Follow us on social

Peacekeepers

European 'peacekeepers' in Ukraine? A horrible idea.

Trump and other leaders reportedly discussed the plan but it's a trial balloon that should be shot down immediately

Analysis | Europe

President-elect Trump is reportedly advancing the idea that a large and heavily armed peacekeeping force from Europe (but including NATO members) could be introduced into Ukraine as part of a peace settlement there. It is important that this very ill-thought-out idea be shot down before it does serious damage to the prospects for an early peace and causes Ukraine still further human, economic and territorial loss.

According to the Wall Street Journal and Le Monde, this idea first emerged in private talks between French and British officials in November. It was discussed on Thursday by NATO foreign ministers in Brussels. Trump made the suggestion to French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at a meeting in Paris on December 7.

Macron then traveled to Warsaw to discuss a plan for 40,000 heavily armed European “peacekeepers” with the Polish government whose officials, however, have so far given it a cool public response. In the words of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk: “To cut off speculation about the potential presence of this or that country in Ukraine after reaching a ceasefire, ... decisions concerning Poland will be made in Warsaw and only in Warsaw. At the moment we’re not planning such activities.”

Friedrich Merz of the German Christian Democrats, almost certain to be chancellor after the elections due in February, has also distanced himself from the idea.

On the face of it, this idea might seem to reconcile several mutually contradictory pressures on the Ukrainian peace process: The Russian demand for a treaty that will permanently bar Ukraine from NATO membership; the Ukrainian demand for Western guarantees against future Russian aggression; Trump’s determination not to put U.S. troops on the ground or make additional and permanent U.S. commitments to Ukraine; and the real need for a substantial international force to patrol an armistice line.

There is just one problem: According to every Russian official and expert with whom my colleagues and I have spoken (most recently on Thursday), the idea of Western troops in Ukraine is just as unacceptable to the Russian government and establishment as NATO membership for Ukraine itself. Indeed, the Russians see no essential difference between the two.

Seen from Moscow, such a Western “peacekeeping force” would be simply a NATO advance guard that would provide cover for the gradual introduction of more and more NATO forces. Indeed, while President Zelensky has said that Ukraine “may consider” the idea of peacekeepers, it would only do so if it is also given a clear timeline for future NATO membership. If this proposal is put forward by General Kellogg, President-elect Trump’s choice as his Ukraine envoy, in negotiations, the Russian side will therefore reject it out of hand; and if it is insisted on, the talks will fail.

However, it seems likely that once European establishments — and populations — have had time to think about this idea, they will in fact let it drop. For the soldiers in this force would be placed in a position of considerable danger, which it is unlikely that their fellow citizens would tolerate. When Macron first suggested French troops for Ukraine earlier this year, opinion polls showed overwhelming majorities of French citizens opposing the idea.

The dangers should indeed be obvious. On the one hand, Ukrainians determined to regain Ukraine’s lost territories by provoking a direct war between NATO and Russia would have every incentive to try to create armed clashes into which the Western “peacekeepers” would be drawn.

On the other hand, if Moscow really wanted to test NATO and take advantage of future internal splits in the West, how better to do it than to threaten NATO “peacekeepers” in Ukraine rather than on NATO territory and thus not covered by NATO’s Article 5? There is either a deep cognitive dissonance or a deep dishonesty in Western hawks who warn about an alleged future Russian threat to “test NATO’s resolve” in the Baltic states proposing to give Russia a far greater and more plausible opportunity to do so in Ukraine.

In these circumstances, it seems obvious that in order for European governments and their military chiefs to agree to such a proposal even in principle, they would require ironclad and public guarantees from the Trump administration that the U.S. military would intervene with full force to rescue their “peacekeepers” if they did come under Russian attack.

This would mean very much the kind of commitment to Ukraine and to potential war with Russia that Trump and leading members of his team are determined to avoid. As the Journal article says, “French officials have made clear that the idea would need to involve some kind of U.S. backup, something it isn’t clear a Trump administration would consider.”

These factors are hardly obscure or hard to understand. Even if this is just a trial balloon, it is visibly full of holes, and the fact that it can have been hoisted even a few feet off the ground is therefore worrying. The appearance of this idea suggests that Trump and the European governments involved have received highly inaccurate information from their advisers about basic Russian positions. This suggests either extremely poor intelligence, or on the other hand that the advisers concerned are setting out deliberately to wreck a peace settlement. If so, then they are no friends to Ukraine; for every indication suggests that the longer this war goes on, the worse Ukraine’s position will become.


Top image credit: The nations of Bosnia, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Montenegro, Slovenia, Serbia and the United States join together to participate in the final field exercise during exercise Platinum Wolf 2016 at Peacekeeping Operations Training Center South Base, Bujanovac, Serbia, May 20, 2016. Sgt. Sara Graham. Marine Forces Reserve (MARFORRES)
Analysis | Europe
Rand Paul Donald Trump
Top photo credit: Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) (Shutterstock/Mark Reinstein) and President Trump (White House/Molly Riley)

Rand Paul to Trump: Don't 'abandon' MAGA over Maduro regime change

Washington Politics

Sen. Rand Paul said on Friday that “all hell could break loose” within Donald Trump’s MAGA coalition if the president involves the U.S. further in Ukraine, and added that his supporters who voted for him after 20 years of regime change wars would "feel abandoned" if he went to war and tried to topple Nicolas Maduro, too.

President Trump has been getting criticism from some of his supporters for vowing to release the files of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and then reneging on that promise. Paul said that the Epstein heat Trump is getting from MAGA will be nothing compared to if he refuses to live up to his “America First” foreign policy promises.

keep readingShow less
Trump ASEAN
Top photo credit: U.S. President Donald Trump looks at Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., next to Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim when posing for a family photo with leaders at the ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, October 26, 2025. Vincent Thian/Pool via REUTERS

‘America First’ meets ‘ASEAN Way’ in Kuala Lumpur

Asia-Pacific

The 2025 ASEAN and East Asia Summits in Kuala Lumpur beginning today are set to be consequential multilateral gatherings — defining not only ASEAN’s internal cohesion but also the shape of U.S.–China relations in the Indo-Pacific.

President Donald Trump’s participation will be the first by a U.S. president in an ASEAN-led summit since 2022. President Biden skipped the last two such summits in 2023 and 2024, sending then-Vice President Harris instead.

keep readingShow less
iran, china, russia
Top photo credit: Top image credit: Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and and Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi shake hands as Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu looks on during their meet with reporters after their meeting at Diaoyutai State Guest House on March 14, 2025 in Beijing, China. Lintao Zhang/Pool via REUTERS

'Annulled'! Russia won't abide snapback sanctions on Iran

Middle East

“A raider attack on the U.N. Security Council.” This was the explosive accusation leveled by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov this week. His target was the U.N. Secretariat and Western powers, whom he blamed for what Russia sees as an illegitimate attempt to restore the nuclear-related international sanctions on Iran.

Beyond the fiery rhetoric, Ryabkov’s statement contained a message: Russia, he said, now considers all pre-2015 U.N. sanctions on Iran, snapped back by the European signatories of the 2015 nuclear deal (JCPOA) — the United Kingdom, France, Germany — “annulled.” Moscow will deepen its military-technical cooperation with Tehran accordingly, according to Ryabkov.

This is more than a diplomatic spat; it is the formal announcement of a split in international legal reality. The world’s major powers are now operating under two irreconcilable interpretations of international law. On one side, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany assert that the sanctions snapback mechanism of the JCPOA was legitimately triggered for Iran’s alleged violations. On the other, Iran, Russia, and China reject this as an illegitimate procedural act.

This schism was not inevitable, and its origin reveals a profound incongruence. The Western powers that most frequently appeal to the sanctity of the "rules-based international order" and international law have, in this instance, taken an action whose effects fundamentally undermine it. By pushing through a legal maneuver that a significant part of the Security Council considers illegitimate, they have ushered the world into a new and more dangerous state. The predictable, if imperfect, framework of universally recognized Security Council decisions is being replaced by a system where legal facts are determined by political interests espoused by competing power blocs.

This rupture followed a deliberate Western choice to reject compromises in a stand-off with Iran. While Iran was in a technical violation of the provisions of the JCPOA — by, notably, amassing a stockpile of highly enriched uranium (up to 60% as opposed to the 3.67% for a civilian use permissible under the JCPOA), there was a chance to avert the crisis. In the critical weeks leading to the snapback, Iran had signaled concessions in talks with the International Atomic Energy Agency in Cairo, in terms of renewing cooperation with the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s inspectors.

keep readingShow less

LATEST

QIOSK

Newsletter

Subscribe now to our weekly round-up and don't miss a beat with your favorite RS contributors and reporters, as well as staff analysis, opinion, and news promoting a positive, non-partisan vision of U.S. foreign policy.