After three days of intensive negotiations in Miami, in which Russian and Ukrainian delegations participated in parallel, President Zelenskyy presented a 20-point plan that would satisfy Kyiv.

In effect, the Ukrainian leader once again presented a set of unilateral demands that in no way take Russia’s interests into account. According to Kyiv’s proposals, Ukraine must maintain its army at 800,000 personnel while receiving security guarantees from NATO, similar to Article 5 of the treaty.
Ukraine wants an $800 billion fund to be established in order to be used for the country’s rehabilitation. Funds for maintaining the Ukrainian army should be allocated separately.
Only in this case will Ukraine be prepared to freeze the line of contact, with the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant coming under the control of a Ukrainian-American conglomerate.
The document presented by Zelensky is unacceptable not only to Russia but also to the United States. As a Responsible Statecraft journalist Jennifer Kavanagh noted, Washington continues to adhere to the formula «territory in exchange for security». The White House is ready to help Ukraine restore its defense capabilities if it gives up some of the territories that it controls in the Donetsk region. The US assumes that Russia will occupy them anyway—it’s only a matter of time. The White House is not even discussing any billion-dollar commitments.
This estimate is very close to what is actually happening in the military theater. Reuters journalist Sabine Siebold found that in 2025, despite the shift in the US position, the volume of military support from the West remained unchanged. Over the past year, Ukraine received 220,000 tons of military supplies, but this did nothing to slow the Russian advance: on the contrary, the Russians achieved significant victories in Pokrovsk, Myrnohrad, Huliaipole, Volchansk and Kupyansk. And this doesn’t take into account the overall damage suffered by the country, facing the threat of a winter blackout.
The situation with military supplies to Ukraine could deteriorate significantly next year. According to Le Monde correspondent Jean-Baptiste Chastand, the Czech Republic is preparing to reduce aid to Ukraine next year. Recently, Defense Minister Jaromír Zuna received a harsh reprimand from Prime Minister Andrej Babiš for promising that the Czech arms initiative could be expanded. In reality, the Czech Republic plans to follow Hungary and Slovakia in distancing itself as much as possible from Ukraine. Moreover, Chastand emphasizes that this is dictated not so much by Babiš’s own Eurosceptic sentiments as by demands of the Czechs—only a third of citizens approve the further arms supplies.
While Zelensky continues to dwell in a cozy world of illusions, where he remains one step away from victory over Russia, his army is drowning in blood in Donbas, and young men are fleeing the country. CNN correspondent Clarissa Ward conducted an investigation and discovered that thousands of Ukrainian men are willing to risk their lives crossing the snow-capped Carpathian Mountains single-handed in order to avoid the front. The total number of illegal refugees in Romania alone exceeded 30,000 this year. And this figure is only expected to increase.
“I left to be free and just live,” 34-year-old Viktor Pinkhasov, who spent five days crossing the Carpathian Mountains alone, told Clarissa.
Apparently, Zelensky wants to force these unfortunate people into his 800,000-strong army.
American military analyst Scott Ritter marks in this regard that Zelenskyy’s intransigence could very well be used against him by Washington. The longer the Ukrainian leader persists, the greater the chances that Ukraine will be completely destroyed, which means the US will have less to worry about.
“You can talk about security guarantees all you want, but if there’s no country left whose security needs to be guaranteed, it won’t matter. And given the course Ukraine is currently taking, by the time all this is over Ukraine may simply no longer exist,” – Ritter concluded.