[The following is a Twitter thread posted by Gonzalo Lira on June 14, 2022. For those not familiar with GL he is married to a Ukrainian woman and has been living in Ukraine (Kharkov) for almost a decade. He has a really good grasp of the culture, the political climate and mood of the people in both Russia and Ukraine . . . SC]

Why there will be no ceasefire or peace agreement in the war over Ukraine - a thread

Bottom line, neither Putin nor Zelensky can afford to sign a ceasefire/peace deal because of internal politics—though for each's foreign relations, they need to seem to be trying to.

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The US has hinted it wants the Zelensky regime to start negotiating—and be willing to give up territory.

Z. can't do that—the neo-Nazis in his cabinet would depose him. They're extremists—they don't know compromise.

Remember—Z. is their HOSTAGE. He has no power over them.

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But the neo-Nazi crazies understand they need to keep the US happy. They know that the money they are skimming and the weapons they are punting onto the black market all come from Daddy America.

So they'll understand when Zelensky tells them he'll PRETEND to negotiate.

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Zelensky will start these “negotiations” with absurd conditions (as he already has)—talk only to Putin face-to-face, Russian troops out of Donbas AND Crimea, etc.

These outlandish postures were to show he's willing to negotiate—while making talks effectively impossible.

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Eventually—under US pressure (happening now)—which the neo-Nazis are aware of—Zelensky will assume a more realistic negotiating posture: Likely agreeing to give up Crimea and Donbas permanently.

But he will insist to his neo-Nazi captors it's just a negotiating bluff.

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(In Washington, there will be/is going on all kinds of internal fights between the DoD and State. The former wants this Ukraine episode to wind down—the latter wants to escalate. Pointless Putin/Zelensky negotiations will be the compromise, dragging out the conflict.)

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Putin for his part can no longer afford to sign a peace deal.

The Russian intelligentsia and upper-middle classes have come to realize this is an existential war between Russia and NATO/USA/EU. They will consider anything other than Ukraine's unconditional surrender a loss.

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Medvedev—previously moderate, pro-Western—is now brutally hawkish: This is a visible expression/embodiment of the Russian people's collective realization.

The Russian people and state realize they can never allow a truly sovereign Ukraine to remain on their western border.

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So the Russian people and state will demand that Ukraine be carved up, with the ethnic Russian parts annexed (as is happening), and what remains “pacified”—permanently. That is, rendered permanently weak, controlled by Russia through a puppet regime.

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This is what Putin must deliver—all of Novorossiya including Odessa, and a rump Ukraine puppet.

If he doesn't—he will no longer be President of Russia.

Whether this is what he himself might want is irrelevant—this is what he must deliver to his people.

And he knows it.

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Analysts in the West do not realize how traumatic the last 100 days have been: The West violently and viciously divorced itself from Russia. So the Russian intellectual and well-to-do classes now know—for a fact—that the West truly hates them.

Russians won't ever forget.

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(Parenthetically—and a big current issue: The vicious, despicable indiscriminate shelling of civilians in Donetsk city by the Zelensky regime forces is also having a huge, traumatic, permanent effect on the Russian people. The AFU is killing civilians purely out of revenge—

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—and the West is saying absolutely nothing! The shelling of Donetsk is a blatant war crime, an unambiguous atrocity—and yet for all the bullshit Western talk of “genocide” and “human rights”, they are absolutely silent about Donetsk. This kind of attitude by the West—

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—is what turns an adversarial relationship into outright hatred. Every AFU rocket—supplied by the West—that kills another innocent civilian becomes another drop of evil that turns the Russian people's antagonism towards the West into open and justifiable hatred of the West.)

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To return to negotiations: Putin has to carry out his people's wishes—and at the same time needs to appear conciliatory to the Global South and Global East.

So he will surprisingly agree to negotiations (though never to a face-to-face summit with Zelensky).

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But he will put zero effort into finding a compromise—he won't send Lavrov, he'll send third-string guys.

Putin knows from experience that the West is “agreement incapable”—any negotiation that results in a treaty or agreement won't be worth the paper it's printed on.

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Look at Minsk II—a very coherent roadmap to long-lasting peace, which the Ukrainians torpedoed without even a word from the West. (Oh and how the Zelensky regime and the West wish they could go back in time and implement Minsk II before this disaster! Alas, too late.)

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But the Global South and Global East need assurances that Putin is responsible. So he'll agree to negotiations—he's actually never closed the door on them—but the Kremlin collectively will understand that it's for the sake of appearances, that nothing will come of them.

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Thus Russia and Ukraine will hold talks (likely soon)—both of them signaling externally that they are reasonable and open to compromise—both of them signaling internally that there will be no deal, no compromise, no ceasefire, no surrender.

This is a disaster—for Ukraine.

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Seeing how the war over Ukraine is playing out—and seeing as NATO/US wants no part of this conflict, and is already winding down its support—the only outcome is Ukraine's unconditional surrender and occupation.

Followed by Ukraine's physical dismemberment and emasculation.

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I am not arguing that this is what I want—I'm saying that, with the information available at this time, this is what will likely happen. It is a tragedy for Ukraine—a tragedy that could have and should have been avoided.

And the party most responsible is America.

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