Knowing well in advance that Russia would reject it, the U.S. and Ukraine announced with fanfare that its ceasefire deal was in “Russia’s court” in what was an exercise of pure public relations, writes Joe Lauria.
Starmer hugging Zelensky outside No. 10 Downing Street. (No 10 Downing Street/Wikimedia Commons)
By Joe Lauria
Special to Consortium News
Nothing could have been clearer than Russia’s repeated conditions for a permanent end of the war, rather than a temporary ceasefire: Ukraine’s neutrality, its demilitarization and denazification, the inclusion of four Russian-speaking oblasts into the Russian Federation and treaties establishing a new security architecture in Europe.
Equally clear was Ukraine’s utter rejection of these conditions, demanding instead the return of every inch of its territory, including Crimea, and Ukraine’s membership in NATO.
It is the reason the two sides are still fighting a war. It is a war, however, that Ukraine is badly losing. Obscuring that fact is an important aim of Ukraine and its European allies to keep their publics onside.
But it isn’t only their publics that they needs convincing to continue supporting Ukraine, but the president of the United States too.
After the Oval Office dustup, in which Donald Trump and J.D. Vance laid it on the line to Zelensky in public, the Europeans held two summits. At both they made loud noises about continuing to support Zelensky, but also made clear they couldn’t do it without the United States.
Much as they loathe him, Zelensky and the European leaders need Donald Trump. So they set Zelensky up to writing a letter sucking up to Trump, a man clearly susceptible to flattery.
Very likely also influenced by his Secretary of State Marco Rubio and National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, both of whom had previously expressed neocon support for Ukraine and condemnation of Russia, Trump was apparently turned around, convinced to propose the 30-day ceasefire.
Trump then somehow got the notion that Vladimir Putin, despite his oft repeated conditions for ending the war, would yield to pressure. It could be Trump thinks he is a neutral mediator who needs to bully both sides to force them to do a deal.
So after the ceasefire was floated, Trump resumed arms and intelligence flows to Ukraine, new sanctions on Russia were threatened and Ukraine fired 350 drones at residential areas of Moscow just as Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff was arriving in Moscow to discuss the ceasefire.
Like Casting a Lone Veto
Russian Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya casting veto in U.N. Security Council in 2019. (Cia Pk/United Nations)
All this was designed to push Putin to accept it or appear like a man guilty of rejecting peace. If U.S. arms, intelligence and sanctions had not deterred Putin before, why would it now?
Putin saw this as the public relations exercise that it is and treated it as such. He responded with public relations of his own.
Instead of firmly saying the expected, “No,” he said, “Yes,” followed by “nuances,” such as who would monitor such a ceasefire along a 2,000-kilometer front?
He said such a ceasefire could not begin as occupying Ukrainian troops were encircled on Russian territory; and, crucially, that a 30-day ceasefire — with no Ukrainian rearmament — could only mark the start of talks for a permanent settlement. Putin exposed the motive to give Ukrainian troops on the run a chance to regroup.
Just as designed, Zelensky and European leaders blasted Putin for being a man who loves war, and hates peace.
At the U.N. Security Council, which I covered as a correspondent for a quarter of a century, I often saw countries introduce resolutions for a vote even though they were certain one of the five permanent members would veto it.
Diplomats explained that this was done on purpose to force the arm of that nation’s ambassador to be the lone one raised in opposition to the measure for all the world to see, causing it maximum public embarrassment.
That is precisely the exercise we have seen with this phony ceasefire proposal. The Europeans and the Ukrainians are trying to milk it for all it’s worth. Zelensky did a selfie video to call Putin a “manipulator” of world leaders.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, pulling out the scare tactic that Putin is bent on European conquest, said: “Russia’s appetite for conflict and chaos undermines our security back here in the United Kingdom.” He even tried to blame his political difficulties at home on Russia for “driving up energy costs.”
In the end, the “ceasefire” gambit may create more public sympathy for Ukraine. But the big question is whether it will harden Trump against Russia by continuing arms shipments and intelligence and perhaps levelling new sanctions against Moscow.
All that would do, however, is prolong the death and destruction. Without NATO’s direct participation in the war against Russia, which would risk nuclear annihilation, the outcome of the war is certain. Because of that, Trump could resume pressure on Zelensky to essentially give up instead.
The ball is now in Trump’s court.
The course of this three-year conflict since Russia’s intervention makes clear that the longer Ukraine tries to fight, the worse deal it will get, no matter how many public relations points it might win along the way.
Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former U.N. correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and other newspapers, including The Montreal Gazette, the London Daily Mail and The Star of Johannesburg. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London, a financial reporter for Bloomberg News and began his professional work as a 19-year old stringer for The New York Times. He is the author of two books, A Political Odyssey, with Sen. Mike Gravel, foreword by Daniel Ellsberg; and How I Lost By Hillary Clinton, foreword by Julian Assange.
That’s the bottom line Joe, thank you. The “ceasefire” was a stunt that they knew (or should have known) the Russians would NEVER accept. Despite Putin’s diplomatic tone, he very firmly said “Nyet!” It was a non-sequitur from the get-go.
The tragic humor just keeps coming. The DT2 regime, like the previous regime, is packed with kakistocrat-cronies who don’t know what they are doing. Did they really think they could play the “good cop, bad cop” BS on the Russians, and they would fall for the BS? (The UK/EU “bad cop” and the DT2 “good cop”. More cringe-worthy, pathetic PR stunts.
These idiots don’t know context, history, or bother to listen to what the Russian govt. is actually saying. The bloviating bullshitter thought he could bully and outwit Putin?
And also, the DT2 faithful came up with all sorts of wishful thinking, excuses and fantasies about how the Orange Saviour would bring “peace” while making the US oligarchy billions (asset-stripping Ukraine’s natural resources etc.). This includes some authors posted here as well as the DT2 supporters who comment here. As if enriching the oligarchy would benefit us “little people”.
Ukraine continues to receive support from the DT2 regime, and the “sanctions” (economic warfare) against Russia continue.
No matter, as Caitlin Johnstone, Ben Norton and others have pointed out: the Ugly Face of Empire is unmasked: the DT2 regime is even more ugly, more incompetent, more freakish than ever. Hegseth, a so-called Christian fundamentalist, has symbols from the Crusades tattooed all over himself. The freak-show just gets freakier.
It does not matter which geriatric freak sits in the WH, the policies do not change. The Genocide of Palestine continues, yet most in the Anglo media ignore it. The DT single-handedly made peace in the middle-east, the Genocide is over, right?
This charade could, of course, be a ‘set up’ by Trump who could say that he tried to bring peace before aligning with the EU to intensify the war effort. That is certainly a possibility.
For Putin, things are much more complicated. A cessation of hostilities does not help restore Russian security unless the anti-Russia regime in Kiev is removed. This is the part of the equation that is never discussed in the media or even among the independent commentariat. All three of Ukraine’s presidents (since the 2014 coup) have supported NATO expansion. Whether Putin controls the 4 oblasts in the east or not, he must still settle on a way to install a leader in Kiev that is either neutral or not openly hostile to Russia.
But how does he do that without surrounding and invading Kiev and overseeing free elections?
That is the conundrum.
We have not reached that point yet and Russia may well be trying to facilitate an internal change of power in Kiev that would preclude an attack on the city.
The Americans may also want to oust Zelensky as well. A peace deal seems impossible without him out of the way.
The Western clown car is bursting at the seams. It is traveling at breakneck speed towards a cliff, but that won’t stop the clowns from insisting they are headed towards utopia. Would be nice if they stopped dragging the rest of the world with them.
This was of course exactly what Biden did with Gaza. Hold “negotiations” with one’s partners that one supplies and pays. Then, announce “results” from these “negotiations”. This “result” is then blared and blasted across the world through America’s soft-mind-influencing ‘soft-power’. The weak snowflakes are supposed to just melt before this heat.
The only thing different about this latest round of negotiations American-style with Russia is that we did not commit some mass atrocity to try to force the “target” into compliance. Usually, in American-style negotiations, there is a Hiroshima, or a Christmas Bombing, or at least a vicious attack on people trying to get food.
funny pic that..here we go…pictures can speak a thousand words..sardistic humour eases anger mostly or so it seems to me anyhow..what grotesquely farcical times of mad hatter politics we are witnessing day by day by day when one thought it could not get worse…1?