Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rejected a proposal from German Chancellor Olaf Scholz just days before the Russian invasion. The February 19 offer called on Kyiv to renounce its NATO aspirations and declare neutrality.
At the time, Zelensky rejected the security plan saying Russian President Vladimir Putin could not be trusted to uphold the agreement. Under Berlin’s plan, Putin and American President Joe Biden would sign the deal and jointly guarantee Ukraine’s security.
The Wall Street Journal, which initially reported the proposal, said that Zelensky rejecting the offer "left German officials worried that the chances of peace were fading."
The day after the meeting, French President Emmanual Marcon appealed to Biden in a call between world leaders to make another push for diplomacy. "I think the last person who could still do something is you, Joe. Are you ready to meet Putin?" Macron said to Biden. However, Washington appeared uninterested in a push for diplomacy.
While the full details of the German offer are unknown, it appears similar to proposals Zelensky has outlined in recent weeks. Ukraine’s top negotiator David Arakhamia said Russia had "verbally" agreed to several of Kyiv’s positions. On Sunday, Russia’s top negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said the two sides are not close enough to an agreement for a meeting between Putin and Zelensky. “The draft agreement is not ready for submission to a meeting at the top,” the Russian chief negotiator said.
Kyle Anzalone is the opinion editor of Antiwar.com, news editor of the Libertarian Institute, and co-host of Conflicts of Interest.
Biden would never have agreed to Scholz’s very reasonable proposal.
Biden’s Neocon bosses always wanted Russia to go to war with Ukraine. They got their wish.
Unfortunately Putin fell into the Neocon trap. Now Russia is bogged down in a war it can’t win and it is being hurt by sanctions. Most tragically for the anti war movement, Russia will not be able to oppose US/NATO imperialist schemes in the Middle East, Africa or the Pacific until it can extricate itself from the Ukrainian mess. And the US war mongering achieved this without committing a single American or NATO soldier.
I am also concerned that the sanctions on Russia may force a premature showdown between China and the G7 that China is not ready for. China’s foreign policy is based on the recognition that as China rises and the US and EU decline, it is in China’s best interest to delay the inevitable showdown with the G7 over the global economy as long as possible. But the sanctions on Russia may force the Chines to choose between abandoning Russia or prematurely challenging the US domination of the global economy.
It would also help if Putin wasn’t on 10 different drugs, obviously it’s impossible to be rational under those circumstances.
Question I wonder about is whether he will be hospitalised soon or if he can stay isolated at his office?
Let’s not make this a personal attack on Putin. The man has made some good decisions fighting ISIS in Syria and giving Snowden asylum to name only two. He is also an authoritarian, runs a repressive state, censors the press and imprisons some political opponents. Putin’s demands for Ukrainian neutrality were completely reasonable and he pursued a diplomatic solution for eight years. But he made a colossal mistake by attacking a country that had not attacked Russia. I hope he has the wisdom to recognize his mistake and the courage to correct it. There are very few just wars. The Russian invasion of Ukraine is not one of them.
Just a mistake? Not a war crime?
The “colossal mistake” was Zelensky’s, as this story shows.
As for Biden: how do we classify his refusal to negotiate, his condemnation of Russian aggression while supporting Saudi aggression, his own attacks on Syria and Iraq? And nearly ad-libbing us into a war with Russia!
Zelensky deserves impeachment in Ukraine. Biden deserves it here.
What is Biden supposed to negotiate, and with whom is he supposed to negotiate it? Ukraine is not one of the 50 US states, nor is the US at war with Russia. The whole affair is none of Biden’s business — and wouldn’t have happened in the first place (at least in the way it’s happening at the moment) if Biden and previous US presidents hadn’t stuck their nose into the region.
The best thing Biden could do would be to drink a nice hot cup of Shut the F*ck Up.
Nicely stated, Thomas!
“What is Biden supposed to negotiate, and with whom is he supposed to negotiate it? Ukraine is not one of the 50 US states” One could get confused, last time Russia invaded someone, it was :-p
And would you nominate Putin for the Nobel Prize?
Biden is the most guilty. But the person who pulls the trigger is always responsible.
Putin should not have invaded a country that had not attacked Russia.
The Azov Brigade is an abomination. But abomination is not justifiiable casus belli.
The invasion force that attacked Donbas was trained, equipped, and AWACS guided by the US; and had killed 13 to 15K Russo-Ukrainians over the previous 8 years before Russia sent in a counter-force.
And escalated the actions immediately prior to Russia’s invasion.
Then Putin should attack the US, we have a lot of Azov like folks here. Plus Russia has an even larger group of home grown Neo Nazis. He should’ve started there.
Look at the leftist Don Julio, talking big. How cute. Never mind that it’s your fellow leftists who attack people in the streets, you pretend it’s “FASCISTS!” Which side was it that looted and burned stores, destroying people’s livelihoods, while the media cheered them and hid their crimes? Causing billions of dollars in damage, and attacking and beating people in the streets? It was BurnLootMurder and the communists in Antifa. Who occupied blocks in Seattle and extracted money from the store owners, while the leftist politicians ordered the police to do nothing? Who burned down a police station, and attacked a court house? It was leftists. Typical leftist behavior to terrorize people in the streets and attack stores in the preparation for a takeover. Ordinary decent people must be terrorized and silenced, plus you’re criminals so you love attacking people for the sake of it. Not in Russia, though. A country with conservative leaders who’d arrest you right away. That’s why you hate Russia.
“Putin should not have invaded a country that had not attacked Russia.”
They were shelling Donbass, and had killed thousands. They moved troops east to invade Donbass. Yes, the Russians should invade to protect those attacked, and to stand up against the globalists. The Russians are among the few who fight back. (Sorry, “PUTIN!” Let’s follow the media propaganda tactic of calling your target one person, while other countries are named as countries. Because it is easier to think a person is wrong. So it’s not “Russia and Zelensky,” it’s “PUTIN and Ukraine”.)
Some of us remember a very bad experience when a European leader declared that his country had the right to go to war against other countries that oppressed German speaking people. After 50 million people died in WWII the allies decided to outlaw the use of military force against foreign countries except in self-defense or authorized by the UN security council without objection by any of the five great powers. I spend most of my effort objecting to wars of aggression by the USA. But it is also wrong when the aggressor is Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iraq, or Russia.
There are Nazis in Ukraine and the Azov brigade is an abomination. But Ukraine has not attacked Russia and the rebellion in Donbass is an internal affair. If Ukraine has committed war crimes in Donbass, there are remedies short of war.
I remember your earlier comment about how you have been watching the players NATO and the West for a long time, & how you “feared” Putin had fallen into a trap. BUT when Doltenburg said “NO” to not absorbing Ukraine into NATO, What should Putin have done to smash that obstruction and keep Russia safe from the Exitentially threatening creep of NATO to his very doorstep?
Biden deliberately tried to provoke Putin into starting a war that would remove Russia as a major competitor against US imperialism. Putin should have supported an indigenous Ukrainian resistance without direct military intervention.
Please, list the 10 drugs Putin is on with sources for justification. You are here on one of the more serious sites and this stuff belongs on The Hill or other such sites.
One of the more serious sites? Really? I love the site, have been visiting it since 2002 but the comments site exploded recently with most people campaigning for Putin and being anti Ukraine and US. Objectivity here is lacking.
The comment section doesn’t degrade the site. Don’t read them if you have a problem with people having a different opinion compared to your own.
Many aren’t’ opinions but posted propaganda. An antiwar website where comments favor the very country that started the war.
Whether that’s true or not still doesn’t degrade the site. Again, don’t read them.
Did you favor the country that bombed or invaded Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, and Serbia?
The commenters speak for themselves, not for Antiwar.com.
In my experience, nearly everyone is antiwar until they see a war they like. Then they turn into the love child of Baghdad Bob and Madeleine Albright.
Soros/WEF Bot talking about “propaganda” — GTFOH
“Everyone I disagree with is a [insert disliked person or group here] bot/troll” may be self-comforting, but it’s not much of an argument.
Being pro-war doesn’t make one pro US.
“exploded recently” The socialist is angry that someone is fighting back against the globalists. Should have let Zelensky invade Donbass. Bad evil conservative Russia, I mean PUTIN!!!
Too many comments to answer, but look up meds for cancer and Parkinson patients. And if you don’t believe, look at the midget himself, I mean Putin. You only look that way when you are dying and propped up on meds.
How can Zelensky have any “peace” negotiation/agreement with Putin where his demands are basically to handover Ukraine to Russia and completely demilitarize. Putin says one thing and does another one. Your word as a man means everything, and he has lost that. Doesn’t help the constant denial of his troops ever doing anything negative.
Nothing anywhere about Russia demanding Zelensky hand over Ukraine. You just made that up.
Maybe Helmut Kohl, German Chancellor and James Baker (among others), who promised the then-Soviet Union that NATO would not be expanded beyond a reunified Germany, lost their “Your word as a man means everything and he has lost that.”?
To completely demilitarize may have been a bridge too far. But not joining NATO shouldn’t have been. After all, if Ukraine join’s NATO, who would control NATO”s nukes on the border…????? It could not be assured that it would be Ukraine, and not Washington, there certainly was room to barter, but not on the control and command issue. There should have been negotiations& not a “Dolt in Burg”straight arm on the critical command and control issue of who control’s the nukes…!!!!!!!
” Do people think that Putin and Russian leaders are THAT stupid to play right into the ‘war crimes/atrocities’ narrative and make it REAL?”
I have no opinion on the number, scale, or particular perpetrators of war crimes in Ukraine, because the truth is just going to be difficult or impossible to pin down.
That said, you seem to think that war crimes happen when the Big Guy in the Office Back Home orders them. That’s usually not the case. What usually happens is that troops in the field get stupid out of anger, shell-shock, whatever, and do things they weren’t ordered to do and in fact were probably ordered not to do.
The German did what Biden ought to have done but did not. This is exactly why this is Biden’s War.
He passed on the clear chance to avoid the war, because he preferred war.
He just expected a different war than he got. But then, almost always those who choose war don’t get the war they expected to get. We don’t see a long history of “Short Victorious Wars” but instead a long history of prolonged nasty wars that don’t work out well at all — that is the norm not the exception, and it just happened again, this time to Biden.
I agree except that Biden got exactly what he wanted. Biden does not want a Ukrainian victory. Biden wants a long, drawn out war that will:
1. Remove Russia as a strategic counterweight against US imperialism in the Middle East, Africa and the Pacific;
2. Bleed the Russian military and strain the Russian economy;
3. Enable the US to wage economic war against Russia for years;
4. Give Biden an excuse for inflation and austerity in the US;
5. Raise Biden’s standing in the polls and save the Democrats from disaster in 2022 and 2024 and;
6, Generate profits for the MIC without the domestic blowback that comes when US soldiers get killed.
Even Zelenskyy is criticizing Biden for going slow on his military aid request. I suspect Zelenskyy may have come to realize the Biden and his Neocon/Neoliberal masters want the war to continue as long as possible. Ukraine is just a pawn to be sacrificed in their game.
Spot on, simple and brilliant true oppinion that should be allowed to published all international news. But they won’t do that,truth is inconvenient truth for Americans and war is higher interest, stimulation of the war economy as usual expense of the dead Ukrainians.
Zelensky is usual idiot’s able and willing to be puppets for US and he has blood in his hands,and I am sure he will be rewarded for that.
Sounds like Scholz proposed this because Biden wouldn’t. The last thing Germany needs is the interruption in natural gas resources.
The globalists are dragging down everyone for their control. Except of course China..
Most bumbling guy in Ukraine, and that’s saying something. What he CAN do is arrest the runner-up in the election and put him in house arrest. Put people in prison for clicking like on social media. But he couldn’t stop the Azov Battalion from shelling Donbass. The video of him shows him telling them, “I’m 41 years old, I won the election, you have to listen to me”. And they just refuse. And the other battalion in Donbass threatened to move troops to Donbass if he persisted.
So Zelensky just switched and ignored the Minsk Agreement. You see him in pics sitting with the battalion leaders by a table. As they wanted, he moved 150,000 soldiers east to prepare the invasion of Donbass, and artillery shelling went up from 20 a day to more than a hundred a day. Will Russia next door stop this? Nah, surely not! Hey, let’s come home from Germany and talk about acquiring nuclear weapons too! Russia will be totally fine with that!
I am fairly certain that history will conclude that this war is the consequence of massive misjudgements on the parts of Putin, Zelenski and NATO.
Strange that there was no western condemnation of Ukraine killing their own people in eastern Ukraine.
Zelensky can`t agree to anything without Washingtons approval , Zelensky was put into power because he is a idiot easy to control by his CIA handlers
Same goes for our NATO partners, e.g. follower subordinates when it comes to making policy and decisions.
Bye-Done is calling for Putin to be tried for “war crimes”.
Yeah, I’ll go along with that when Bush is tried for war crimes.
Zelensky making new demands every day, thinking he is deserving of everything asked, when he’s just a tinhorn tinpot dictator, who is the successor to the regime we installed in Ukraine when we funded, planned and helped overthrow the last legal, democratically elected (and neutral) government there, in 2014.
It never was zelensky’s decision, was it? Who decided?
You already know.