Ukraine's peace trap

Talks on ending the war are following troubling historical patterns

When I watched President Zelensky walk out of the White House last Friday, flashing that defiant thumbs-up to reporters, he wasn't surrendering. He was signaling resistance to a troubling historical pattern. We've been here before - not just once, but repeatedly. And the ending is rarely kind to those who placed their faith in American promises.

Really think about what's unfolding: direct talks between Washington and Moscow in Saudi Arabia, without Ukraine at the table; accusations that Ukraine's government is corrupt or unreasonable; demands for Ukraine to "make peace" while offering vague or limited security assurances. This playbook has been used before, with devastating consequences.

A familiar scenario

What we're witnessing isn't a new strategy. It’s what foreign policy experts call "crossed-lateral peace agreements," where America negotiates directly with adversaries while excluding the most legitimate stakeholder from the talks. The historical evidence for how this ends is consistently catastrophic.

In Vietnam, the Paris Peace Accords of 1973 were primarily negotiated between the U.S. and North Vietnam, with South Vietnamese President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu largely sidelined. The Nixon administration justified this exclusion by portraying South Vietnam as the primary obstacle to peace. When Thiệu rejected the agreement as a threat to his country's sovereignty, the U.S. pressed forward anyway, promising future security guarantees. The result? The fall of Saigon in 1975, just two years later.

In Afghanistan, the 2020 Doha Agreement followed an identical script. The Trump administration negotiated directly with the Taliban, completely cutting out the Afghan government. The deal required only that the Taliban prevent terrorism from Afghan soil—a promise they promptly broke, as evidenced by the discovery of Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul in 2022. President Ashraf Ghani, like Thiệu decades earlier, was portrayed as corrupt and obstructionist when he objected.

President Biden, who oversaw the chaotic withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, deserves a fair share of the blame for the execution. But it was Trump's own deal that set those events in motion by declaring America's exit from the conflict, completely sidelining the Afghan government in the process.

The Ukraine situation isn't Trump's first experience with withdrawing support from allies. During his first term, he abruptly abandoned Kurdish forces in Syria and Turkey, leaving them vulnerable to Turkish military action. His bromance with North Korea's leader even led him to discuss withdrawing most of America's 28,500 troops from South Korea, potentially serving Kim's ambitions to reunify the peninsula on his terms.

Today in Ukraine, we're witnessing the early stages of this same dangerous pattern—but with alarming speed and brazenness. Secretary of State Rubio has already held closed-door talks with Russian officials in Saudi Arabia, deliberately excluding Ukraine from negotiations about its own future. The message couldn't be clearer: Washington and Moscow will decide Ukraine's fate, then present Zelensky with a take-it-or-leave-it proposition. Trump has even publicly stated was "not important" for Zelensky to participate in these initial talks. Meanwhile, we're seeing the now-familiar accusations that Ukraine's government is corrupt or uncooperative - the same groundwork that was laid before abandoning Vietnam and Afghanistan. This isn't diplomacy; it's a prelude to capitulation.

Minerals for peace

The proposed mineral rights agreement—in which Ukraine would surrender access to approximately $500 billion worth of natural resources to the United States—bears all the hallmarks of these past arrangements. Yes, having American companies working inside Ukraine could discourage Putin from attacking those specific areas while Americans are working there. But this at best provides only temporary, perhaps even localized, security while creating the appearance of a "deal" that obscures the fundamental reality: true security guarantees appear secondary to a quick resolution.

Post-ceasefire security vacuum

“In both Vietnam and Afghanistan, American negotiators promised that security guarantees would come after the initial agreement,” Kosh Sadat, a former Afghan general who served as deputy minister of intelligence during the U.S. negotiations with the Taliban. “Those guarantees never materialized. Instead, America quickly lost interest once agreements were signed, leaving its allies vulnerable.”

Sadat, who studied U.S. military history, said the results were predictable. In Afghanistan, the Taliban violation of the Doha Agreement began almost immediately, with escalating attacks on the Afghan government. In Vietnam, North Vietnamese forces launched their final offensive less than two years after the Paris Peace Accords.

Today, Ukraine faces potential security promises that look eerily similar. The talk of European peacekeepers is promising, but without clear American backing, these forces would face enormous challenges. Swedish, Danish and British officials have expressed willingness to contribute, but Italy is hesitant, and Poland- one of Ukraine's strongest supporters - has already ruled out sending soldiers. A fragmented, underpowered peacekeeping mission would likely be insufficient against a determined Russian military.

Europe's existential challenge

The most significant difference between Ukraine and past scenarios may be Europe's stake in the outcome. European capitals are watching with growing alarm, both for Ukraine and their own security. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has outlined a four-point plan for supporting Ukraine, while French President Emmanuel Macron has even floated the possibility of sharing France's nuclear deterrent to protect the continent.

"Today, it became clear that the free world needs a new leader," EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas bluntly said last week on X. "It's up to us, Europeans, to take this challenge."

Yet Europe's ability to fill the void left by American disengagement remains uncertain. They lack both the military capabilities and political unity to shoulder this burden alone. One estimate suggests Europe would need hundreds of thousands of new troops and at least $260 billion more in defense funding to credibly deter Russia without American backing.

The cost of abandonment

Abandoning Ukraine wouldn't just harm Ukraine - it would fundamentally damage American credibility worldwide. Our allies in Asia, especially Taiwan, are watching closely. Our adversaries in Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang would draw their own conclusions about American resolve.

"For that matter what about South Korea?" asks Donald Kirk, a veteran journalist who covered the Vietnam War. "Would Trump be likely to wage a second Korean War to protect it again?" Given his past approach, it seems doubtful.

There's an undeniable irony here. Trump deserves credit for doing what Biden never attempted - actively seeking to end the conflict rather than simply managing it through piecemeal weapons deliveries that kept Ukraine in the fight without providing enough firepower to win decisively. The tragedy is that this peace push comes when Ukraine's battlefield position is deteriorating, undercutting its leverage at any negotiating table. A year ago, with stronger territorial positions and momentum, Ukraine might have secured better terms. Both Republicans and Democrats have made catastrophic miscalculations when they prioritize getting out over getting it right.

Lessons learned

Ironically, some Republican senators who once criticized the Biden administration for not sharing intelligence quickly enough with Ukraine are now silent as intelligence cooperation is reportedly paused. The same officials who once demanded greater support for Ukraine now seem willing to accept terms that look remarkably similar to those that doomed South Vietnam and Afghanistan.

A free Ukraine has always been about more than Ukraine, just as a free West Berlin was always about more than Germany during the Cold War. If Ukraine fails due to a flawed peace agreement, everything the United States achieved through World War II and the Cold War to create a freer, more prosperous, more secure, and more democratic world is in jeopardy.

Nobody is naive enough to think peace bought at the cost of Ukraine's sovereignty would put an end to Putin's revisionist ambitions. Precisely the same warnings were issued about North Vietnam and the Taliban. We ignored them then. We should heed them now.

A path forward

The reality is that both sides are operating from positions of unrealistic expectations. Ukrainian officials may still believe they can reclaim all lost territory, including Crimea - a goal that grows more distant each month. Meanwhile, the Kremlin continues to harbor ambitions of fully subjugating Ukraine, something the West cannot allow.

Kosh Sadat says the current deadlock mirrors Afghanistan pre-Doha, but with a crucial difference: Ukraine, he notes, isn't fractured by civil war like Afghanistan was. It's a united country with legitimate democratic institutions defending against foreign aggression. A potential deal, he says, doesn't need to reinvent Ukrainian governance- it needs to secure Ukraine's future sovereignty.

Zelensky's territorial demands aren't illegitimate- they're rooted in international law and Ukraine's recognized borders. But diplomacy is the art of the possible, not the ideal. The challenge for Trump is to craft an agreement that preserves Ukraine's sovereignty, halts Russia's advance, and signals to allies worldwide that America won't simply cut and run. This would require giving both sides something they can claim as a win while ensuring that core principles about territorial integrity aren't completely abandoned.

The question isn't whether Ukraine deserves peace—of course it does. The question is whether we've learned anything from our past mistakes in negotiating peace deals that served American political timelines more than our allies' existential needs. The window for a better path forward remains open, but just barely.