By Tarik Cyril Amar, Website, 6/16/24
On 16 June, Russian President Vladimir Putin has laid out his country’s conditions for ending the fighting in Ukraine and, after that, a comprehensive peace settlement (hereafter, the Moscow Conditions). Unsurprisingly, this was clearly a thoroughly prepared statement, and it was delivered in a setting obviously carefully chosen to signal its importance: As Russian TV news have emphasized, this was not just any meeting of the president with the staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Instead, it was a rare occasion when representatives of that ministry, including its highest ranks, members of the Presidential Administration, the Federal Assembly, and various other executive agencies were gathered for a major meeting with the president. The last time this format was used was November 2021, that is before the large-scale war in Ukraine.
Putin stressed that he was speaking not about a “freezing of the conflict, but its conclusive ending” and that if Kiev were to agree to the conditions he was enumerating – beginning with a full military retreat from the areas of the oblast regions of Donetsk, Lugansk/Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia/Zaporozhe, which Moscow has annexed – Russia would proceed to negotiations (clearly implying, of a full peace settlement) without delay.
The conditions listed by the Russian president were: the recognition as parts of Russia of the four regions listed above as well as all of Crimea; a “neutral, non-affiliated, non-nuclear status” for Ukraine; its “de-Nazification and de-militarization” – “all the more so,” he stated, “because everyone already agreed with these parameters” during the Istanbul negotiations of spring 2022. He also demanded guarantees for the “rights and interests of the Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine.”
“Naturally,” he added, the “fundamental international agreements” required to tie down all of the above would also presuppose the end of sanctions against Russia.
In sum, Putin reiterated Russia’s declared initial war aims (neutrality, “de-Nazification,” and de-militarization) and added the territories it has formally annexed (and, to a significant extent, occupied) since, while also, unsurprisingly, confirming that Moscow intends to keep Crimea. The reference to a non-affiliated status was, of course, most of all about NATO (which neutrality, too, would rule out) as well as, not to be overlooked, the EU.
Many Western observers and politicians have been content with dwelling on the obvious: This is a set of uncompromising or “maximalist” cease-fire and peace conditions (“a dictatorial peace” in German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s historically clumsy and factually wrong terms: Putin was not “dictating” anything), directly derived from what Russia wants and what it has already got on the battlefield. It is still a genuine offer, but it is true, entirely on Russian terms. It is not polemical or any exaggeration to observe that if the West and its Ukrainian proxy regime were to accept these terms, it would amount to a de facto recognition that they have lost the war.
Expectably, this offer has been rejected comprehensively, from Washington, via Brussels, to Kiev. The interesting question about this exchange is not if it could have had a different outcome; unfortunately, it could not. Equally unsurprising is the fact that Putin himself knew as much in advance. We can take him by his word – conveyed through his speaker Dmitry Peskov – that he did not expect a positive response.
Hence, the real question we should ask is why and for what purpose these conditions were stated at this point. The New York Times has pointed out that they represent “Mr. Putin’s most concrete set of territorial conditions to stop the war to date.” One can quibble, but there is little doubt that, in this form, this is a milestone statement one way or the other.
But then, a milestone on the road to what? First of all, let’s not get distracted: The timing of spelling out the Moscow Conditions in one handy package probably had something but not all too much to do with the so-called “peace summit” at Bürgenstock, initiated originally by Ukraine and obligingly hosted by Switzerland in a Qatari-owned luxury hotel. While not a real peace meeting by any stretch of the imagination (that would presuppose the presence of Russia which was not invited and may well have declined anyhow), Bürgenstock was meant to once again try against all odds to rally the Global South for Kiev and as a public relations boost for Ukraine’s Zelensky regime, President Zelensky personally, and their Western backers. By now, it has ended with a declaration long on rhetoric, short on everything else.
So, yes, Moscow may have enjoyed disrupting the Bürgenstock news cycle a little by its announcements. But as the meeting in Switzerland was a predictable dud anyhow – as even the staunchly russophobic and bellicist Economist acknowledged, if very gently – at the latest since both China and US President Biden decided to stay away, this is not a sufficient explanation of Putin’s actions. Mostly, over-reacting is not his style.
No, the relevant context for the Moscow Conditions is not Bürgenstock. Instead, think Savelletri, that is, where, in another luxury resort, the G7 has just met. You could add Washington in April of this year, for instance. Both places stand for Western announcement to pump more funding into Ukraine and the proxy war the West is waging through it: 50 billion dollars in the case of the G7 meeting, officially 61 – though, in effect, rather around 32 – billion dollars in the case of America’s legislation passed in April. The manner in which these funds are generated may differ, but the overall Western message to Russia is clear and has been sent explicitly time and again recently: The West, as of now, refuses to quit and signals its readiness to continue the war.
In this respect, the real message of the Moscow Conditions was that Moscow as well is ready for an even longer war. For Putin did not merely lay out how Russia would be willing to make peace now; he also added on the same occasion, two points about the alternative, namely, continuing the war:
First, that this is an offer that will get worse as Russia’s military situation will get even better. Take this now or get an even less attractive deal later, was his message; and he confirmed it again after the meeting. As Peskov has put it, in principle, the conditions named by Putin have no deadline, but “the situation on the frontline is changing dynamically” and “there will be a moment, when it will change again in such a manner that the Kiev regime will face another worsening of its position.”
Second, Putin also, once again, underlined that he sees the root cause of this war in the West’s unwillingness to relinquish its delusions of unipolarity and the policy of limitless expansion they have produced. In that context, he warned, also not for the first time, of “tragic” consequences if this Western approach does not change. What exactly “tragic” means is, in reality, not hard to guess: an escalation of the current large but localized war between Russia and Ukraine as well as the West, if mostly still indirectly, into an at least European or probably global open war between, at least, Russia and NATO, which would be devastating even without the use of nuclear weapons and a possible extermination event if they come into play.
What does all of this mean? We cannot know yet because Putin’s message was really about the future. But we can speculate: It is not, as some shortsighted or dishonest Western politicians, such as Mark Rutte, have tried to pretend, a sign of Russian weakness. Instead, it is a warning of what Moscow may do with its highly mobilized capacities: In the short-term, the real message of the Moscow Conditions may be that a major Russian offensive is coming. In that case, they will have served as a last warning to Ukraine and the West before Russia will strike even harder. If that is the case, Putin’s speech will end up being seen as an analogue to Moscow’s last offer to negotiate in earnest before its February 2022 invasion.
In the long term, with or without such a major offensive this year, the warning says that Russia is prepared to fight a long war and win, and, perhaps more importantly, that if the West should manage to prolong the war (despite the success of the European far right and the likelihood of Trump returning to the US presidency) and choose to escalate this long war in such a manner that Russia would feel under serious pressure, attacks on the West itself, at least in Europe, and the use of nuclear weapons will not be excluded.
Perhaps, for once, we should listen.