The following facts must be emphasized when assessing any proposed peace agreement:
-Vladimir Putin has never once kept a single promise that he has made regarding Ukraine. Not once. Ever. And he’s not about to start now. Any agreement that requires any element of trust placed in Vladimir Putin’s “promise” is not worth the paper it is written on.
-There are only two enforceable security guarantees: 1) NATO Article 5, or 2) a treaty that is passed by the U.S. Congress. Anything outside of this is just a Budapest Memorandum 2.0 — a completely unenforceable and empty promise that led to the invasion of Ukraine, and will lead to the future dismantling of Ukraine.
-Any “forced reduction” of the Ukrainian military means future increased pressure, risk, and danger to the European, NATO, and U.S. military.
-Any official recognition of Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory as “Russian territory,” and any official prohibition of Ukraine from being free to decide what alliances to join, would, for the first time in American history, create a brand new precedent of officially rewarding a dictator for invading a sovereign nation, and officially punishing a victim nation that was wrongfully invaded. What a terrible precedent to set. What a terrible message to send.