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For a brief period, the former US president gave the impression to adopt a strong stance concerning the Ukrainian conflict. After making statements of "significant consequences" last August if Putin persisted hindering ceasefire negotiations, the former president finally introduced considerable penalties on Russia's primary petroleum corporations, Rosneft and Lukoil. This decision significantly hindered the Russian leader's capability to fund his war effort in the region.

But, through his newly presented 28-point peace initiative for the conflict, which was developed by US and Russian representatives lacking Ukrainian or European involvement, Trump has apparently returned to his favorable to Russia approach.

Rewarding Aggression

Trump's proposal would effectively reward Putin for occupying Ukraine while putting the country's democracy in danger. Despite strong statements that "Ukraine's sovereignty will be confirmed", much of the proposal actually undermine that very autonomy. What represents a Russian ideal would certainly be a catastrophe for the nation.

Reflecting his real-estate experience, Trump continues to view the Ukrainian conflict as a mere land disagreement, like handing Putin a section of Ukraine's territory will please the president. However, Russia's invasion is not merely about occupying a destroyed swath of deindustrialized land in eastern Ukraine. It is about the nation's democracy – and Putin's obvious desire to destroy it so it ceases to functions as an attractive standard for the Russia's population of the democratic leadership that Putin's increasing autocracy denies them.

Land Concessions

While keeping in status the currently separated regions of these areas, the plan would compel the nation to give up all of Donetsk province. Aside from favoring the Russian Federation with territory that its military have been unsuccessful to seize in exceeding a lengthy period of conflict, this concession would leave Ukraine's defenses dangerously undermined.

This region is the place of the nation's much-vaunted "stronghold system", the well-established defensive positions that are a critical impediment to enemy progress. The proposal would have Ukraine abandon these defenses, giving Putin a open route to Kyiv if he eventually decide to restart the war.

Military Reductions

Then, in a step that would enable future fighting easier for the Russian military, Trump would require Ukraine to cut the numbers of its armed forces from their existing large number troops to a cap of this lower number. Importantly, the plan imposes no such constraints on Russian forces.

Apparently as a concession to Putin's efforts to depict the nation's chosen by the people leadership as radicals, the plan states: "All extremist doctrine and actions must be opposed and banned." As if to highlight this point, it demands that "Ukraine will hold elections in this period" of a truce. Meanwhile, Trump places no condition that the Russian leader risk his authoritarian rule by conducting democratic processes in his own country.

Security Commitments

To be sure, the plan includes Russia promise not to "attack neighboring countries" and to "establish in regulation its position of non-aggression towards Europe and Ukraine". However considering that Putin has broken comparable agreements in the past – including the 1994 agreement, in which Russia committed to recognize the nation's sovereignty in exchange for relinquishing its former Soviet nuclear weapons, and the Minsk accords, in which Moscow agreed to a ceasefire and a handback of occupied territory in eastern Ukraine to Ukrainian control – how should the international community trust Russia now?

This explains Ukraine has been so determined on western protection assurances. While the plan promises a "strong unified armed reaction" in case the Russian Federation restart its invasion, and includes that "Ukraine will receive reliable defense commitments", the details vary from fuzzy to troubling. The proposal would not just deny Ukraine Nato membership but also preclude alliance nations from positioning forces on Ukraine's soil, thus blocking the reassurance force, presumptively headed by Britain and France, on which Ukraine had been counting to deter Russia from restoring his weakened military, rearming, and resuming aggression.

International Reaction

Another supplementary accord apparently would grant the nation with a Nato-style security guarantee, in which any subsequent "major, planned, and continuous armed attack" by Russia on Ukraine "shall be regarded as an attack threatening the stability and safety of the transatlantic community." That suggests a armed reaction. But different from a capable national defense – the nation's most reliable deterrent against future Russian aggression – the credibility of the side agreement would depend on the commitment of alliance members, including the US administration, to react with force to Russia's aggression, an action they have {not