This is a translation (which I made with help of AI to do it fast) of an extremely thoughtful article by Marcin Wyrwał - Polish war correspondent in Ukraine (See Marcin on X). The original text is here).
A note - I did not get permission from Marcin to do so. I hope I do not make any harm though ...
Donald Trump promises to end the war. In reality, he will drag us into an even bigger one
At the Republican convention, Donald Trump promised to end all wars, including the one in Ukraine. At first glance, his proposal seems brilliantly simple. In reality, it is simplistic and guarantees dragging not only Ukraine but all of Europe into a much bloodier conflict.
During the Republican Party convention in Milwaukee, the presidential candidate, Donald Trump, once again made populist promises. One of them is particularly dangerous—not only for Ukraine but for our entire region. It concerns ending the war in Ukraine.
Trump, in a single sentence, promised to end not only this but "every international crisis caused by the current administration." The promise to end all crises is classic populist fluff, unsupported by reality, and aimed at applause from less informed voters. However, the promise to end the war in Ukraine might actually come true if Trump comes to power. The issue is that, in Trump's proposed formula, it is a ready recipe for bloodshed on a much larger scale and territory than Ukraine alone.
Trump's plan to end the war has been known since at least April. In private conversations described by "The Washington Post", the Republican presidential candidate suggested that to achieve this, it would be enough to give Russia Crimea and the other territories it currently occupies in Ukraine. In the same conversations, Trump said that such a plan would allow both sides to "save face", and that the residents of the occupied territories "would not mind" joining Russia, which clearly indicates a complete lack of understanding of the situation.
Let's focus on the core part of Trump's plan—peace in exchange for territories handed over to Moscow.
The problem is that Ukraine has already been through this, and each time, the result of such a scenario has been escalation on a much larger scale. Explaining this is a bit more complex than Trump's rally slogans.
How the West Allowed Ukraine to Be Pushed into the Gray Zone
Ukraine liberated itself from Russia on August 24, 1991, with the adoption of the declaration of independence by the Ukrainian parliament. The Ukrainian nation gained freedom, but this development was also extremely beneficial for Poland. Until then, we were the buffer for Europe and the first strike zone for Russia in an attack on Europe (of course, for several decades, we were also in the Eastern Bloc, which would still end in conflict on our territory).
For the Russian empire, which has always been based on the mechanism of continuously expanding its borders, the loss of Ukraine was unacceptable from the beginning. Perhaps Zbigniew Brzeziński, advisor to three American presidents, captured it best when he said:
In the imperial logic, in the longer term, the "loss" of Warsaw, Berlin, and Paris is also unacceptable for Russia. Therefore, our continent is doomed to perpetual skirmishes with Russia. This is a historically insoluble situation in our region.
The chance for longer stabilization was to incorporate Ukraine into NATO structures in the first years after gaining independence, when Russia was still economically and militarily weakened. However, the West did not decide on such a solution due to its perennial fear of escalation. Even the accession of Poland and other countries in our region to NATO caused enough problems due to the resistance of several Western countries, including our closest neighbor, Germany.
Ukraine, therefore, remained in the gray zone of Europe.
This allowed Russia to start the process of peeling away Ukraine. In the following years, we realized that it was not the West's firm stance but successive concessions regarding Ukraine that led to further escalations from Moscow.
Why Kyiv Gave Up Its Nuclear Weapons
In the first years after the collapse of the USSR, Moscow was too weak to extend its reach over Ukraine. On the other hand, Ukraine was grappling with an economic downturn and corruption, making it vulnerable to Russia's soft power influences.
The first major test of strength was the crisis involving nuclear weapons. After the dissolution of the USSR, nearly 1,900 nuclear warheads and 2,500 tactical nuclear weapons remained on Ukrainian territory. Overnight, Ukraine became the world's third-largest nuclear power, after the USA and Russia. Although the launch codes for these warheads were still in Moscow, merely possessing these weapons provided Ukraine with security guarantees.
Why did Ukraine ultimately surrender such a significant arsenal to Russia?
On one hand, Moscow made territorial claims against Ukraine, signaling that it would be willing to make concessions if Kyiv surrendered its nuclear arsenal. Not everyone remembers today that at that time, Russians were already stirring up separatist movements in Crimea, and in May 1992, the Crimean parliament even declared that the peninsula was an independent state. There was also unrest in the Kremlin-sponsored separatist republic of Transnistria, which borders Ukraine.
On the other hand, during the bloody war in the Balkans, the West feared that Ukraine would become a "Yugoslavia with nukes." As usual, it was terrified of Moscow's unpredictable reactions.
A country fighting to maintain its newly gained independence and on the brink of economic collapse found itself squeezed by the pressures from the world's major powers.
The resulting compromise
These pressures culminated in the signing of the Budapest Memorandum on December 5, 1994. By surrendering its nuclear weapons, Kyiv temporarily obtained two things it desperately needed. The first was the recognition of its borders by Moscow. The USA, Russia, and the United Kingdom became guarantors of its sovereignty.
The second, less frequently mentioned, was American compensation for surrendering the weapons in the form of one billion dollars, which provided Ukraine with the economic lifeline it needed at the time.
However, the memorandum had a significant flaw: it did not specify any concrete actions by the West in the event of Russia violating its terms - said then-President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma.
The West was optimistic, believing that by handing over the nuclear weapons to Moscow, it was de-escalating regional tensions.
But what were the actual consequences of these concessions?
What resulted from giving up nuclear weapons
For years, Russia did not feel strong enough to strike Ukraine directly and was content with increasing its political influence in the country.
The crisis between the two nations was triggered by the Orange Revolution in Kyiv in 2004, caused by electoral fraud by the pro-Kremlin camp. As a result of the revolution, Ukrainian democrats came to power through fair elections, but due to significant internal disputes, they eventually lost control. Viktor Yanukovych, a Kremlin puppet, became president. At that time, this was sufficient for Moscow.
It stopped being sufficient when widespread corruption, multiplying economic crises, and pushing Ukraine towards Russia led to the outbreak of the Maidan revolution in Kyiv in late autumn 2013. After the removal of the Kremlin puppet from the presidency in 2014, Moscow decided it could not wait any longer.
Putin annexed Crimea and started the war in Donbas. The guarantees of territorial integrity from the Budapest Memorandum proved futile. And the West? As predicted by Kuchma, "did not even raise an eyebrow."
In September 2014 and February 2015, Ukraine, under the threat of a gun to the head and pressured by Germany and France, signed the humiliating Minsk Agreements, which were supposed to end the war. The fighting in Donbas resulted in about 15,000 Ukrainian casualties, and Ukraine lost 7% of its territory.
Ukrainians tried to find some silver linings. Officials and politicians I spoke with at the time unofficially pointed to benefits from losing Crimea and parts of Donbas—arguing that the pro-Russian electorate from those regions no longer voted for their own, which significantly weakened pro-Russian forces in the Ukrainian parliament.
But did the "end" of the war at that time really conclude it?
What Trump really proposes?
No - it did not! It smoldered for the following years, while Russia gained the time needed to prepare for another, much stronger strike.
At dawn on February 24, 2022, I listened from a hotel on Kyiv's Maidan to the first explosions of the new phase of the war—a mass invasion of Ukraine by Russia. The first people were dying.
As I write these words, despite the lack of official data, it can be safely assumed that the number of Ukrainian casualties has significantly exceeded 100,000. Russia also occupies about 18% of the country’s territory, two and a half times more than after the first aggression. The damage to civilian infrastructure runs into billions.
The de-escalatory gesture of handing over nuclear weapons to Russia in 1994 led to escalation in 2014. The de-escalatory "end" of hostilities in 2015 led to escalation in 2022. Each successive stage of this drama multiplies the losses.
Today, we are at a point where Russia is sending subtle signals to the West that it might be ready for negotiations. This could—though it is not certain—mean that its resources in the more than two-year-long material war are starting to run out. In such a case, the task for the resource-rich West would be to press Moscow on the Ukrainian front.
Instead, we have Trump's seemingly brilliantly simple, but in reality, crude and counterproductive idea of ending the war at the cost of the territories already occupied.
For Moscow, such a proposal is simply an opportunity to gain time to prepare for another, even stronger strike in the future. From historical experience, we know that all kinds of guarantees and agreements, which Trump would now like to sign, are meaningless to the Kremlin.
At the same time, Europe will arm itself to the teeth, understanding that with the progressing isolationism of the USA, it will be left to face this war alone. Today in Europe, we see a trend towards reducing military aid to Ukraine in favor of filling their own warehouses. Given such a development, this means that during the next Russian strike, the Ukrainian defense might quickly collapse. Then the war will move to the eastern edges of the European Union. Well-armed forces will clash with even greater intensity than currently.
And this is what Trump proposes to us....
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