Authored by Andrew Korybko via substack,

The peace process might go kaput if they can’t resolve these issues...

Trump speculated that Russia’s bombing of civilian areas might signal that “maybe [Putin] doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along”, and then reiterated his earlier threat to impose “secondary sanctions” against those who violate the US’ primary ones, which was analyzed here. This followed Trump’s latest meeting with Zelensky, who might have negatively influenced over his hitherto largely positive perceptions of Putin, and comes after reports that the US has finalized its peace plan.

Five significant disagreements that have emerged throughout the course of negotiations account for Trump’s volte-face toward Putin.

• The first was referenced by Trump in his post where he condemned Russia’s bombing of civilian areas. Putin argued earlier in April that Russia is targeting Ukrainian troops there, but the optics of continued Russian strikes against civilian areas amidst peace talks with the US evidently left a very negative impression on Trump, who now doubts Putin’s commitment to peace.

• The second concerns European peacekeepers in Ukraine, which the US’ reportedly finalized peace plan suggests despite Russia opposing it. Although Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth already declared that the US won’t extend Article 5 mutual defense guarantees to NATO countries’ troops in Ukraine, Russia fears that the US could be manipulated by the Europeans into mission creep if the latter deploy there. Putin therefore prefers for there to be no ambiguity about this and for Trump to scrub it from his plan.

• Third, it’s unclear whether Ukraine will be obligated to at least partially demilitarize like Kiev provisionally agreed to do during spring 2022’s ultimately failed peace talks, which is one of Russia’s explicitly declared goals in the conflict. Trump is reluctant to support this since he seems to believe that it could embolden Putin to recommence hostilities in the future, especially in the absence of European peacekeepers, but this demand isn’t something that Putin could easily walk away from.

• The fourth disagreement is over the US’ refusal to accede to Russia’s demand for coercing Ukraine into withdrawing from the disputed territories that are still under Kiev’s control. The New York Times cited a source who described this as “unreasonable and unachievable”, but it’s imperative for Russia after the Kremlin recognized the entirety of these regions as Russian following September 2022’s referenda. Just like with demilitarization, Putin also can’t easily walk away from this either, hence the disagreement.

• And finally, the US’ reportedly finalized peace plan also requests that Russia hand over the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant and Kakhovka Dam to the US, which is as unacceptable for Putin as the preceding points of accepting European peacekeepers, dropping demilitarization, and curbing his territorial claims. All five disagreements, including the first-mentioned one about Russia’s continued strikes against military targets in civilian areas, collectively contributed to this impasse right before the diplomatic finish line.

If Putin and Trump can’t resolve these issues, after which Trump would then also have to get Zelensky to agree to their new deal, then the peace process will probably go kaput. 

Putin and Trump are incentivized to resolve their disputes due to how mutually beneficial the nascent Russian-US “New Détente” is while Zelensky would struggle to continue fighting if the US once again cuts off military aid as punishment for rejecting whatever those two agree to. Be that as it may, it’ll still be very difficult to break this deadlock.