The latest haggling over ending the war in Ukraine appears to be focused on three elements two of which could be labelled “promissory” and one “instant delivery."
The instant delivery bit concerns an agreement to let Russia keep the chunk of Donbas it has conquered. That is what US President Donald Trump calls “territorial concession” by Ukraine.
In his latest meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Berlin, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky seemed to have accepted such an outcome with the caveat that it be regarded as de facto rather than de jure.
In exchange, he wishes to get unspecified security guarantees from the US, something that Trump might grant on his social media accounts knowing that an iron-clad legal guarantee may never happen.
The “promissory” part of the putative deal stipulates that Ukraine should cut the size of its army by half and promise never to seek membership of NATO. As you might have guessed these promises are diplomatic fig leaves to save Russian President Vladimir Putin from embarrassment as both could be ignored in a future that none can predict.
As a result, what matters right now are territorial concessions that Putin has demanded. The future of the occupied Crimean Peninsula doesn’t appear to be part of the current negotiations. As none of the members of the United Nations has recognized Russian annexation, its status will remain uncertain.
But even if Putin gets what he wants in Donbas, he is unlikely to achieve an abiding victory to justify a war that has been the costliest in terms of blood and treasure in Russian history since the 1940s. Having started with the stated aim of in one way or another attaching the whole Ukraine to Russia he would have to settle for a total of 30,000 square kilometers of land, a flimsy glacis for his federation’s 17 million square kilometer territory.
Prevalent view today is that Putin has a better hand to play than Zelensky and that may be right. Zelensky is badly shaken by corruption scandals under his nose and incompetence in many parts of his government. Thus, he may be prepared to make the concessions that Putin and Trump demand albeit in different tones.
Nevertheless, it would be wrong to overestimate the advantage that Putin might claim at this juncture. The fact that he was prepared to spend hours with Trump’s personal envoy Steve Witkoff thus ignoring all protocol is a sign if not of desperation at least of the weakness of the hand he can play.
Putin may get Donetsk and Luhansk. But would he be able to russify them? The answer may be no. The war has driven some 40 percent of the population out of their villages and towns. More than half have fled to Ukraine while the other half has become refugees in Russia itself. Moscow has tried to turn the half-ruined city of Mariupol, the crown in the jewel of its victories in this war, into a showcase for how lovely life could be under the Russian flag.
Dozens of new apartment blocks have been built, often in Stalinist architectural style that would have pleased Zhdanov and other gurus of Socialist Realism.
Most of those “gifts of the Russian people” have found no takers.
Ukrainian refugees refuse to return and ethnic Russian settlers have not rushed to colonize the new conquests.
Reporters who visited the showcase town found a ghost-town populated by old people who couldn’t escape and a sprinkle of Latin American and African mercenaries.
Afflicted by one of the lowest birthrates in the world plus a demographic hemorrhage that has driven millions of young Russians into exile, Russia lacks the extra population needed to build colonies and empires.
We already knew that when Putin’s grandiose policy launched a decade ago for populating Siberia known as the Far Eastern Federal District plan ran into a wall.
Despite promises of cash-for settlement, landownership deeds, grants and interest free loans to set up businesses only a few thousand ethnic Russians rose to the bait.
Ultimately the plan attracted large numbers of Chinese settlers and seasonal workers plus North Korean “temporary residents” who come and go across the border.
History is full of examples of demographic deficit frustrating empire-building schemes.
In the 19th century Russia annexed large chunks of land in Central Asia and the Caucasus but couldn’t alter their ethnic identity as the Tsarist Empire unlike the British Empire at the time didn’t produce enough babies.
In the 1940s Russia annexed 10 percent of Finland but never managed to replace the ethnic Finn population who fled across the border.
Newly minted German Reich under Bismarck annexed the French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine with the result that a chunk of the population fled to other parts of France while the Reich lacked the demographic reserve to repopulate the annexed lands.
Enjoying demographic boom Spain, Portugal and France built empires on three continents. World War I stopped France’s baby boom.
Back to the Ukrainian tragedy, Putin may find out that even if he is allowed to annex part of Donbas, he would fail to Russify them. Russia’s historic sense of insecurity arguably the core cause of its aggressiveness would not be addressed by a flimsy glacis which in time would need a further glacis to offer it security.
Putin is thinking about 21st century issues in 19th century terms.
Russia lacks the advantages it enjoyed in the 19th century. Today, Russian official statistic show that the country faces a labor shortage of over four million to keep its economy afloat and hundreds of thousands of young men and women to replace losses sustained by its army in this senseless war.
The moral of this tragedy may be this: Don’t bite more than you can chew, and If you wish to win wars and build an empire make babies.
