There is a desperate need for a ceasefire in Ukraine. Russia’s war continues to bring death to thousands, displacement of millions, and the destruction of towns and cities across Ukraine. The war, now entering its ninth month, has been illegal from day one. It violates both the UN Charter and international humanitarian law. Years of provocations by NATO, Europe and most of all the United States did not justify Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine.
A ceasefire to end the war was urgently needed on February 25, the day after the war began. A ceasefire was imperative when Russia escalated its attacks and seized Ukrainian territory in the south and east of the country starting in early April. A ceasefire was critically important when the Ukrainians succeeded at wresting back much of the seized territory in September. And a ceasefire is desperately required now as the Ukrainian counter-offensive continues and Russia persists in its retaliation against civilian targets across Ukraine.
In some ways ceasefires can seem complicated – by themselves they don’t solve the problems that led to armed conflict in the first place. By themselves they don’t hold the perpetrators accountable. By themselves they don’t change the balance of forces on the ground when they go into effect. In short, by themselves, ceasefires are never enough. But in one fundamental way they are as urgent and simple as can be: once declared, and for as long as ceasefires hold, while other issues are being negotiated, people are no longer being killed, injured or made homeless.
. . . There must be real, serious diplomacy and negotiations. As is always the case with negotiations, that means a long bargaining process. The United States certainly has no right to impose specific concessions on Kyiv – Ukraine is a sovereign country. But as the primary weapons supplier and economic backer of Ukraine’s military and government, Washington has not only the right but the responsibility to push for diplomacy. Despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hostile rhetoric, the claim that Russia isn’t interested simply isn’t enough, especially when Russian officials have voiced openness to participating in talks.
Neither side is likely to show willingness to negotiate without pressure – and telling the leadership in Kyiv that Washington will continue to provide unlimited billions of U.S. tax dollars and weapons to continue this war, at the potential cost of far more Ukrainian lives, with no endgame in sight, is simply not acceptable. The risks are too great.
The United States doesn’t need to tell Kyiv what it should concede, but it certainly should make clear its own diplomatic positions. That could start with making clear that U.S. sanctions on Russia, designed ostensibly to push Russia to negotiate, will in fact be lifted when a ceasefire in Ukraine is implemented.
Second, the United States could call for new bilateral U.S.-Russian talks designed to reopen and strengthen all existing and abandoned nuclear disarmament and arms control treaties. That could start with a new commitment from both the United States and Russia to implement Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which calls for the recognized nuclear weapons states to move towards “nuclear disarmament, and . . . general and complete disarmament.”
Third, the United States could announce its intention to halt construction on its latest overseas military base, currently being built in Poland just 100 miles from the Russian border. The base is designed to serve as the Pentagon’s 5th Army Headquarters, and will include the deployment of strategic missiles as well as a full field battalion of soldiers, the first permanent U.S. troop deployment among NATO’s eastern European post-Soviet members.
Any or all of these moves by the United States – while appropriately limited to Washington’s own negotiating positions – could go a long way in pushing reluctant politicians in both Kyiv and Moscow to reconsider their need for a ceasefire and diplomacy. And they could go equally far in reducing the current threat, however small it may seem, of direct U.S.-Russian nuclear engagement.
To read Phyllis Bennis’ article “It’s Time For a Ceasefire in Ukraine,” click here.
Quote of the Day – December 28, 2022
See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• A “Post-Cold War Train Wreck Long In the Making”
• Yanis Varoufakis: Quote of the Day – February 24, 2022
• A Prayer for Ukraine
• Jeff Cohen: Quote of the Day – February 28, 2022
• Something to Think About – March 4, 2022
• William Hartung: Quote of the Day – May 24, 2022
For more of Phyllis Bennis at The Wild Reed, see:
• Phyllis Bennis On the Crisis in Afghanistan
• Progressive Perspectives on the Ongoing Israeli-Palestinian “Nightmare”
• Progressive Perspectives on the Ilhan Omar “Controversy”
• Progressive Perspectives on U.S. Military Intervention in Syria
• You, O Comforter, Are Ever Near
• In the Wake of the Paris Attacks, Saying “No” to War, Racism and Islamophobia
• The Tenth Anniversary of the U.S. Invasion of Iraq
• Phyllis Bennis: Quote of the Day – February 2, 2011
• A Voice of Reason
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