Trump doubles down on Ukraine giving territory for peace

Axios and several media outlets, including Reuters, report that Donald Trump and his administration are quietly pressuring Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to accept their proposed peace plan.

According to Axios, the U.S. administration is working on a secret «28-point roadmap» for ending the war in Ukraine, a plan reportedly developed in consultation with Russian officials and overseen by U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff. The discussions are taking place through secret channels rather than public diplomatic talks.

The plan described by Axios would require Ukraine to accept significant territorial losses and a substantial reduction of its armed forces. These conditions, presented as part of a broader effort to end the conflict, would markedly reshape Ukraine’s borders and military capabilities.

According to Axios, Trump’s proposed plan to end the war in Ukraine includes granting Russia parts of eastern Ukraine that it does not currently control, as his administration tries to bargain these territories with Kyiv in exchange for security guarantees for Ukraine.

Trump’s peace plan would hand over the Ukrainian regions of Luhansk and Donetsk (the Donbas) to Russia, even though Ukraine still controls part of those territories. According to the plan, Trump wants to turn the Donbas into a sort of demilitarized zone under exclusive Russian control, claiming that Putin would not be able to station troops there.

According to Axios, a Ukrainian official said the Trump peace plan would also limit the size of Ukraine’s military and its weapons in exchange for U.S. security guarantees, but warned that the proposal fails to ensure protection if Russia attacks again or seizes more Ukrainian territory in the future, casting major doubt on the credibility of those guarantees as a whole. For many in Kyiv, these vague security promises echo the broken assurances of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, deepening doubts about their real value.

Trump’s bargaining with Ukrainian territory in exchange for vague security guarantees is likely to shock Ukraine’s allies and European partners, as many already criticise him for failing to defend Ukraine’s sovereignty since entering peace negotiations earlier this year and for treating its land as a bargaining chip for Putin’s benefit.