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Topic: Geopolitics Blog Brand: The Buzz Region: Eurasia Tags: Crimea, Peace Talks, Russia, Ukraine War, and Vladimir Putin What Vladimir Putin Wants From The Ukraine Peace Talks February 19, 2025 By: Stavros Atlamazoglou Share

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Essentially, the Kremlin seeks to officialize its military gains in Ukraine through international recognition. 

Peace talks about ending the war in Ukraine are underway between the United States and Russia in Saudi Arabia. For the first time in many months, there seems to be a true momentum for negotiations that could end the war.

But what should America make of the Russian demands? Russia, after all, is the aggressor. It is the one who commenced this war by invading its neighbor on February 24, 2022. Almost three years since the large-scale war began, what is the Russian leadership seeking to get out of a potential peace settlement that it could not achieve through three years of bloodshed?

The Russian Position

“The Kremlin reiterated its demands that Ukraine cede additional territory in eastern and southern Ukraine to Russia and disband the Ukrainian military in the future while continuing to message that the Kremlin is unwilling to make territorial concessions itself in any future peace negotiations,” the Institute for the Study of War stated in its latest operational update on the war in Ukraine.

Russian Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya expressed some extreme positions during a UN Security Council meeting on Monday. Specifically, the Russian official stressed that Ukraine has irrevocably lost the Crimean Peninsula, as well as the Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson Oblasts.  

Essentially, the Kremlin seeks to officialize its war gains through international recognition. Specifically, it seeks to legitimize the land bridge that connects Russia with the Crimean Peninsula, which was one of the main objectives of the Russian military during the initial invasion. In addition, the Kremlin seeks to make its hold over the Crimean Peninsula—achieved in 2014 through a covert invasion and a sham “referendum” in which 97 percent supported annexation by Russia—official in the eyes of the world.

As a reminder, Crimea was the reason that Russia’s war on Ukraine began in the first place. In 2014, following Russia’s takeover of the peninsula—aided by the “little green men,” later revealed to be Russian soldiers without uniforms or insignia—conventional Russian military units flooded the Peninsula on the pretext of stability operations. Similar units’ entry into the rebel-held areas of Donetsk and Luhansk on February 21, 2022 helped provide a justification for the full-scale invasion of Ukraine three days later.

“The Kremlin also appears to be resurrecting Putin’s previous demands and information operations aimed at delegitimizing Ukraine and its government in the eyes of the West — notably ahead of the February 18 Russia-US bilateral meeting in Saudi Arabia,” the Institute for the Study of War added.

Russia Wants Ukraine’s Annihilation

Russian President Vladimir Putin does not want Ukraine to continue to exist. In 2021, the Russian president wrote a long essay, “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians,” detailing the centuries-long bonds between the Russian and Ukrainian people. Putin’s central thesis was that Ukraine had always belonged to Russia, and Ukrainians were Russian. Consequently, the independence of Ukraine from Russia was a historical mistake that needed to be corrected—a process that Putin undertook in February 2022.

For this reason, any “peace settlement” that fails to provide Ukraine with the means to defend itself is a guarantee of future war. Like a hungry wolf looking for his next prey, Putin will come back to get the rest of Ukraine at the earliest opportunity.  

Fortunately, it is unlikely that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will agree to such terms. The Ukrainian military and people have fought hard and paid a bitter price to liberate their territory from the Russian yoke. 

Although it is true that the Ukrainian forces are exhausted and currently lack the means necessary to achieve an operational breakthrough on the battlefield so as to strengthen the Ukrainian negotiating position, it is hard to imagine Zelensky agreeing to humiliating terms—particularly as the Russian forces are barely in a better position on the battlefield than the Ukrainians are.

About the Author: Stavros Atlamazoglou  

Stavros Atlamazoglou is a seasoned defense journalist specializing in special operations and a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ). He holds a BA from the Johns Hopkins University and an MA from the Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). His work has been featured in Business Insider, Sandboxx, and SOFREP. 

Image: Shutterstock. 

The post What Vladimir Putin Wants From The Ukraine Peace Talks appeared first on The National Interest.

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