syria. As Simplicius reports, what a coincidence that
only a day after Israel’s ceasefire a motley of Turkish-backed rebels, SNA, and Al-Qaeda’s rebrand of HTS has launched a shock offensive that caught resistance forces off guard, reaching all the way past the gates of Aleppo, threatening to scuttle the city itself. Many reports have indicated that northern crossings between Turkey had opened, allowing the free stream of assistance southward, showing once more the duplicitous game Erdogan plays.
The aim seems obvious: Israel had hoped to defeat Hezbollah and thus eliminate Iran’s influence. But having lost, Israel has gone to Plan B, which is to eliminate Iran’s ability to resupply Hezbollah via Syria. To do that, Assad must fall. Not one to waste an opportunity, Erdogan appears to have played along for his own gains. Israel’s handprint on the attack was obvious this morning, by the way, when SAA [Syrian Arab Army] was hit with a major “exploding beeper and radio” attack, wounding many SAA servicemen—a perfect replay of the same attack on Hamas earlier.
The Empire as a whole—which includes the US and UK—have of course activated all their terrorist sleeper cells to assist the offensive because it serves them to keep Iran and Russia busy, particularly vis-a-vis Ukraine. Reports already claimed that Russia was forced to send various reinforcement contingents to Syria, which obviously stands to weaken Russia’s Ukrainian efforts.
How often have you written that Russia now occupies less of Ukraine than it did immediately after its invasion, and how is anyone supposed to believe that? First it was butter being non-existent in Russia and now it is potatoes: but you care nothing for Russians so why are you writing this? You claim Russia will suffer bankruptcies: have you not heard of the problems suffered by major English and German car manufacturers? Russia dependent on North Korea is purest US propaganda and absolutely untrue, or will you now claim the Oreshnik was made in North Korea? Remember that Russia still cooperates with USA on the International Space Station, and that NASA and the ISS were totally dependent for years on Russia for flights to the station until SpaceX got its act together. And, no, there are no North Koreans on the ISS. Russia is doing OK, especially in matters of high-tech.
Has the comments section of the DS website been infested with Russian apologists? Seems like it by a lot of the comments.
If you are a US/UK/EU apologist then I apologize. Feel free to provide your opinion on world matters. Variety is the spice of life.
It’s called free speech matey boy, something this particular site should be very proud of. Have a super day! x
Translation: the gangster Zelensky sees Trump on the horizon and realises the grift is over having banked as much as he possibly can so Madame Zelensky can return to Paris for more £40k spending sprees