The United States is privately telling Ukraine to be open to negotiations with Russia...

 

A Ukrainian fighter near Zaporizhzhia. Reuters.

The United States is privately telling Ukraine to be open to negotiations with Russia. Reuters. Ukraine and President Zelenksyy have publicly said they would not negotiate with Russia unless Vladimir Putin resigns. The officials quoted in the report said it was not a genuine attempt to end the war, but as a ploy to calm foreign critics who are paying a price for the costs of the war. Joe Biden said he would continue to fund Ukraine for "as long as it takes" So far Zelenskyy has not shown himself to be open to negotiation and it is unclear if Putin would agree to new negotiations. 

My Comment:

Talk about a cynically development. For a second I thought that some sanity had finally broken out in the Biden White House as it has been obvious for a long time that the only way this war ends is with a negotiated settlement. When I read the headline I had the naïve hope that this was a legitimate attempt to accomplish that goal. 

Instead this seems to be a cynical attempt to mislead people into thinking that the West is serious about ending the war. People have started to demand that the war end, and it is to the point that we are actually seeing an anti-war movement develop, both here and overseas. 

The people that are actually paying for the war are getting sick of it. I know that I have heard audible groans from people when I announced Biden was sending even more money to Ukraine. And that's here in the United States. We aren't the ones running out of energy. We aren't the ones that have been cut off from grain and fertilizer. We aren't the ones that are going to have people freeze and starve if this nonsense continues. 

The really disgusting thing about this is that there were negotiations happening that were close to ending the war. Indeed, the negotiations were fruitful and that's a major reason why Russia pulled back from Kiev. But Joe Biden pretty much personally ended the negotiations by sending Boris Johnson to law down the law with Zelenskyy. That meant that the war continues to this day. 

I should point out that there is a possibility that this story is false. Reuters didn't cite any named sources for this article and whenever that happens I have to point out that they could be making things up. That isn't always the case but when nobody is willing to go on the record it is something to be wary off. 

I tend to believe that it is true though. Biden is certainly cynical enough to call for negotiations while at the same time telling Zelenskyy to not negotiate. Indeed, that seems like a classic Biden move. I do think that in order to continue to war, Biden needs to blunt the anti-war movement and what better way to do that than by offering this crumb? 

Of course, the whole story is moot if Putin doesn't want to negotiate. I personally don't know what way he would go, I know he was willing to negotiate in the past. But after so many lives have been lost and the massive escalations the United States have committed, I am not sure he will do so. And it's not like he's in any position to lose the war at this point, at worst it will be a Korean or Iraq-Iran war style stalemate. At best, all he has to do is outlast the will of people in the United States and Europe to keep supplying the Ukrainians. That's not a position where he would feel the need to negotiate...