The Offer to the Aggressor

Russia invaded Ukraine. Now Volodymyr Zelensky is offering Vladimir Putin a meeting and a ceasefire along the front line in an open letter, and the responsibility to end the war lies with the one who started it without cause!

Russia invaded Ukraine. Every honest examination of this war begins with that sentence, and there is nothing to reinterpret about it. This was not a conflict that gradually escalated. It was one country attacking another, a war chosen by one man and continued by him to this day. On the evening of June 4, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky published an open letter on the website of his office in which he offers the aggressor an immediate meeting between the two heads of state and a complete ceasefire along the entire front for the duration of negotiations. The responsibility to end this war therefore lies where responsibility for its beginning also lies, with the one who unleashed it without cause.

Link to the original letter

The letter recalls that many in Ukraine viewed Putin favorably when he came to power in Russia more than twenty six years ago. That is over. Today, Zelensky writes, the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians welcome that Ukrainian long range drones visited the opening of Putin’s forum in St. Petersburg and covered more than one thousand kilometers in doing so, and that distance is not the limit of what is possible. Twenty six years of his rule have reduced the relationship between the two countries from questions of trade and civilian life to one subject only: strikes and losses. Putin has spent almost half of that time at war with Ukraine. Whatever he says about NATO, geopolitics, and the Russian language, this war was his personal choice, a war without real cause, and history will remember him accordingly. This is the hard conclusion, and it is accurate. No alliance and no language forced Putin to send an army across the border. He did it because he wanted to.

Gradually, the letter continues, even Russians themselves are beginning to tire of the war. Putin accepts it only so long as it does not concern the security of his residence in Valdai or the parade in Moscow. His own life matters to him, while he spends the lives of others. Russians, meanwhile, dislike the drones and missiles, fuel shortages and rising prices, constant restrictions, the threat of a second mobilization wave intended to expand the war, and the prospect of a war without end. For now, Putin can still force Russians to live this way, but his means are diminishing, and eventually he will lack both the money and the political strength to continue buying their loyalty as he has for twenty six years.

The Kremlin has received Volodymyr Zelensky’s letter. It will be forwarded to President Vladimir Putin and presented to him at a later point in time, Dmitry Peskov, spokesperson for the Russian president, stated.

What follows is an accounting of the losses demanded by Putin’s war. As Putin himself says, everything must be counted. The day before, Zelensky writes, he received the report on Russian military losses for May: once again more than thirty thousand Russians killed or seriously wounded, a figure that, according to Ukraine, has been recorded month after month and documented by video confirmation in every case. Sixty three percent were fatalities and only thirty seven percent wounded, a ratio that no army in the twenty first century can sustain, and the share of deaths continues to rise. These are the men Putin sends into a war he never needed to fight. Zelensky also acknowledges Ukraine’s own losses. He worries about Ukrainians, every loss hurts, and even a ratio of one to five or one to six to Russia’s disadvantage weighs heavily. Every few months Putin moves the deadline for capturing Ukrainian territory, especially Donetsk region, and this year as well he will not take it.

Ukraine does not want an endless war, the letter continues. It knows that life without war would be far better, and the majority of Russians would agree with that. Many never believed Ukraine would be able to defend itself for this long, not Putin and not his advisers, and that was their mistake. In the fifth year of the full scale invasion, Zelensky urges him not to fear leaving the war behind. That is now the most important thing. Ukraine preserved its independence and will continue to preserve it. It united many around the world in defense of Ukraine and against Putin, secured weapons and funding, Ukraine receives support and Russia receives sanctions. That will remain the case until justice for Ukraine is achieved. Those claiming sanctions will be eased and aid reduced without Putin changing course will not succeed. The example of Orbán shows the kind of disgrace awaiting those who choose to help Russia in this war.

The letter sets out how much Putin’s position has deteriorated. Ukraine survived the hard winters in which he tried to destroy its energy system. It brought the war onto Russian territory, something Putin would not have managed without North Korean assistance. He became the first ruler of Russia forced to seek help in Pyongyang and is now completely dependent on China, also for the first time in Russian history. Ukrainian soldiers are now helping strengthen the defense of partners in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. Putin hoped for internal unrest in Ukraine, but it was his own military formations that rebelled, and June 23, the anniversary of that uprising in 2023, cannot be erased from history through silence. His own officials, business figures, and propagandists look at him with visible exhaustion. The world has not grown tired of Ukraine, which he had long counted on, but even those helping Russia circumvent sanctions are becoming tired of Russia. Intelligence materials show, according to Zelensky, that Putin is already reviewing war plans for 2027 and 2028, that he continues to rely on his missiles, wants to draw Belarus further into the war, and is playing games around Transnistria while his propagandists threaten all neighboring countries. Whether he truly wants to walk this entire path, Zelensky asks, remains his choice.

JOURNALIST: President Zelensky wrote a letter to President Putin. He wants the two of them to meet to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine because he believes you are too busy with the war with Iran. Is he right?

TRUMP: Well, I don't know. I'm glad that they may be talking about meeting. I think we had a lot to do with it. I know exactly what you're getting at. But I think it would be great if they met. They should get it done.

Only then comes the actual offer, and it comes from the country that was invaded, not from the aggressor. Enough of the war, Zelensky writes. Ukraine proposes ending it honestly and with dignity and with guarantees that no new war will be started. Since the United States is currently focused entirely on Iran, it would be wrong simply to wait until its attention returns to the war in Europe. He offers a meeting, not in Moscow and not in Kyiv, because a Ukrainian head of state belongs in Putin’s capital no more than a Russian one belongs in Kyiv, but in one of the countries that have traditionally hosted such meetings: Switzerland, Turkey, or the Arab world. A fixed date should be agreed upon. The promises made in Alaska regarding Ukrainian and European issues are irrelevant because Ukraine’s fate will not be decided in Anchorage. Additional participants could later join the bilateral process, above all guarantors with real influence. Europe’s participation is necessary and so is that of the United States, from which a new security order for this part of the world could emerge. The many agreements with Russia and the Minsk accords failed, which is why bilateral answers must be sought instead of hiding behind formulas, technical groups, or the delays of shuttle diplomacy.

With his war, Zelensky writes, Putin separated Ukraine and Russia forever. The front line is now the line from which diplomacy must begin. Ukraine is ready for a complete ceasefire for the duration of negotiations, with compliance along the front to be monitored by the United States. Ukraine is prepared for a prisoner exchange based on the principle of all for all, which could become a good beginning to ending the war. Serious steps are needed to return civilians and children taken during the war. This is not a side issue but one of the gravest crimes of this war of aggression: the removal of children from a country that was invaded. And finally, there must be agreement on what the future will look like for all coming generations of Ukrainians and Russians. If Putin does not come to the conclusion on his own that the war must end, Ukraine will continue fighting for its existence, supported by its partners. Putin, however, will have to fight far harder for his own survival. This is not a threat, Zelensky writes, but a fact of Russian history, because when Russia becomes tired, change follows. He can end his war. Eternal memory to all whose lives this war has taken.

What remains is a simple moral reality that outlasts all words. On one side stands the country that was invaded and nevertheless offers a meeting, a ceasefire, and the return of abducted children. On the other side stands the man who began this war without cause and who alone can end it. A war that nobody needed to wage is being kept alive by a single will, and every additional person who dies from this day forward dies because that will wants it so. The honest question therefore is not directed at Kyiv but at Moscow. It is whether a ruler who unleashed a war without reason can find the reason to end it, or whether he will choose the dead of the coming months in the same way he chose the war itself. The door stands open. The one keeping it closed is only the aggressor.