The Moscow Times doesn’t live in Russia, is not controlled by the Russian government or Putin, but reports more-or-less honestly about life in Russia and its war on Ukraine. For it Konstantin Sonin, a prof at U. of Chicago writes about why no one is negotiating with Putin. Hat tip to RealClearWorld for the link.
Negotiations with Putin are currently pointless because he cannot make any meaningful commitments. … Over his 20-year rule, he has promised practically everything — his signature is on the border treaty with Ukraine, for example. And he violated all of it. Over the past two years, he has broken almost every promise he made. Again, Putin himself may not even know about this. I suspect it would be a terrible risk for his subordinates to remind him of what he said a month, a year, or even a week ago. But everyone else knows that he breaks all of his promises. No matter how pragmatic and cynical a negotiator might be, what is the point of such negotiations?
Even if he (Putin) does not want to violate them now and genuinely believes in them, nothing in Russia can compel him to keep those agreements. That is precisely why the current plan — no negotiations until the defeat of Russian forces on Ukrainian territory, and post-war guarantees of Ukraine's security through NATO membership — appears to be the only realistic option, even for the most hardened cynics.
I suspect the “defeat of Russian forces on Ukrainian territory” is not something Ukraine can accomplish, regardless of NATO arms shipments. What Ukraine can do is what the Afghans did to the Soviets - refuse to be defeated, keep fighting until the Russians get tired of the bloody stalemate and go home.
“Going home” will probably involve an internal change in leadership reflecting popular dissatisfaction with both the war and Putin.
