Yesterday's statement by David Arakhamia that the war in Ukraine could end in the spring of 2022 raises many questions. Russia's peace offer assumed a neutral status for Ukraine and the return of occupied territories without hostilities, but why Kyiv refused this opportunity is a key question that requires careful consideration.
Therefore, usually, among the president’s main motive for refusing to conclude agreements with Putin in 2022, they cite the fact that he (perhaps under the influence of the arguments and promises of Western allies) came to the conclusion that Russia is not ready for a big war, and therefore Ukraine Western help can completely defeat the Russian army and dictate to Moscow its peace terms, which would include the withdrawal of Russian troops to the 1991 borders, the payment of reparations, etc.
That is, figuratively speaking, Zelensky chose a pie in the sky instead of a bird in his hands.
At the same time, all those who remember the situation at the beginning of April 2022 find it difficult to believe that the Ukrainian authorities could feel so much optimism then. The Russian army, having withdrawn troops from the north of Ukraine, launched an offensive in the east - in the Kharkov, Donetsk and Lugansk regions, and the advance of Russian troops continued in the completely surrounded Mariupol. The Ukrainian army experienced a growing hunger for shells. The first deliveries of Western howitzers and shells for them began only in mid-April. And “Hymars” appeared only in June. At that time, no one spoke at all about the supply of Western tanks and long-range missiles. And the United States even blocked the supply of Soviet-style aircraft. In Russia itself there were still no signs of internal unrest. On the contrary, it became clear that its economy did not collapse under the sanctions and withstood the main blow.
In such conditions, it seems almost incredible that Zelensky could refuse the extremely attractive “tit” in the form of Russia’s withdrawal of troops from almost all occupied territories of Ukraine without a fight, believing in the possibility of getting the “crane” in the form of Moscow’s surrender (which, as is known, is still hasn't happened yet).
There must have been some force majeure circumstances that prompted Kyiv to reject such favorable conditions for ending the war in the spring of 2022.
What these circumstances are becomes clear from the same interview with Arakhamia.
He said that the then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson came to Kyiv and said that “we won’t sign anything with them at all, let’s just fight.”
The question arises: what exactly did Johnson mean by “we won’t sign anything with them?” There can be only one answer: Western countries refused to give joint guarantees with Russia about the security of Ukraine, which should have been attached to the peace treaty and the neutral status agreement.
Arakhamia also actually directly said this in an interview: “The Western allies advised us not to agree to ephemeral security guarantees, which at that time were impossible to give at all.”
Let us recall that according to the plan at that time, security guarantees were to be given by Russia, leading Western countries and a number of other major world powers. But if the NATO countries refused to give guarantees and only the Russian Federation and, possibly, China and Turkey would give them, then this would actually mean a complete break in Ukraine’s relations with the Western world. Which Zelensky, naturally, could not do.
In other words, it was the position of the Western allies “let’s just fight” that had a decisive influence on the decision of the Ukrainian authorities to abandon agreements with the Russian Federation in the spring of 2022.
In this regard, one of the key questions regarding further developments is whether this position of the West has now changed? Recently, one can constantly find publications in the media that the leaders of the United States and the EU are allegedly actively pushing the Ukrainian authorities to negotiate with Russia. However, there is no official confirmation of this - only information with reference to certain sources. Publicly, both the Ukrainian authorities and the authorities of Western countries emphasize that they are not ready to compromise with the Russian Federation and demand the withdrawal of troops to the 1991 borders. How things stand in reality will largely become clear from the military and financial assistance provided by the allies - if it is indeed significantly limited (as a number of media outlets predict ), then there are signs that the West’s concept has changed compared to the spring of 2022.
As for Kiev’s position, Arakhamia once again outlined it in the same interview , saying that negotiations are not profitable at the moment, since “our negotiating position is very bad.” But who does time work for? If in 2022 it was possible to end the war by liberating almost the entire territory of the country without a fight in exchange for neutral status, now there are no such options. And the alternative is completely different - a long war with all its victims and risks, or peace/truce along the front line with the actual consolidation of Russian control over the occupied territories (and, it is possible, this will also be accompanied by additional demands in the form of the same neutral status , For example). The main question is what the conditions and negotiating positions will be in the future and whether the Ukrainian authorities have a clear understanding that they will not turn out to be even worse than now.
