In spite of enthusiasm coming from US-Ukraine negotiations in Jeddah, President Putin has refused the idea of a ceasefire. If the path to peace appears to be complicated, even more complicated will be the discussions around the security guarantees Ukraine needs for its survival as a State. Strong hopes for joining NATO in the nearest future possible still are very strong despite strong opposition from Russia and from the West. Plus, what future for the Ukrainian Presidency can we expect? We discussed these issues with Ivan Us, Chief Consultant National Institute for Strategic Studies, Advisor for foreign policy to President Zelenskij and for the Council of National Security.
What is the current situation in Ukraine on the ground?
At the moment, everyone is interested in looking at the possible developments that Jeddah can bring. The Trump administration would like to have a fast solving of the war, but to be honest this is impossible in my opinion. Trump instead thinks that the faster the better. He just needs peace to praise himself that he has reached peace – no matter if it is just or not.
In Ukraine there were worries that during this meeting there could be a sort of pressure on Ukraine on the part of the United States, especially for what concerns the issue of leaving our occupied territories. We should consider the fact that from the beginning of the full-scale invasion in 2022 thousands of crimes have been committed by the Russian Federation in those territories, and the material damage amounts to trillions of dollars according to the Kyiv School of Economics in 2023. Plus, human lives. According to us, there is some pressure on Ukraine to leave those territories. We have all seen what happened in the Oval office. Now, after Jeddah, the ball is in the court of Russia. The US demonstrated its plan to rebuild the relations with Russia, as well as repeated its rhetoric and propaganda- which for Ukraine was the most dangerous aspect. In that moment, Ukraine understood that if the US will not support Ukraine anymore, probably the European Union will continue to stay by its side. And not only the EU, but also the UK and Türkiye.
The US supported Ukraine under the Biden Administration, but they are convinced that they should somehow maintain their relations with Russia. The same already happened in Ukraine in 1991, when we gained independence. Two weeks before the implosion of Soviet Union, President Bush father came to Kiev and said in a speech that we had to remain in the Soviet Union. At that time, this proved that the US had not a vision of the world without the USSR. The USSR imploded, and if we compare this situation to the present nothing has changed: the US still believes that it has to keep its relations with Russia.
The same is not true for Türkiye. It has not so many resources to help Ukraine as the US, but it has a vision of the world without Russia.
Historically speaking, Türkiye and Russia are competitors.
Indeed. In 2015 when Russia sent their airplanes to bomb Syria, it happened that some locations were next to Türkiye’s territory. Ankara was against those actions also because of the violation of the country’s airspace, but the statement was ignored by Russia. Therefore, Türkiye shot down Russia’s airplanes[1]. Russia then threatened Türkiye about the consequences of that action, but the then Prime Minister of Türkiye pronounced a genius phrase: “throughout history we had eight wars. It will be the ninth”.
Despite this, Erdogan has advanced a plan which embodies its “new ottoman vision”, and looking at the map we notice that much of the territory that was under Soviet Union and now Russia’s influence is presented as under the influence of Türkiye. Russia believes in its “Russky Mir”, but we have Türkiye.
Ukraine from the beginning has searched for a good relation with Türkiye and Erdogan because we have understood that.
Let’s come back to Europe. What happened after the “Oval office Scandal”?
After that, President Zelenskij came back to London and met Keir Starmer with other European leaders. We understood that Europe is not ready to substitute the US, because the first request that the President received was that of re-establishing the relations with the US Administration and with Donald Trump. Without that, Europe could not help.
Since the moment when Donald Trump became President, you have clearly experienced changes in the relations with the US. How has US support materially changed?
First of all, we received this emotional pressure because US rhetoric changed, but then this turned into practical pressure. They stopped military aid and the share of intelligence information, which for Ukraine’s defense was extremely negative since it is also information about Russian rocket attack. In previous moments of the war, if Russia was about to send a rocket we immediately received the signal and sent the air alert in the theoretic place in which the rocket was supposed to hit. For us, due to satellites of the US, was very important to get that information.
Then, a further problem for Ukraine is the pressure on Europe that President Trump is exerting. The rhetoric is that after the Second World War the US was the guarantor of European security. Europe, however, should now pay more for its security. In my view, Trump has started a set of provocations against Europe and one of these is putting pressure on Ukraine: we are not giving you aid, information, rockets and so forth, but for Ukraine this was a very hard moment. The EU, however, invited President Zelenskij to rebuild the relations with the US because they are not ready for confrontation.
Do you believe that the approval at the European Parliament of the “ReArm Europe” plan will change this perspective? Maybe by bringing Ukraine closer to the European Union accession. Frankly speaking, I am a bit skeptical of Ukraine joining NATO.
Actually, in our view if Ukraine joins NATO it would be an opportunity for the European Union too. But not now, and not in the nearest future. January 1, 2030 is the first possible date in which we will theoretically can be in the European Union. But for me it could be a realistic date also to join NATO and I explain you why. It is clear that we cannot join NATO when there is a war. But if the war is over, it will mean that the Ukrainian army will become very experienced also in knowing how to deal with new weapons. So, for NATO it would be interesting to have Ukraine. The only thing that I would probably forecast is that NATO would need to change its title – not North Atlantic Treaty Organization anymore because Ukraine is far from that location, but not only due to Ukraine presence. I believe that other two countries will be in NATO: Japan and South Korea. Japan has one of the strongest economies in the world.
Well, the issue of Japan appears a bit simplistic to me, as you need to consider that for the moment there is no military, and you would need to change the Japanese Constitution…
Yes, I understand your point, but Japan has also understood the need to be in NATO due to the presence of China.
Actually, also the position of China will be very interesting to observe: in Ukraine, after this clash between Trump and Zelenskij, many people observed that it may be possible to see that the US will present to the world its project of rebuilding alone the relations with Russia. But the reason why they are doing this is because China is paying attention to this restoration: in the moment in which the US and Russia started to be involved in this project, a very important news appeared on the media. The information concerned the fact that the US and Russia were discussing strategies not giving China the possibility to be in the Artic region. For China, that information was not pleasant.
And connected to this, it was our idea to start talking about rare minerals in October 2024, before the Presidential election. We understood that we needed something to interest Trump. Concerning rare earth minerals, the problem is that nobody actually knows what Ukraine has. We need good research, that costs at least $25 million. For Trump this was interesting, especially because of trade wars. One of these will be with China, and by analyzing Chinese response the media posited that probably China will put a ban to rare earth exports to the US. As a consequence, the US would need to re-organize and have bilateral contracts with other countries to import rare earths. Ukraine may be interesting exactly at this point.
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Coming back to NATO, don’t you think that if you will join the Alliance, Russia will perceive it as a provocation? I am asking this because many Western commentators and analysts have the perception of Russia desiring peace to have time to restore its military apparatus and then engaging in another war.
First, Russia does not need peace. For example, before the full-scale war, when we were discussing about trade with Russia, the former main economist of the National Bank of Ukraine said that it is hard to discuss about trade with someone that wants to kill you. Russia wants to destroy Ukraine and repeats that it does not want to have NATO close to its border. Let’s analyze the situation: Russia started the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and then some countries bordering with Russia that were not in NATO and that were not planning to join immediately decided to become part of the Alliance. I am talking about Finland and Sweden. Until 2022 in global politics there was a term, “Finlandization”, that referred to a country close to the USSR and then Russia and Europe that was not joining any of those alliances to preserve neutrality. Now we see Sweden and Finland in NATO: the first has excellent military expertise; as for Finland, 1200 km of border with Russia and 300km of distance with Russia’s second city St. Petersburg has not produced a statement by Russia. For US, this is the proof that NATO is not a problem because it is at less than 300 km from St.Petersburg. NATO forces from Finland – if NATO wanted to attack Russia – could be in the city in just several hours.
I believe that in 2022, when the invasion started, Russia had the intention of rebuilding Soviet Union before the end of that year. Historically, the Soviet Union appeared in the end of 1922, and 100 years after Putin wants to rebuild it. Actually, not only Russian propaganda but also the US said that Moscow could take Kyiv in a few days. Thanks to the fact that we received weapons from the West, the Russians failed to maintain their positions near Kyiv. They were in Irpin, in Bucha, but then they had to make terror and then left. Even before Bucha, many massacres were committed in the roads connecting the villages around Kyiv. Russia remained in Cherson, but then Ukraine started thinking step by step how to put Russia out of the city. There was a funny moment when Ukraine repeated that it would have attacked Cherson but then attached Kharkiv. The Russians were prepared in Cherson and so we liberated a big part of our territory, but the problem is that we were not expecting that the reaction of Russians was running until they had fuel in their thanks. Actually, that region was liberated because Russians ran.
What kind of security guarantees would you need?
Giorgia Meloni’s proposal of extending art. 5 to Ukraine was very interesting. But we understand that it did not find support. As for the idea of peacekeepers advanced by Marcon, I am sure that France has not forgotten when Russia pushed it out from Sahel. Possibly France was waiting for revenge, and that could happen in Ukraine. Russia does not want to see peacekeepers: France, UK and Türkiye, instead, are ready for this proposal.
Despite this, even though Ukraine will not be in NATO, for the moment what interests as for security guarantees is the status of Ukraine as allied of the US, while waiting for NATO. Some, however, believe that if we proceed in the status of Ukraine as allied of the US without NATO, there won’t be NATO at all. Therefore, I believe that this status should be temporary, while waiting for NATO membership.
Considering the situation with Crimea and especially how the war is proceeding in Donbas at the frontline, what kind of peace would you consider “just”, “satisfactory” and “acceptable”?
We always speak about “just” peace, but “just” means the returning of our territory, compensation of material losses that Russia should make. $300 billion Russian frozen assets are now being used in Ukraine; we have credit by G7 countries that comes from the profits of Russian frozen assets. There were concerns about the use of these funds for European economy, but then G7 countries agreed on that.
A further problem can be law, but countries began to adapt their legislation to allow the use of those assets. Numerous lawyers advanced the possibility of considering Russia as a country that committed crimes against everybody to justify the use of those funds.
Probably one of the conditions requested by Russia for peace, ceasefire or any other sort of agreement will concern the end of Zelenskij’s presidency. Will there be the risk of another figure imposed by the outside (maybe with a pro-Russian orientation) or is there currently someone that could replace Zelenskij?
This is a big pressure for Ukraine since the beginning. We had to have elections in 2023, and Russia returned many time to the issue because it is a way to de-legitimize Zelenskij. Actually, making elections during the war is not that easy. There were some drafts for new legislation on parliamentary elections in Ukraine during the war, about local referendums too. The problem is that the whole electoral process lasts 90 days, and during a war we cannot guarantee security for our people during 90 days. This is why making the elections are problematic. As for possible replacements of Zelenskij, according to rankings now he is at the second position in the chart.
Who ranks first?
Valerij Zalužnyj, the Ukrainian Ambassador to the United Kingdom. He is the only person that ranks higher than Zelenskij, but he is not planning to be a President. One thing is having a big popularity, the other is becoming a President.
Theoretically, I do not exclude the fact that if the pressure will become higher Zalužnyj could become President. But then, the task for Zelenskij’s team will be how to make the Parliament work: Ukraine is not a Presidential but a Parliamentary Republic, and due to the fact that the majority of deputies are from the President’s political party – Servant of People – I am wondering whether the people surrounding the President are ready for that. In times of Martial Law, anyway, doing elections is impossible. It would be too risky.
Looking at the future, are there concrete plans for reconstruction? Has this matter already been discussed? And more importantly – what will be the role of China in this, as numerous projects within the framework of the Belt and Road initiative also passed through Ukraine?
The main plan mainly stared in 2022, it was advanced by the European Union – Rebuild Ukraine. In Ukraine we love the term “Marshall Plan 2.0”. Some politicians were the proponents of that idea already in 2014-2015, so that may be the main road in my opinion. There should be first of all the contribution of the EU and the UK, and then the participation of China also depends from the relations with the EU and the US. The US has started a set of trade wars, so maybe we can expect a sort of union between the EU, China, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Australia, South Korea and so forth. Reconstruction will first consider the strategic infrastructure, and we need to restore our economy. Many damaged buildings here in Kyiv have been immediately restored.
Note
[1] The reference here is to the 2015 Russian Sukhoi Su-24 shootdown. On 24 November 2015, a Turkish Air Force F-16 fighter jet shot down a Russian Sukhoi Su-24M attack aircraft near the Syria–Turkey border. According Türkiye, the aircraft was fired upon while in Turkish airspace because it violated the border up to a depth of 2.19 km for about 17 seconds after being warned to change its heading ten times over a period of five minutes before entering the airspace.
Foto copertina: Zelenskij NATO