The strife and war in Ukraine started with a U.S. supported coup eleven years ago. It might end, ironically, with a U.S. supported coup eleven years later. There is an embryonic chance that, if Vladimir Putin signs an agreement to end the war, it will not be Volodymyr Zelensky’s signature on the line beside it.
Being the leader to negotiate an end to the war was always going to be a struggle for Zelensky. He may have been the perfect president to lead Ukraine through the war with Russia. But he may not be the perfect president to lead them out.
Negotiating an end to the war with Russia could be challenging for Zelensky for three reasons. The first is that Ukrainians were nourished throughout the war on Zelensky’s promises of maximalist results. To rally both Ukrainians and Ukraine’s partners, Zelensky promised that Ukraine would reconquer lost territory and redraw the borders of Ukraine to include, not only the Donbas, but Crimea. After all the suffering and loss of life, to negotiate an end to the war, having not gained back territory, but having lost even more would be a difficult sell for Zelensky. Especially given that the concession will certainly come without the compensation of membership in NATO.
The second is that, having insisted that Putin should not and cannot be negotiated with, Zelensky would have to rescind his decree that Ukraine would not negotiate with Putin.
The third is that Zelensky would face solid, and potentially lethal, opposition from the same ultra-right nationalists who persuaded him to abandon his campaign promise to negotiate a peace with Russia when he was elected in 2019. Even then, Zelensky faced a backlash and defiance from ultranationalist leaders who even threatened his life. How much worse would the resistance be were Zelensky to lead Ukrainians back to those negotiations with the loss of the Donbas that then could have been theirs and with the hundreds of thousands of people who died or were wounded for nothing?
Hellbound and Down 