Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s plea to Donald Trump — “stay on our side” — should be read as more than an appeal for sympathy. It is a warning about strategy.
At the centre of the current diplomacy is a question that sounds technical but is in fact decisive: what comes first — a peace treaty, or hard security guarantees?
Zelenskyy’s answer is plain. Security guarantees must come first, and they must be specific, enforceable and politically binding. Trump, by contrast, is reported to favour a single, grand settlement in which Ukraine signs a peace agreement with Russia while, at the same moment, the United States and European partners sign on to security guarantees.
That may look neat on paper. It is not how this war works.
The flaw in a treaty-first approach is that it assumes Russia is negotiating in order to end the war. Ukraine’s leadership does not believe that. Nor, on the evidence of the past decade, is there much reason to do so. Moscow has repeatedly used talks, truces and diplomatic formats while continuing to apply force, probe weaknesses and wait for better conditions.
In that context, a “peace first, guarantees later” formula does not protect Ukraine. It weakens it.
Kyiv would be asked to sign a political settlement before the protections that are supposed to make that settlement survivable are locked in. In practice, that means Ukraine would surrender leverage first and wait for security later. If Russia then delays, violates or reinterprets the terms — all familiar tactics — Ukraine would again be left exposed while its partners debate how to respond.
Zelenskyy is right to resist this sequence, and there is a very clear reason why: Ukraine has already lived through it once.
The Budapest Memorandum is not an historical footnote in Kyiv. It is the central precedent. In 1994, Ukraine gave up the nuclear arsenal it inherited after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In return, it received security assurances from the United States, the United Kingdom and Russia. Those assurances did not prevent the seizure of Crimea in 2014. They did not prevent Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
For Ukrainians, this is not an academic argument about the difference between “assurances” and “guarantees”. It is a lesson paid for in territory, lives and state survival.
That is why Zelenskyy keeps returning to the same point: what exactly will partners do if Russia attacks again? Not general support. Not warm statements. Not vague language about sovereignty. What will they do, how fast, and under what legal and political mechanism?
This is the question Washington should be answering. Instead, the risk in Trump’s apparent approach is that he is trying to compress the whole process into a single diplomatic event — a peace deal, a security package, and a declaration of success all at once.
That may suit American political theatre. It does not suit Ukrainian security reality.
There is also a deeper problem. Russia’s objective is not simply to gain a line on a map. It is to keep Ukraine weak, vulnerable and within reach. Even if Moscow signs a document, that objective does not disappear. A treaty, by itself, does not deter future aggression. Deterrence comes from capability, commitments and clarity.
If Trump genuinely wants to help Ukraine and end the war on terms that do not merely postpone the next round, he should reverse the order.
First, push for a ceasefire. A real one, monitored and verifiable, with clear consequences for violations. A ceasefire is not peace, and no one in Kyiv should pretend otherwise. But it can stop immediate losses, test whether Russia is capable of restraint, and create space for serious negotiation.
Second, secure binding guarantees for Ukraine before any final settlement is signed. Those guarantees must be concrete enough to shape Russian calculations, not just reassure Western audiences.
Only then should there be talk of a final peace treaty.
That sequence is not anti-peace. It is the only sequence that treats Russian conduct as it is, not as diplomats wish it to be.
Zelenskyy’s position is often portrayed as hard-edged. In truth, it is rooted in experience. Ukraine has seen what happens when it gives up leverage in exchange for promises. It has seen what happens when Western commitments are politically sincere but strategically incomplete. It has seen what happens when Moscow signs and then strikes.
Trump is free to pursue a dramatic settlement if he wants one. But if he ties security guarantees to a peace treaty that may never be honoured, he will not be ending the war so much as setting the conditions for its return.
Ukraine should not accept that.
The Budapest Memorandum is precisely why.
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