As US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin and their respective teams prepare for their summit meeting in Alaska, numerous media reports are appearing in the media purporting to record the basics of a territorial agreement on Ukraine agreed upon by both sides. Based on unidentified US officials, the two sides have supposedly agreed that a ceasefire will commence when Ukraine withdraws its forces from Russian claimed and largely taken Donetsk and Luhansk (Lugansk) Regions and that Russia will then forego its claims on Zaporoshe and Kherson Oblasts, while keeping Crimea. No American or Russian official has confirmed (or denied) this as the basics of an agreement on a ceasefire, which Russia has repeatedly refused. Thus, commentators are claiming that Mr Putin has made a compromise, abandoning some of his other previously stated objectives of the ‘special military operation’ (SMO), which consistently have included the following: a concrete commitment by Ukraine and NATO that Ukraine will not become a NATO member or receive NATO military assistance, i.e., Ukrainian neutrality (the main Russian demand and reason for the SMO); Ukraine’s de-Nazification (removal of neofascism from Ukrainian politics); and de-militarization (unspecified limits on Ukraine’s military power and/or force deployment). This is all wrong……
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About the Author –
Gordon M. Hahn, Ph.D., is an Expert Analyst at Corr Analytics, www.canalyt.com. Websites: Russian and Eurasian Politics, gordonhahn.com and gordonhahn.academia.edu
Dr. Hahn is the author of the new book: Russian Tselostnost’: Wholeness in Russian Thought, Culture, History, and Politics (Europe Books, 2022). He has authored five previous, well-received books: The Russian Dilemma: Security, Vigilance, and Relations with the West from Ivan III to Putin (McFarland, 2021); Ukraine Over the Edge: Russia, the West, and the “New Cold War” (McFarland, 2018); The Caucasus Emirate Mujahedin: Global Jihadism in Russia’s North Caucasus and Beyond (McFarland, 2014), Russia’s Islamic Threat (Yale University Press, 2007), and Russia’s Revolution From Above: Reform, Transition and Revolution in the Fall of the Soviet Communist Regime, 1985-2000 (Transaction, 2002). He also has published numerous think tank reports, academic articles, analyses, and commentaries in both English and Russian language media.
Dr. Hahn taught at Boston, American, Stanford, San Jose State, and San Francisco State Universities and as a Fulbright Scholar at Saint Petersburg State University, Russia and was a senior associate and visiting fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Kennan Institute in Washington DC, the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and the Center for Terrorism and Intelligence Studies (CETIS), Akribis Group.