‘Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.’ ‘Putin must fail.’ Ukraine’s path to NATO is ‘irreversible’. These are just some of the soundbites we’ve heard from Western leaders since Russia’s 2022 invasion. Yet according to Mark Galeotti, historian of Russia and author of Forged in War, the lofty rhetoric has never truly matched what the West was ever willing to give.
Galeotti sat down with spiked’s Fraser Myers last week to discuss what Trump, Putin and Ukraine can hope to get from the peace talks. Below is an edited extract from that conversation. Watch the full thing here.
Fraser Myers: What do you make of the state of play between Ukraine, Russia and the US at the moment?
Mark Galeotti: Everyone is now living in Trumpworld, and we’re having to adapt to that. The Ukrainians certainly got a battering. Trump wanted to make them realise that, as far as he’s concerned, Ukraine is a bought-and-paid-for vassal state that needs to know its place.
Trump has offered the Russians all of these unexpected goodies to bring Putin to the table. But Russia also understands that things could change quickly, and that Trump could be a dangerous antagonist. Clearly, the Russians are trying to work out how they can get the best deal possible, without antagonising Trump.
Myers: Trump is often accused of being a stooge for Putin or a Russian asset. Do you think that has actually been borne out by events?
Galeotti: I think it’s a lot of nonsense. People find it much easier to blame everything they don’t like – whether it’s Brexit or Trump’s election – on the big, bad, bogeyman in the East, rather than understand that these are the result of domestic factors.
Trump obviously hasn’t helped himself. He has never met an autocrat he doesn’t like. He does have a desire to be seen as a tough guy. He also shares a common view of the world with autocrats. This view is, essentially, that the world is shaped by a handful of powerful countries.
Trump doesn’t care about old traditions or the self-imposed limitations on the US. He regards himself as the chief executive officer of USA Inc. His job is to elevate himself and get his Nobel Peace Prize, but also to maximise the value of his corporation.
Myers: What’s your take on the minerals deal the US offered to Ukraine recently?
Galeotti: This is a classic case of Trump not looking too much into the details. It’s also all about selling the sizzle rather than the sausage. It’s about grandstanding.
Many of these resources are actually in Russian-held areas. It’s going to take a lot of upfront investment before they’re accessible. In many ways, this is a vaporware deal. In theory, it provides substantial revenue for the US, but it depends on circumstances that are, at the moment, implausible.
Myers: What does Putin want out of this situation?
Galeotti: The glib answer is, the most he can possibly get. Putin doesn’t have a clear strategy, in terms of a fixed goal and a roadmap to get there. He’s an opportunist. He creates chaotic situations that throw up a variety of opportunities, and he’ll decide there and then which one to follow through with.
That said, he clearly has some core interests. He is not going to abandon any of the occupied territories. Short of a massive military reversal, there’s no way to change that.
Secondly, he’s going to want some degree of sanctions relief. He’s probably realistic enough to know that this won’t occur across the board. But he needs to be able to say to the Russian population and elites: ‘You see? They turned the screws, we resisted, now they’re unscrewing them again.’
The third, and in many ways the most difficult, thing is limitations on the sovereignty of Ukraine. Russia has talked about keeping Ukraine’s army limited to a small size, which would mean they could muscle in again in the future. Obviously, Russia is very concerned about the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO. Quite where the lines should be drawn, except on the NATO issue, I don’t really know.
Myers: How is the war viewed in Russia?
Galeotti: It’s very hard to do proper polling in what is now an authoritarian, thuggish police state. But there are polling agencies that have clever ways of accessing opinion.
What emerges is that about a quarter of Russians are broadly supportive of the war. That doesn’t mean that they support war crimes, but they believe this is a necessary war for Russia.
There’s a similar number of Russians, maybe a few more these days, who are opposed to the war. They’re not out protesting, because that gets you clubbed and dragged off to prison. But they nonetheless think it’s a bad thing. That means you have a chunk of the population, half or a little bit less, who don’t know what to believe and are trying not to think about it.
One of the fascinating statistics is that viewership of TV news in Russia has dropped off a cliff. Instead, Russians are watching romcoms and science fiction. In some ways, they would like to ignore the war as much as they can.
What is clear is that there is not a majority in support of the war. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean people want Russia to lose. You might think you’re in a silly war, but you still don’t want to see your country humiliated or your soldiers to die.
Myers: Is there a danger of Ukraine being strong-armed into a bad peace?
Galeotti: The difficulty is that, given the limits to which the West is willing to engage itself, the only real option is a fairly bad peace. It would give Russia about 20 per cent of Ukraine’s territory and, very bluntly, allow it to get away with it. Russia would probably lose the £300 billion of funds currently frozen in the West, which will be used to help rebuild Ukraine. But, essentially, Russia would cope.
The question is, what kind of Ukraine would the remaining rump of the country be? Is it genuinely free to turn towards Europe and join the European Union, for example? Is it able to build up its own military so that it can be secure from future invasion? All that is very much in play.
Myers: What do the media and politicians miss when they talk about Russia and Ukraine?
Galeotti: One of the biggest issues is that we never sat down to define our terms. We talk easily about a Ukrainian victory. What does that mean? Does that mean every single Russian soldier is pushed off every single square centimetre of Ukraine? Because that was always very, very unlikely to happen. We talk about Putin needing to fail. Again, what does that mean?
This is a war that has been defined by soundbites and social media. As a result, both the public and the Ukrainians have been badly served.
Obviously, morality and international law says Russians have to leave Ukraine, return all prisoners of war and pay reparations. Unfortunately, the world doesn’t work that way. We’ve never defined what we thought was plausible and credible, and what we were willing to do to achieve it.
Trump has been willing to challenge many of these sacred cows. For example, the issue of Ukraine’s membership of NATO. We all say Ukraine joining NATO is irreversible. A decision on admitting a new member into NATO is one that has to be agreed by every country. But there are a number of countries that are not willing to accept Ukraine’s membership, because that would mean running the risk that they would be required to fight a war with Russia. This war looks very different from Warsaw than from Rome.
Mark Galeotti was talking to Fraser Myers. Watch the full conversation here: