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Initially, Donald Trump seemed to take a firm stance on the Ukrainian conflict. After making threats of "severe ramifications" during the summer if Vladimir Putin persisted blocking truce talks, Trump finally introduced substantial penalties on the Russian biggest petroleum corporations, Lukoil and Rosneft. This move significantly hindered Putin's capability to fund his war effort in the region.

Yet, through his newly presented comprehensive peace initiative for Ukraine, reportedly created by American and Russian officials without Ukrainian or European participation, he has seemingly reverted to his pro-Putin position.

Favoring Invasion

This proposal would effectively benefit the Russian leader for invading Ukraine while putting the country's democracy in danger. Despite ringing declarations that "The nation's sovereignty will be confirmed", large portions of the proposal in reality undermine that essential sovereignty. This constitutes a Moscow's wish would probably be a catastrophe for the nation.

Demonstrating his real-estate past, the former president persists to view the situation in Ukraine as a mere land disagreement, implying handing Putin a portion of Ukrainian land will appease the leader. But, Russia's military campaign is not only about occupying a damaged swath of deindustrialized area in eastern Ukraine. Rather, it is about Ukraine's democracy – and the Russian leader's clear desire to weaken it so it stops serves as an attractive model for the Russian people of the accountable governance that Putin's deepening autocracy denies them.

Territorial Giveaways

While keeping in status the already separated oblasts of these areas, Trump's proposal would force Ukraine to surrender the whole Donetsk region. Aside from favoring Russia with land that its military have been failed to occupy in over a ten years of fighting, this concession would render Ukraine's defensive positions dangerously undermined.

This region is the location of the nation's well-known "defensive line", the well-established protective structures that represent a key impediment to enemy progress. The proposal would have Ukraine leave these defenses, providing Russian forces a open route to Kyiv if he later decide to renew the hostilities.

Defense Restrictions

Then, in a move that would make additional fighting easier for the Russian military, Trump would mandate the nation to reduce the size of its military from their current approximately 800,000 soldiers to a maximum of 600,000. Significantly, the initiative imposes no similar restrictions on Russia's military.

In what appears as a concession to Putin's attempts to portray Ukraine's democratically elected government as radicals, the plan declares: "All radical doctrine and activities must be rejected and prohibited." Apparently to emphasize this aspect, it requires that "Ukraine will hold elections in 100 days" of a peace deal. At the same time, the proposal places no obligation that Putin endanger his dictatorship by conducting elections in his own country.

Protection Commitments

To be sure, the proposal makes the Russian Federation promise not to "invade bordering nations" and to "establish in law its stance of peaceful relations towards European nations and the Ukrainian people". Yet given that Putin has breached comparable accords in the history – for example the 1994 Budapest memorandum, in which the Russian government committed to respect Ukraine's borders in return for relinquishing its Soviet-era nuclear weapons, and the previous peace deals, in which Moscow committed to a ceasefire and a return of occupied areas in eastern Ukraine to Kyiv – how should anyone believe this commitment on this occasion?

This explains Ukraine has been so insistent on western security guarantees. Although the plan promises a "strong joint defense action" in case the Russian Federation resume its aggression, and provides that "The nation will receive dependable defense commitments", the particulars vary from vague to troubling. The proposal would not just block Ukraine Nato membership but also prohibit alliance nations from stationing military personnel on Ukraine's soil, thus blocking the reassurance force, reportedly led by European powers, on which the Ukrainian government had been depending to stop Russia from restoring his diminished forces, restocking, and attacking again.

Global Concern

An additional supplementary accord apparently would provide Ukraine with a Nato-style protection assurance, in which any subsequent "major, deliberate, and continuous aggression" by Russia on Ukraine "will be treated as an assault jeopardizing the stability and safety of the transatlantic community." This implies a armed reaction. However different from a capable Ukrainian military – the nation's best protection against future Russian aggression – the credibility of the supplementary deal would depend on the commitment of Nato leaders, including Trump, to react militarily to Russia's attacks, something they have {not