The diplomatic atmosphere around Ukraine has changed considerably in only one week. After Donald Trump’s Alaska meeting with Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy travelled to Washington on 18 August accompanied by an unusually powerful group of European leaders, including Emmanuel Macron, Friedrich Merz, Keir Starmer, Giorgia Meloni, Alexander Stubb, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. The meeting was markedly different from February’s disastrous Oval Office confrontation. Trump said the United States would participate in security guarantees for Ukraine as part of a future peace settlement, although he has since ruled out deploying American ground troops, while European governments would take the leading role. Zelenskyy subsequently said the details could be formalised within roughly ten days and disclosed that Ukraine had proposed purchasing around $90 billion of American military equipment, particularly aircraft and air-defence systems, as part of the emerging framework. Trump is also attempting to arrange direct negotiations between Zelenskyy and Putin, potentially followed by a trilateral summit. The territorial dispute remains enormous, but this week’s diplomacy has clarified something more fundamental: the value of any Ukrainian territorial compromise depends less on the exact number of square kilometres surrendered than on whether the territory Ukraine retains becomes sufficiently secure that Russia cannot profitably attack it again.
This is why security guarantees should be treated as the central economic variable in the peace negotiations rather than as diplomatic language attached afterwards. Consider two hypothetical settlements. Under the first, Ukraine retains 90% of the territory it hopes to control but receives weak security guarantees, forcing businesses and households to assume another Russian invasion remains plausible within five years. Under the second, Ukraine retains somewhat less territory but receives sufficiently strong military guarantees that investors believe another invasion has become highly unlikely. The second Ukraine could eventually become wealthier, more populous and strategically stronger despite controlling less land because security changes the expected return on every asset inside the country. A factory worth €500 million in peaceful Poland can be worth dramatically less if physically identical but located somewhere investors assign a meaningful annual probability of missile attack, occupation or destruction. Security therefore functions like an economy-wide reduction in the discount rate.
This matters because Ukraine’s post-war problem will be enormous even if the shooting stops tomorrow. Reconstruction needs are already measured in hundreds of billions of dollars, millions of Ukrainians remain abroad, infrastructure has been destroyed and the country’s demographic position has deteriorated sharply. Governments and international institutions can provide reconstruction grants and loans, but public money alone cannot reconstruct an entire modern economy indefinitely. Ukraine eventually needs private capital. Manufacturers need to build factories, banks need to issue mortgages, developers need to construct housing and emigrants need to believe returning home is safer and economically preferable to remaining elsewhere in Europe. Every one of those decisions is forward-looking. A peace agreement therefore becomes economically valuable only when people believe it will survive. The difference between an armistice and credible peace eventually appears in investment rates.
This is why the debate about security guarantees cannot be reduced to whether Ukraine formally enters NATO. NATO membership would provide the clearest institutional guarantee through Article 5, but Russia rejects Ukrainian membership and Trump has called it unrealistic. The emerging alternative appears closer to an armed Ukraine backed by long-term European commitments and some American support, potentially involving continued weapons supplies, intelligence, air defence, training and European forces or capabilities associated with a post-war reassurance arrangement. Trump has ruled out American troops while leaving room for other forms of US participation. This could create deterrence by denial rather than deterrence through automatic American intervention: Russia refrains from another invasion because Ukraine itself remains sufficiently armed that conquest is unlikely to succeed at acceptable cost.
The distinction matters because security guarantees exist on a spectrum rather than as a binary variable. At one end sits a political statement promising support. At the other sits a treaty commitment backed by permanently deployed forces and automatic military planning. Ukraine’s experience with the Budapest Memorandum makes the first end of that spectrum politically inadequate. Ukrainians surrendered the nuclear arsenal inherited from the Soviet Union in exchange for security assurances, yet Russia subsequently annexed Crimea and launched the 2022 invasion. The lesson Kyiv draws is not necessarily that every future guarantee must reproduce NATO exactly. It is that a guarantee needs a credible enforcement mechanism defined before the violation occurs. If Russia attacks again, what happens during the first twenty-four hours? Which weapons move? Which sanctions return? Which countries intervene? Which intelligence systems activate? Ambiguity can deter when an adversary fears the worst response, but excessive ambiguity can encourage aggression when the adversary expects hesitation.
The proposed $90 billion American weapons package is therefore interesting because it could align Ukrainian and American incentives more effectively than indefinite grant-based assistance. Ukraine receives equipment required for deterrence. American defence companies receive large orders. European governments could finance significant portions of procurement. American voters who increasingly question open-ended foreign aid can see a commercial and industrial return. This turns Ukrainian security partly into defence-industrial interdependence. American factories producing air-defence interceptors or aircraft for Ukraine create jobs and constituencies with an economic interest in maintaining the relationship. It is not equivalent to a defence treaty, but economic relationships can reinforce strategic commitments by increasing the domestic political cost of abandonment.
The proposal that America could purchase Ukrainian drones adds another dimension. Ukraine has become one of the world’s most innovative military-drone ecosystems because battlefield necessity forced extremely rapid development. A country that entered the war overwhelmingly dependent on Western military technology could leave it exporting important technologies to Western militaries. Zelenskyy said the discussions include arrangements under which the United States could purchase Ukrainian drones once exports reopen. This demonstrates how warfare can accelerate learning-by-doing. Thousands of battlefield iterations produce knowledge about electronic warfare, autonomous navigation, manufacturing costs and tactical adaptation that peacetime procurement systems struggle to replicate.
Ukraine’s reconstruction therefore should not attempt simply to restore the economy that existed in 2021. That would waste some of the technological capabilities generated during the war. Defence technology, drones, cybersecurity, software, energy resilience and advanced manufacturing could become export sectors. Ukraine possesses highly educated human capital and increasing integration with European institutions. A credible security settlement could transform military adaptation into a post-war productivity dividend, much as military technologies historically generated civilian applications elsewhere. The risk is allowing the defence economy to become permanently dependent on government contracts and wartime demand rather than converting technological knowledge into competitive civilian industries.
Europe’s role in the guarantee remains the largest unresolved issue because European leaders want strong Ukrainian security but remain dependent on American capabilities in several critical areas. Trump has indicated that Europe should provide the principal security presence while America supplies some form of support or backstop. This arrangement is politically attractive in Washington because it reduces the direct American burden. It is strategically challenging for Europe because European militaries still rely heavily on US intelligence, logistics, air defence and command capabilities. The coalition of the willing led by Britain and France has been discussing exactly how Ukraine could be supported after a settlement, including training, equipping Ukrainian forces and potentially establishing a reassurance force. The question is therefore moving from “will Europe defend Ukraine?” towards the much more useful question of which country supplies which capability, in what quantity and under what trigger conditions?
This is where the enormous European defence commitments made earlier this year become relevant. Germany has created fiscal space for much greater defence expenditure. Poland already spends extraordinary amounts. NATO has adopted much higher long-term ambitions. Britain and France possess Europe’s most capable expeditionary militaries and nuclear arsenals. Collectively, Europe has the economic resources to make Ukraine extraordinarily difficult for Russia to invade again. The problem is coordination. European defence remains fragmented across national procurement systems and political authorities. A guarantee therefore needs to transform aggregate European wealth into credible military response capacity. Russia will not be deterred by Europe’s combined GDP statistic. It will be deterred by forces, weapons and mobilisation plans it expects actually to appear during a crisis.
This creates an important credibility test for European strategic autonomy. For years, European leaders have argued that Europe should become capable of acting more independently from the United States. Ukraine provides the opportunity and the obligation to demonstrate what that means. Strategic autonomy cannot simply mean disagreeing with Washington more frequently. It means possessing enough resources that European preferences remain actionable when Washington’s preferences differ. If Europe believes Ukraine should receive stronger guarantees than Trump wants America to provide, Europe needs to finance and field the difference. Autonomy is a capability, not a diplomatic adjective.
Trump’s willingness to involve America at least partially may therefore be strategically optimal for Europe. A completely American guarantee would perpetuate dependency. A completely European guarantee today might lack credibility. A European-led arrangement with an American backstop could provide enough immediate deterrence while giving Europe time to develop greater independent capability. This is transitional burden-sharing: America supplies high-value capabilities that Europe cannot replace quickly while European states increasingly carry the financial and conventional military burden.
Russia, unsurprisingly, objects strongly to NATO-linked military forces being deployed inside Ukraine after a settlement. Moscow can argue that accepting Western forces would reproduce precisely the NATO military presence it claims the war was partly intended to prevent. Ukraine can respond that Russia’s invasion is exactly why foreign guarantees are necessary. This produces another self-confirming security dilemma. Russia says Western military presence threatens Russia. Ukraine says Russian aggression makes Western military presence essential. Every Russian objection therefore strengthens the Ukrainian argument that the guarantee needs to be stronger, while every stronger guarantee strengthens Moscow’s argument that the West intends to encircle it.
There is no solution that eliminates this contradiction completely. The realistic objective is designing a guarantee defensive enough to reduce Russian threat perceptions while strong enough to deter another invasion. Force composition matters. Air defence, monitoring, training and logistics can provide substantial deterrence without stationing enormous offensive formations near Russia. Restrictions on particular long-range systems could potentially accompany reciprocal Russian force limitations. Transparency mechanisms could reduce fears of surprise attack. None produces trust. They can reduce the military value of mistrust.
Territory remains the politically explosive variable, but the security architecture can change how territory is valued. Russia currently occupies roughly one-fifth of Ukraine, while Putin reportedly wants additional Ukrainian withdrawal from territory in Donetsk that Russian forces have not captured. Ukraine has strong reasons to reject formally surrendering land Russia failed to take militarily. Yet the final settlement may still freeze Russian control over substantial occupied territory. The economically relevant question becomes what happens to the remaining Ukrainian state. If it joins European markets more deeply, receives reconstruction investment and develops credible security, the relative value of controlling additional devastated territory can change over time.
There is a historical analogy in West Germany, although it should not be stretched too far. Post-war West Germany did not control all territory Germans considered part of their nation, yet Western security guarantees and economic integration allowed it to become extraordinarily prosperous. Over time, the attractiveness of the West German model itself became a form of political power. Ukraine could pursue something conceptually similar: do not recognise conquest legally, but prioritise making the territory under Kyiv’s control prosperous, democratic and secure enough that time works in Ukraine’s favour rather than Russia’s. This is competition through institutional performance rather than immediate territorial reconquest.
Such a strategy would require patience that wartime politics makes difficult. Displaced Ukrainians understandably want homes returned. Soldiers did not fight simply to be told occupied territory can wait indefinitely. Governments cannot reduce national territory to a spreadsheet. But statecraft sometimes requires separating legal objectives from military timetables. Ukraine can maintain a legal claim while deciding that recovering territory by force is currently too costly. The absence of immediate military reconquest is not the same thing as permanent recognition of annexation.
This distinction also helps preserve the international norm against territorial conquest. Western governments do not need to pretend Russia controls nothing. They need to avoid converting control into recognised ownership automatically. Sanctions related to occupied territory can remain. Diplomatic maps can continue showing internationally recognised borders. Final status can remain unresolved. This makes aggression less rewarding than a settlement in which conquest receives immediate legal recognition, while still allowing the shooting to stop.
Trump’s push for a direct Putin-Zelenskyy meeting could therefore be valuable because the most difficult territorial questions ultimately require political authority that negotiators below presidential level may not possess. Trump said after Monday’s meetings that he had begun arranging such a meeting, potentially followed by a trilateral summit, although Moscow’s precise commitment remained uncertain. Zelenskyy has said he is prepared to meet without preconditions. The symbolism would be enormous because Putin has spent years questioning Ukrainian legitimacy while Zelenskyy has demanded direct negotiations.
But summit diplomacy works best after technical negotiators have narrowed the disagreement. Presidents can trade the final 10%. They struggle when 70% remains unresolved. A Putin-Zelenskyy summit without prior convergence risks becoming political theatre where neither leader can compromise without appearing humiliated. High-level diplomacy is most useful when leaders resolve decisions bureaucracies cannot make, not when leaders substitute for the entire negotiating process.
The immediate absence of a ceasefire remains concerning because Russia continues military operations while negotiations proceed. European leaders continue pressing for one, while Trump has become more willing to negotiate a final settlement without requiring a ceasefire first. This sequencing matters because Russia benefits from continued fighting if it believes battlefield gains improve its negotiating position. Ukraine benefits from freezing the line earlier. The process therefore redistributes bargaining power every day it continues. Negotiating procedure is itself part of the negotiation.
A compromise could involve a time-limited monitored cessation of major offensive operations during high-level talks rather than an indefinite ceasefire presented as the final settlement. That would reduce casualties and prevent one side using negotiations merely as cover for military advances while avoiding the concern that a temporary ceasefire becomes permanent without political resolution. Monitoring would still be difficult across a front stretching hundreds of kilometres, but satellite surveillance and drones make verification more feasible than in earlier wars.
The economic architecture after peace can also strengthen enforcement. Russia wants sanctions relief and potentially restored access to Western markets and capital. Ukraine wants reconstruction funding and European integration. Europe wants reduced security risk. America wants lower long-term military expenditure and commercial opportunities. These interests create potential peace dividends that can be made conditional on compliance. Russia receives phased economic relief as the agreement holds. Ukraine receives investment and market integration as reforms continue. Violations trigger automatic costs. The objective is making peace progressively more valuable over time so that breaking it becomes increasingly expensive.
This is how successful settlements become self-reinforcing. Initially, actors comply because external guarantors impose costs. Later, businesses invest, trade resumes and citizens build lives around stability. The opportunity cost of renewed war rises. Peace eventually develops its own constituency. The European Union itself emerged partly from this logic after the Second World War: integrate economies deeply enough that conflict becomes economically and institutionally irrational. Ukraine and Russia are nowhere near that relationship, but the mechanism remains useful. Durable peace is strongest when maintaining it creates assets that war would destroy.
Ukraine’s security guarantee therefore should not be treated as merely the military appendix to a peace agreement. It is the foundation on which the economic settlement rests. Without security, reconstruction capital remains cautious. Refugees hesitate to return. Insurance remains expensive. Governments continue financing emergency assistance. With credible security, private capital can begin replacing public aid and Ukraine can shift from wartime survival towards development.
That is why the coming negotiations over aircraft, air defence, European forces and American support may matter more historically than arguments over whether one particular district sits on one side of the ceasefire line. Territory matters enormously. The productivity and security of the people living on the territory matter too.
A smaller secure Ukraine can become stronger over time.
A larger insecure Ukraine can remain permanently fragile.
This is not an argument for surrendering territory casually. It is an argument for evaluating peace through the future state it creates rather than the map on the day it is signed.
The success metric therefore should be ambitious but clear. Ten years after the settlement, is Ukraine sovereign? Is it democratic? Is its economy converging towards the European Union? Have millions of refugees returned voluntarily? Does it possess enough military capability that Russia has not invaded again? Has private investment replaced emergency assistance? Has Russia concluded that renewed conquest would cost more than it could gain?
If those answers are yes, the settlement worked even if the territorial map remains painful.
If the map looks more favourable but Russia attacks again three years later, the agreement failed.
This is why security guarantees are not a secondary concession designed to make Ukrainians feel better about territorial compromise.
They are the mechanism that determines whether territorial compromise ends the war or merely schedules the next phase of it.
Trump’s Alaska summit opened the negotiation.
This week’s Washington meeting may have identified the variable around which a real agreement can eventually be built.
Not trust.
Not friendship.
Not even complete territorial settlement.
Credible deterrence.
Ukraine does not need Putin to become peaceful.
It needs the post-war balance to make another invasion irrational.
If Europe and America can construct that balance, a painful peace may become durable.
If they cannot, every territorial concession simply changes where the next war begins.
