Why Putin started talking about peace again: CNN explained the Kremlin’s goal

Putin spoke about peace again/Collage 24 Channel

The other day, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin cynically declared that Russia is open to peace negotiations. However, such Kremlin rhetoric is the main military tool for propagandists, which they have used not for the first time.

CNN recalled that Reuters previously wrote that Russia has declared its readiness to consider the possibility of peaceful negotiations. However, the conditions of the aggressor country were too demanding.

Not cynicism, but practical necessity

The Kremlin leader said that Russia is ready for peace negotiations based on preliminary agreements, hinting at the Istanbul Agreement, which was considered at the beginning of 2022, however was not successful.

One of the main reasons for this, as the publication notes, was that the Russian invaders were still on the territory of Ukraine. No less important were the mass killings of residents of the occupied cities of the Kiev region by Russians. .

They questioned the legitimacy of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky after Kyiv was forced to postpone elections as a result of the full-scale invasion that Moscow launched back in 2022.

CNN adds that Unconfirmed information has appeared that Viktor Yanukovych’s private plane has landed in Belarus. Probably, as the author writes, the Kremlin hopes for the return of the ex-president to power in Ukraine.

The less brutal goal of the Kremlin in Ukraine, other than the full or partial occupation of the country, is that , in order to install in Kyiv a president whom he considers loyal and who will stop the country’s movement into the European Union and NATO.

And if this was considered fantastic at the beginning of the invasion, now the Ukrainian population “boils” from the cruelty of the occupiers. The publication notes that diplomacy has always been a military tool for the Kremlin.

He regularly spoke about peace even when the Russians stormed Debaltseve in the Donetsk region in 2015. Therefore, distrust of Russia's sincerity in negotiations is not cynicism, but a practical necessity.

Experience shows that it considers negotiations worthwhile continue them if they unexpectedly lead to a useful result without violence, or give the opponent a reason to pause in hostilities in order to try to encourage him to conclude an agreement, the material says.

Why Putin started talking about peace

It is noted that there are two reasons for the Kremlin returning to such conversations about peace agreements. The first factor is the Peace Summit in Switzerland, which our country and its allies will convene in June 2024.

It is likely that the above-mentioned event will be aimed at creating momentum for the Kremlin's withdrawal when its forces are completely exhausted militarily or find themselves in a stalemate.

At the same time, Zelensky hopes for the presence China, which is one of the most powerful allies of the aggressor country, however, only partially supports it in the war in Ukraine. Perhaps Putin, with the help of “peaceful statements,” seeks to prevent Beijing’s presence at this meeting.

The second reason is that with such statements Putin sends messages to governments in the West and the current American presidential campaign. He is trying to suggest opaquely – perhaps to populists in Europe or MAGA Republicans in the US – that there is a simple deal in which the front where Ukraine is currently losing could suddenly freeze.

CNN writes that Western support for the war is expensive and growing weaker, and Putin is a pragmatist. He started the war thinking it would be easy. Now the dictator sees a moment of electoral weakness in the United States and other European countries. diplomacy. There is no denying that he may receive some support among those who “desperately hope that the war in Ukraine will simply end, and who are less concerned about the existential threat.”

However , these statements should be viewed through the prism of the deep cynicism of Moscow’s previous diplomacy in Syria and Ukraine. Russia has always used this time to fiercely pursue those same military goals, but under the illusion that peace might be just around the corner.