Ukraine will not surrender to Russia

CIUS weekly report on North American media coverage of Ukrainian affairs, 23 February–1 March 2025

Five publications (Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The Wall Street Journal, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, and Policy Magazine) were selected to prepare this report on how Ukraine has been portrayed in the North American press during the past week. The sample was compiled based on their impact on public opinion as well as on their professional reputation, popularity among the readership, and topical relevance. These publications represent centrist viewpoints on the political spectrum.

This MMS report covers only the most-read and relevant articles about Ukraine, as ranked by the respective North American publications themselves in the past week. Its scope covers promoted articles on home pages and articles from special sections on Ukraine, with the hashtag #Ukraine, from the paper editions of the publications, and about Ukraine from opinion columns and editorials.

MMS summaries

Russia systematically breaks its promises. The editorial board of the Wall Street Journal states that Ukraine’s demand for security guarantees in the ceasefire agreement is justified. Russia has repeatedly violated its commitments to Ukraine since 1991, when the USSR collapsed and Ukraine became independent. According to the author, it started with the 1994 Budapest Memorandum: “Ukraine yielded its nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees from the U.S., U.K. and Russia. Moscow explicitly promised to respect Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and refrain from economic coercion.” Despite these commitments, Moscow has systematically taken aggressive actions against Kyiv. Of the more egregious territorial violations, in 2003 Russia began building a dam on the tiny Ukrainian island of Tuzla, without providing notice or securing permission from Kyiv. That crisis was resolved only after Ukraine made concessions. In 2014, Kyiv’s desire to strengthen its political and economic ties with Western Europe prompted Russia to illegally occupy Ukraine’s Autonomous Republic of Crimea and part of the Donbas (Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts). The Minsk I and Minsk II agreements became tools in Moscow’s hands to prepare for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. According to the Wall Street Journal, “When Ukrainians say they want credible security guarantees from Europe and the U.S., this is why. They know that another ‘cease-fire,’ a Minsk III, would merely give Mr. Putin a respite to refinance his war machine after sanctions ease, rearm, and invade again later.”

US must pressure Russia to achieve a lasting peace. Thomas Wright (Foreign Affairs) asserts that Ukraine has significant leverage for future negotiations with Russia, provided that Washington supports Kyiv and adopts a negotiating strategy that puts pressure on Moscow. In recent weeks, however, US support for Ukraine has been called into question, with bilateral talks between Moscow and Washington in Riyadh only reinforcing this concern. It is important to understand that such actions by the USA are a choice, not a necessity, and that there is still an opportunity to strike a deal that supports democracy and is favourable to Ukraine. According to the author, “The Trump administration should enter these negotiations with a clear sense of U.S. interests […] and a strategy for how to accomplish its objective. If it does that, it can secure a free and independent Ukraine with the ability to defend itself and deter future attack.” The USA has at least four core interests in ensuring a free and sovereign Ukraine and preventing Russia from winning. First, since its invasion of Ukraine in 2014 and especially after the full-scale invasion in 2022, Russia has significantly deepened its cooperation with China, North Korea and Iran: “If Russia prevails in Ukraine, it will be a victory as well for each of its three partners, without whom Moscow would already have lost.” Second, the survival of a free and independent Ukraine would benefit a democratic USA: “The Ukrainian military will emerge from the war as Europe’s third largest, after Russia and Turkey.” Third, a Russian victory in Ukraine would significantly increase the threat to small European states that are staunchly pro-American and spend a large percentage of their GDP on defence. Fourth, the US should be interested in a stable and peaceful Europe: “Europe is the United States’ largest source of foreign investment and largest export market, and a key ally that broadly aligns with the United States on the central issues in world politics.” According to Wright, “If the United States fails to help Ukraine exploit the advantage it has on the eve of talks, it will give Moscow a lifeline, which it will not just use in its quest to dominate Ukraine but also damage U.S. interests globally.”

Ukraine will not surrender to Russia. Janina Dill, Marnie Howlett, and Carl Müller-Crepon (Foreign Affairs) argue that Ukraine is open to peace talks but will not agree to a forced deal. Bilateral negotiations between the US and Russia without considering Ukraine’s interests and voice are likely fruitless: “Washington may have leverage over Kyiv, since ending U.S. military assistance would greatly impede the country’s ability to fight. But the Trump administration cannot simply command Ukraine to lay down its arms.” In the authors’ opinion, “Trump’s strategy to sideline Ukraine in peace negotiations with Russia not only violates basic international norms of diplomacy but is also strategically mistaken.” According to the survey, as in 2022, Ukrainians in 2025 are against territorial concessions and are resolved to resist Russia at all costs: “Most important, Ukrainians remain categorically opposed to any [negotiation] strategy that ends with Russian control over their government. When participants were given a choice between an outcome that led to Russian dominance and one that resulted in full political autonomy, 77 percent chose full autonomy, even if it came at very high cost. This has changed little since 2022, when 81 percent of them did. In the instances when respondents accepted Russian control, they generally did so to pick a strategy that restored Ukraine’s full territorial integrity with its pre-2014 borders. High civilian casualties, military casualties, and nuclear risks had little effect on their choices.” Thus, Washington’s pressure on Kyiv may not lead to peace but rather will make the US look weak. According to the authors, “It means that a deal in which Ukrainians ‘may be Russian someday’ will not in fact end the war. After all, there is nothing ‘realist’ about forcing 39 million people into a rump state frantically forged in the furnace of great-power politics.”

Trump’s proposed economic rapprochement with Russia is wrong. Keith Johnson (Foreign Policy) suggests that President Trump’s proposed economic rapprochement with Russia is a mistake. It is more of a “preemptive surrender” by Washington than a justified necessity: “Just four weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened Russian President Vladimir Putin with harsher economic sanctions if a deal to end the war in Ukraine is not reached, Trump and his team are breaking out the carrots.” Such an initiative would satisfy all of Moscow’s desires and place an additional burden on European security—and thus on the US. The assumption that the Russian economy is attractive for investment is also questionable: “This is a place with 21 percent interest rates, inflation that is higher than what hurt former President Joe Biden, and labor and supply chain problems that would vex nimble economies, let alone sclerotic ones. Couple that with the absolute lack of rule of law—Russia is a place where investments are placeholders, not assets; those who find themselves in favor with the Kremlin end up in resorts such as Sochi, while those who don’t end up in Siberia—and you can see why U.S. businesses have cold feet.” Russia’s economic power is based on revenues from fossil fuel exports, which contradicts President Donald Trump’s statements about US energy dominance. Johnson declares: “If Russia gets the financial cuffs taken off, the first thing it is going to do is flood Europe with cheap gas, which will thrill the Germans and appall everyone on the U.S. Gulf coast, who were hoping to send fleets of tankers full of U.S. natural gas to Europe.” According to the author, “Trump likes to play at geopolitics, even if diplomats and longtime observers fret, worry, and wonder. His gambits to take over Greenland, Panama, Gaza, and Ukraine are alarming and revealing.”

Trump-Zelensky standoff should become a warning for US’s allies. Daniel Béland, Juliet Johnson, and Maria Popova (Policy Magazine) argue that US President Trump’s Oval Office attack on Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky on Feb. 28 was more than just an outburst—it was a public display of the Trump administration’s alignment with Russian President Putin’s agenda—and a warning sign for America’s allies, including Canada. Trump and his vice-president, JD Vance, accused Zelensky of being ungrateful for US aid after he questioned their trust in Putin to uphold a ceasefire without security guarantees for Ukraine. The confrontation derailed a planned agreement that would have granted the US mineral concessions in Ukraine, and Trump reportedly demanded that Zelensky leave the White House. The authors note that this episode reflects a broader effort to pressure Ukraine into an unfavourable peace deal that would benefit Russia. In fact, Russia’s demands remain unchanged since 2022—reduce Ukraine’s military, oust its government, and block its NATO aspirations: “Putin seems to be counting on the Trump administration to do his dirty work for him by browbeating Ukraine into conceding via coercion what Russia has so far been unable to win for itself on the battlefield.” Béland, Johnson, and Popova warn that Trump’s hostility toward Ukraine is part of a wider pattern of aggression against America’s traditional allies, particularly Canada. Trump has previously dismissed Canada’s sovereignty, referring to its border as artificial and joking about making it the 51st US state. The authors argue that this rhetoric mirrors Putin’s language about Ukraine, suggesting a dangerous precedent. Beyond political insults, the Trump administration’s willingness to strong-arm other nations is evident in its approach to Mexico, where Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth allegedly threatened unilateral US military action. If Trump’s White House succeeds in forcing Ukraine into a one-sided deal with Russia, other American allies could face similar pressure. Instead of appeasing Trump, as the UK’s Prime Minister Starmer did, the authors urge a stronger international response, warning that “what happened to President Zelensky on Friday…was not a shocking aberration or one-off interaction but part of a broader pattern of contemptuous aggression by President Trump and his administration.”

Canada’s delay on seizing Russian assets undermines Ukraine’s war effort. Balkan Devlen, Aaron Gasch Burnett, and Yuliya Ziskina (Macdonald-Laurier Institute) warn that Canada’s failure to act on confiscating frozen Russian assets is directly undermining Ukraine’s war effort and enabling further Russian aggression. The Liberal government has stalled for over a year and a half on legislation that would allow the seizure of over C$20 billion in Russian assets, leaving Ukraine without vital financial support at a time when the USA’s commitment to Kyiv is wavering. Worse still, the authors argue, Prime Minister Trudeau’s politically motivated prorogation of Parliament has blocked both the C$5 billion loan Canada promised Ukraine—backed by interest from these assets—and any direct transfer of funds. Ottawa is jeopardizing Ukraine’s survival despite the fact that “this delay and inaction are particularly galling, when the measure would cost Canadian taxpayers absolutely nothing.” With Parliament prorogued until March 24 and the Liberal government on shaky ground, Canada’s ability to provide meaningful support remains paralyzed, even as Ukraine continues fighting for its sovereignty. Devlen, Burnett, and Ziskina urge immediate action, outlining four concrete steps Canada must take: (1) Ottawa should extend a limited loan to Ukraine, using the frozen Russian assets as collateral, while ensuring these assets will be seized to repay it once Parliament reconvenes; (2) the next government—Liberal or Conservative—must fast-track legislation to formally transfer these funds to Ukraine, building on existing proposals by Senators Ratna Omidvar and Donna Dasko, which already have bipartisan support; (3) Canada should move the frozen Russian assets into separate accounts, making future seizures easier and preventing co-mingling with non-sanctioned funds; and (4) Ottawa should push allies to follow its lead in formally sanctioning Russia’s central bank, strengthening global financial pressure on Moscow. The authors reject concerns that seizing Russian assets would destabilize markets, noting that “rather than destabilize the financial system, this move would strengthen it by upholding the rule of law.” Ukraine’s ability to resist both Russian military aggression and US pressure for an unjust peace depends on financial security, and Canada has the means to act—what’s missing is political will.