Diplomatic pathways from Biden to Putin would be dangerous

By Eli Lake

The government of the president of the United States, Joe Biden, has endeavored to show its toughness towards the military strengthening of Russia on the Ukrainian border. Biden himself assured on Wednesday that he had told Russian President Vladimir Putin that if he ordered an invasion, the United States would be prepared to unleash economic consequences in Russia. “never seen before”.

Possible consequences of this kind would include excluding Russia from the Swift system for international electronic payments and possibly a re-imposition of US sanctions on companies working on the construction of the Nordstream 2 gas pipeline between Russia and Germany. Biden also threatened to increase arms shipments to Ukraine and bolster the defenses of vulnerable NATO allies on the Ukrainian border.

It remains to be seen if any of this will deter Putin from invading Ukraine. But even if he does, Putin’s troop buildup has already earned him some initial concessions: Along with his warnings, Biden has offered Putin what the White House calls “diplomatic exit ramps”.

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, on Tuesday described these avenues as support for the somewhat moribund peace process based on the 2014 and 2015 Minsk accords, as well as an invitation for Putin to enter into consultations with NATO. about your concerns about the alliance.

Are “exit rampsThey run the risk of making Putin believe that he can erase Ukraine’s sovereignty through diplomacy. For his part, the Russian president has already pressured Biden, according to the Kremlin’s reading of his conference call on Tuesday, to assure him that the United States would oppose allowing Ukraine to join NATO.

On the other hand, Putin’s diplomats have also favored an interpretation of the Minsk accords that would give the Russian-backed separatists in Lugansk and Donetsk almost complete autonomy from the central government in Kiev, while denying that any of its forces are present. in those regions.

Kurt Volker, who served as former President Donald Trump’s envoy to the Ukraine peace negotiations, told me that he made it clear that the United States interpreted the Minsk accords to mean that Russia would have to withdraw its forces and dismantle illegal militias. which he supported before Ukraine gave Lugansk and Donetsk special political status.

Russia’s view on its obligations under the agreement “it would actually undermine Ukraine’s sovereignty and reward Putin for the attack on Ukraine that started in 2014″ Volker pointed out.

For its part, the Biden Administration has not publicly offered a detailed view of its own interpretation of the Minsk accords, other than saying that it supports the negotiations and, more generally, the territorial integrity of Ukraine. The US government has also said it hopes to use those negotiations to reduce tensions within Ukraine and seek a possible ceasefire or other confidence-building measures.

However, offering consultations with NATO and renewing America’s attention to the Minsk process is itself a concession to Putin. To begin with, it confirms that Russia has been a bona fide actor in the peace talks for the past seven years. But Ben Hodges, a former US Army commander in Europe and a Pershing fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, said Russia has undermined the deal in recent years by thwarting European attempts to monitor hot spots in Ukraine’s war. To this day, Russia denies that its forces are in Lugansk and Donetsk, thus arguing that it cannot withdraw troops that are not there.

As for NATO, Russia’s position is well known: it wants guarantees that Ukraine and other former Soviet republics can never join the alliance. Hosting a high-level meeting with Russia on Ukraine’s possible future in NATO will only sow further questions about how much the West is willing to risk to protect what remains of Ukrainian sovereignty. It would also give legitimacy to Putin’s demands, whose goal is to break the alliance, not reorganize it.

Biden needs to be cautious: It is almost obvious that the United States and Europe must dissuade Putin from starting another war against his neighbor. However, the price of that deterrence could ultimately be the independence of Ukraine.