Give Donbas, take NATO seat: Could new US pitch work for Ukraine, Russia?

The United States has pitched a new pathway for Ukraine to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an aspiration that Kyiv has long held as a means to guarantee its defence against Russia, almost five years into their war.

But the administration of President Donald Trump has suggested that Ukraine would need to agree to give up all of the Donbas region in the country’s east, which Russian President Vladimir Putin has demanded as one of his conditions for ending the war.

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The idea, according to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was communicated to him by Trump’s negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner at the latest round of US-mediated peace talks between Ukraine and Russia in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, last week.

After the Abu Dhabi round of talks, Kushner and Witkoff met Putin in Moscow on Thursday, then briefed Zelenskyy in Dublin, before a meeting of European leaders in the Irish capital on Friday.

Ukraine applied to become a member of NATO in September 2022, seeking to fortify its borders with Russia.

But the Kremlin has repeatedly said Ukraine becoming a member of NATO would demand “a harsh response” from Russia.

So will Washington’s latest pitch be acceptable to both Ukraine and Russia?

Here’s what we know:

What do we know about the US proposal?

On Saturday, Zelenskyy told reporters that Kushner and Witkoff had suggested that Ukraine could become a NATO member if it ceded control of Donbas in the east.

He said, “The Americans raised a question: ‘What if Ukraine joins NATO? Would Ukraine withdraw from Donbas?'”

“NATO is back on the agenda” since it is part of an “extremely difficult” conversation between Ukraine and Russia which would determine the future of European security, Zelenskyy said.

Putin has been against Ukraine’s NATO membership and has demanded that the alliance pull back its troops from countries bordering Russia.

“This is dangerous because, in my view, it is precisely things like this that lead to wars or escalations,” Zelenskyy said.

“Real security in Europe means the EU [European Union] and NATO. That’s it. There is no other security in Europe.”

Ian Lesser, distinguished fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States told Al Jazeera that the US proposal, if accurate, is significant because it articulates very directly an approach long current in US administration circles that Ukraine should be prepared to make territorial concessions in the service of a settlement.

“The NATO element seems very doubtful. Surely attractive to Ukraine, but [it is] hard to imagine Moscow agreeing to this. And some NATO members will be doubtful too,” he said.

Chris Featherstone, a political scientist from the University of York in the United Kingdom argued that the proposal was a major departure from previously held positions.

“The US has been very cautious about getting further involved in Ukraine, with the Biden administration giving military support, but clearly opposing any ideas of Western involvement on the ground. Trump has seemed to be very sympathetic to the Russian cause, and has had significant blow ups with Zelensky, so this proposal is certainly a surprise,” he noted.

He told Al Jazeera that offering NATO membership in a peace settlement would give significant support to Ukraine should Russia reinitiate the conflict in the future.

“In the light of Trump’s repeated attacks on NATO this could be seen as a recommitment to the alliance. However there would be questions over whether Trump could bring other NATO allies to support the proposal,” he added.

What does the US proposal mean for Ukraine?

Ukraine applied to become a NATO member in September 2022, just months after Russia’s full-scale invasion of the country.

Since then, Zelenskyy, his officials and Ukrainians around the world have been lobbying NATO nations to speed up Kyiv’s accession process.

But NATO members remain divided over offering Ukraine alliance membership amid an ongoing war despite a broad consensus to signal strong support for Kyiv.

NATO members bordering Russia, like Lithuania and Poland, have been most enthusiastic about backing Ukraine’s ambitions. Several other nations in the alliance have also been supportive of an expedited process for Kyiv to join, amid concerns about corruption in Ukraine and while seeking an end to the war with Russia as a condition for the country to become a NATO member.

But under President Trump, the US has been far less receptive to Ukraine’s calls for NATO membership. Trump has publicly told Ukraine to give up on hopes of joining the alliance.

Yet, while the new proposal from Witkoff and Kushner revives Ukraine’s hopes of joining NATO, it demands a compromise that no government in Kyiv can easily make.

On Saturday, Zelenskyy told reporters that the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO in exchange for ceding territory had not been raised by members of the alliance before and reiterated that Kyiv would not give up any of its territories.

But he said if Ukraine received a peace deal which included security guarantees, the right to maintain a strong and well-funded Ukrainian army and funds to rebuild the country, then he would hold a national referendum on the question of ceding territory in exchange for NATO membership.

Featherstone noted that Ukraine has been fighting for a long time, and has consistently maintained that it will not relinquish it’s territory in a peace deal.

“The proposal from the Trump administration is clearly an attempt to test this Ukrainian position, in an effort to confront the impasse,” he said.

“NATO membership would give a level of security that Ukraine would likely welcome, however, this would be a big sacrifice of territory and sovereignty. After years of Trump’s questioning of the NATO commitment, Ukraine would need a strong statement of commitment to its defence should they be considering any proposal like this,” he added.

What does the US proposal mean to Russia?

The Kremlin has not yet responded to the latest US proposal.

But it has maintained a strict position that Ukraine’s NATO membership is a red line for Moscow and a direct threat to Russia’s national security. In fact, Putin has also cited the issue of Ukraine’s NATO aspirations as one reason why Russia launched its war in 2022.

Despite Kushner and Witkoff’s meetings with Putin, the Kremlin has shown little appetite for a change in that position. Moscow has continued, throughout the war, to demand that Ukraine abandon its NATO ambitions and maintain a neutral and demilitarised status. Russia has also firmly opposed any deployment of Western troops or peacekeepers on Ukrainian soil.

In addition to demanding that Ukraine give up its NATO dreams, Moscow has also insisted that Ukraine should cede sovereignty over the Donbas region, in addition to parts of Zaporizhia and Kherson provinces that Russia already occupies.

Just as the new US proposal asks Ukraine to give up some territory in return for a NATO seat, it offers Russia a bargain — withdraw the red line on Ukraine’s NATO membership and get Donbas in exchange.

Why is Donbas significant?

The region in eastern Ukraine has historically been the country’s industrial heartland and is therefore a critical economic engine.

A majority of people in the Donbas identify as ethnically Ukrainian, but a minority identifies as ethnically Russian. The Russian language is also widely spoken in the region — a legacy of Russian migration there in the 19th century and then under the Soviet Union.

Russia accuses Ukraine of discriminating against Russian-speaking and ethnically Russian people in the Donbas, and has used this claim to justify its demand that Kyiv hand over the region to Moscow.

The region consists of the provinces of Luhansk and Donetsk. Since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russia has occupied almost all of Luhansk and most of Donetsk. In all, it controls about 88 percent of the Donbas region. But it has consistently demanded that Ukrainian troops withdraw from the remaining parts of the Donbas they currently hold.

Harry Nedelcu, partner and senior director of geopolitics at Rasmussen Global who previously served on the NATO Secretary General’s policy planning staff told Al Jazeera the US proposal tests the extent to which the territory of Donbas really matters to Russia.

But he said that the recent Abu Dhabi talks had shown that Russia wanted more than just territorial concessions from Ukraine.

“They [the Russians] want to discuss what they call a new European security Architecture, which is a code name for Russia having veto when it comes to NATO,” he said.

He noted that it is also interesting that the Americans did not put forth the idea of Kyiv ceding Donbas for NATO membership to the Russians.

“But everything indicates that the Russians will never accept this,” he said, referring to the idea of Ukraine joining NATO.

“The Russians have no intention of actually coming to the negotiating table. They’re just bringing up new issues (currently about European security architecture) and broadening the agenda in order to make it look like they’re negotiating and appease the American leadership, while inflicting as much damage on Ukraine as possible,” he added.

What has the US said?

The US has not explicitly announced that it has suggested Kyiv should cede territory for NATO membership.

On Saturday, hours after Zelenskyy’s remarks to reporters, in a lengthy post on X, Kushner suggested that “the press has reported some of the maximalist positions proposed by both sides, along with strong political rhetoric”.

He highlighted that the conversations between Russia, Ukraine and the US were “private discussions” aimed at ending the war.

“Several new ideas emerged from these discussions and are now being explored. Some may lead to breakthroughs directly, while others may evolve into new proposals that help bridge the remaining gaps,” he said.

“In our private discussions, both sides understand that practical compromises will be necessary to end this war. Serious and constructive work continues among those of us committed to finding solutions,” he added.

Earlier, on Thursday, Kushner also told reporters that Putin has agreed to include Europe in peace negotiations.

“We cannot conclude this deal without the Europeans being at the table,” he said.