In the wake of this week’s historic White House meetings, President Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine and its allies are “already working on the concrete content of the security guarantees”.
Sir Keir Starmer has been chairing a virtual meeting of those nations prepared to help secure Ukraine after a peace deal – the so-called “Coalition of the Willing”.
And Britain has dispatched its Chief of Defence Staff, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, to Washington to work out how the US can help. The cogs are clearly turning.
But what do “security guarantees” actually mean in practice?
There is a wide spectrum here, ranging from the much overused “boots on the ground” to the threat of crippling economic sanctions on Russia’s oil exports.
Let’s start with what Ukraine wants, and isn’t going to get, at least not for the foreseeable future, and that’s membership of Nato.
US President Donald Trump has ruled that out but there are plenty of other Nato members who also quietly oppose it, such as Slovakia, mainly on the grounds it would dramatically raise the chances of the transatlantic alliance getting dragged into a shooting war with Russia.
Clearly Ukraine will need strong security guarantees after a peace agreement is reached, to prevent Russia from coming back and taking a second, or third, bite.
This is why Sir Keir and President Emmanuel Macron of France have been putting together the 30-plus nation Coalition of the Willing with the aim of providing Ukraine with some international reassurance after a peace deal is signed.
Policing Ukraine’s airspace is one likely option. This could be done by basing planes at existing airbases in neighbouring Poland or Romania, with US participation.
But they would still need clear and robust rules of engagement if they are to be anything more than a symbolic gesture.
In other words, pilots need to know whether or not they can shoot back if Russia violates the peace deal by say, firing a cruise missile at a Ukrainian city.
The Black Sea is another area where Western security guarantees could help keep Russia’s fleet at bay and ensure the free flow of commercial vessels out of ports such as Odesa.
On land, the situation becomes more problematic. Ukraine is a vast country and the front line currently stretches for more than 600 miles, or 1000km-plus.
The Coalition of the Willing cannot possibly muster enough troops to deploy to safeguard that line of contact, even if Russian President Vladimir Putin would agree to that, which he won’t.
The Kremlin has reiterated its absolute opposition to the presence of any Nato troops in Ukraine, under whatever badge. So military support here is likely to be more in the areas of training, intelligence and logistic support, helping Ukraine to rebuild its bruised army, along with an ongoing supply of weapons and ammunition.
A big question mark, though, remains over what Russia will accept as security guarantees for Ukraine. Plenty of commentators online have suggested that Moscow should have no say in this matter at all.
But no countries in the Coalition of the Willing are prepared to send troops into Ukraine opposed. Nobody wants to start World War Three.
John Foreman, a former British military attaché in Moscow who has been following every twist and turn of this conflict, told me: “Russia might accept a US security guarantee for Ukraine in return for formal recognition of the occupied territories, effectively partitioning Ukraine for the long term, and no NATO (troops) in Ukraine and no Ukraine in NATO…Whatever happens, the Coalition of the Willing is no substitute for US power.”
Numerous military experts have said any future “reassurance force” provided by the Coalition of the Willing must have input from the US, something that up until the Alaska summit last week, Donald Trump had declined to commit to.
He has now said the US will be involved, but with no boots on the ground in Ukraine.
In an ideal world, what Ukraine and its allies would like from Washington is both US support for this notional future force but also, more crucially, a solid undertaking that if Russia breaches the peace deal and looks like renewing its assault on Ukraine then US military muscle – especially air power – will be on-hand to back up the Europeans.
Trump has hinted that US air support will be available in some form but given how many times he has changed his position over how to end this war, this is less than reassuring.
Lt.Gen (retd) Ben Hodges, who commanded US Army forces in Europe, says he is sceptical that the “US is really serious about security guarantees for Ukraine and will deliver more than just words”.
He adds: “The Europeans do not trust Vladimir Putin and they are not confused about who the aggressor is in this war. They are concerned that Trump is unable or unwilling to acknowledge that Russia is the aggressor. Putin will not abide by any agreement unless he is forced to do so”.
And here lies the inherent contradiction about security guarantees. How do you make them robust enough to put Russia off attacking Ukraine again, yet not so robust that Russia opposes them and threatens to target Western assets if they go ahead without Moscow’s consent?
The former British Defence Secretary Sir Ben Wallace believes the West, collectively, has not been firm enough in standing up to Vladimir Putin.
“The reality that everyone seems to want to avoid admitting or doing anything about is that Putin shows no sign of wanting to stop the killing,” he says.
“Until Trump or Europe or both are prepared to do something to make Putin want a change then little will be achieved.”
Edward Arnold, senior research fellow for European security at the London-based thinktank RUSI, concludes the Coalition of the Willing has been “successful in providing a format which is flexible and can engage with Trump in a constructive way while supporting Ukraine”.
But he cautions: “It remains a political aspiration, rather than a hardened military construct. The next couple of months will really test its resolve and political risk appetite”.
