End of grain deal must sow seeds for ceasefire in Ukraine

The year-old agreement that allowed grain ships to leave Ukrainian ports without threat of Russian attack was always precarious, and something of an anomaly in a war notably short on diplomatic efforts. But it was not as one-sided as often presented. Russia benefited, too, in that its ships – carrying food and fertiliser – were also given safe passage. As such, it was a classic bargain.

But it is one that may now be at an end, with renewed Russian assaults on Ukraine’s Black Sea ports and the threat of food shortages much further afield. And if the agreement really is over, one of the safety valves helping to contain the war and one of the lifelines for Ukraine’s battered economy will be lost. Regrettably, this could lead to a spread of the fighting, when it could be a spur to the very opposite: urgent international pressure on both sides to consider a ceasefire and, it must be hoped, wider talks.

Now it is true that Russia has signalled its unhappiness with the working of the grain deal for a while – claiming that the guarantees it was offered have not been honoured and that Ukraine has used the “safe” grain corridor for what it calls “combat” purposes. Nor can it be excluded that Russia is simply using the impasse it has created to try to weaken the effect of Western financial sanctions, rather than eyeing an escalation of the war – in which case there is likely to be a new deal on slightly different terms and the conflict will go on much as before.

But there are also signs that the war could be approaching a juncture when talks may be more possible than they have appeared before. Even as the conflict appears stuck, with some forecasting that it could go on like this for years, there are developments, too, that could militate in favour of change.

On the Russian side, the power dynamics in Moscow remain murky after the apparent mutiny last month of the Wagner mercenary force. Vladimir Putin remains clearly in charge, but the top brass and the defence establishment may be in some sort of flux.

The Wagner chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, may or may not be in exile, with at least some of his forces in Belarus; but they will not, it seems certain, be reappearing on the Ukrainian front. Putin this week announced that some reservists could be subject to call-up, up to the age of 70 – a quasi-mobilisation calculated to attract minimal resistance.

Russian officials continue to say they are open to talks as and when; there have been some informal – deniable – contacts between US and Russian elder statesmen in recent months, and US and Russian intelligence chiefs speak from time to time. There are potential openings here if either the US or Russia chose to use them. Meanwhile, Russia’s defence of the areas of Ukraine it has occupied appears to be holding. Might now be the time for Moscow to consider cashing in its chips for fear of losses ahead?

And could Ukraine be approaching some kind of turning point, too? When Joe Biden said the US would supply cluster munitions to Kyiv because “the Ukrainians are running out of ammunition” was this, as some have suggested, an exaggeration to strengthen the argument? Or was it, as others have argued, letting slip a state secret? Kyiv has so far appeared philosophical about the lack of progress in its long-heralded counteroffensive, and maybe it has some spectacular move in the making. If not, though, how much longer can the official stoicism hold?

Volodymyr Zelensky showed uncharacteristic frustration when informed that Ukraine would not be invited to join Nato. There is also the mood on the ground. Morale in Ukraine has always remained remarkably high, with popular determination to resist only strengthened by every successive Russian blow. Nonetheless the tenor of some – including some eminently pro-Ukraine Western – reports has recently assumed a darker tone.

Ukraine’s war losses remain a state secret, but the toll from the counteroffensive, as judged by ambulances bringing casualties back from the front and new graves in cemeteries, appears to have been high. A recent survey from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology found that almost four out of five Ukrainians said they had friends or family among those killed or injured. Casualties are becoming more visible in places hitherto little touched by the fighting.

Any outsider’s suggestion that now might be the time for Ukraine to consider talking is met by a fierce rebuff from officials in Kyiv to the effect that there is nothing to talk about, because Russia has consistently rejected the 10-point plan set out by Zelensky last November; and because, in particular, Ukraine will never trade land for peace.

So far, it is probably true to say, there is no international consensus in favour of talks, with many foreign leaders and ex-leaders such as Boris Johnson, as well as many Ukrainian emigres, standing adamantly behind Ukraine in its stated intention to recover all the land taken by Russia, including Crimea, force Russia to pay for Ukraine’s reconstruction in the form of reparations, and see Putin brought to justice for war crimes.

There may come a time to stop the bloodshed, they argue, but it is not now. Pressing for early talks, so their argument runs, would only cede Russia an advantage and convey the message that aggressors are rewarded. Ukraine has to win, and Russia has to lose.

But if not now, when? Just how many of its people is Ukraine prepared to lose, either to war or emigration? Does there come a point when Ukraine, having fought a war for its very existence, becomes less viable as a sovereign state? Might a time come when international support cools – after all, was this not what the UK defence secretary, Ben Wallace, meant when he suggested more “gratitude” from Ukraine might not come amiss, given that other countries were giving up some of their own security resources to bolster Ukraine?

And does Ukraine have to be the sole arbiter about when and whether to talk? It is understandable that this is Ukraine’s position: it is their people who are suffering and dying. But Ukraine could not be defending itself without military help from other countries: do they not get a say in when to call time? I would note that at least some of those who once backed a fight to the end and wanted to give Kyiv the last word are now shifting towards support for diplomacy.

Those still opposed to attempts to halt the war now can find plenty of reasons – many of them set out in a recent set of essays published by the London-based think tank, Chatham House – as to why Ukraine should fight on, while imputing some spurious arguments to those of us who disagree. I am not among those, for instance, who argue that a Russian defeat should be avoided, because of the instability that might result. Or that the West – the European West in particular – is losing too much from ostracising Russia. Or that Ukraine should not pursue justice through international courts or another tribunal.

Nor, though, do I believe that Ukraine has been fighting to defend Europe or Western civilisation; it has been defending its right to exist as a nation. My argument is that this fight has been won, and Ukraine now risks losing more by fighting on than it would do by engaging in an internationally mediated diplomatic process.

It is all very well, each side banking on the other’s capitulation, but to defeat Russia, Ukraine would need considerably more US, if not Nato, help, and the Vilnius summit showed just how far the US and the alliance were prepared to go.

With intimations of weakness in the Kremlin following the Wagner mutiny, Ukraine’s battlefield losses mounting, and the threat of an all-out maritime war being added to the stagnating land war, now may be the optimum time to pursue a halt to hostilities, however hard that might look right now from Kyiv.