In the fall of 1962, our country discovered that the Soviet Union had installed nuclear missiles in nearby Cuba. The prior year, a CIA-trained paramilitary group of Cuban expatriates had attempted to invade Cuba and overthrow Fidel Castro’s communistic government. 

This U.S.-supported military action was a spectacular failure. Russian perceptions afterward were that a young, inexperienced U.S. president, John F. Kennedy, was weak and could be bullied.

Kennedy rejected military advice to bomb the missile sites. Instead, he announced a naval quarantine (blockade) of Cuba.  As Russian naval ships approached, tense, secret negotiations were going on.  

An agreement was forged. The Soviet Union would remove the missiles from Cuba. The U.S. would remove nuclear missiles from Turkey and commit to no further invasions of Cuba.

There were several lessons that came from this seemingly irresolvable conflict and unacceptable Russian aggression. Both countries found back-door communication channels to negotiate while each country’s leader could continue to posture about how strong they were. State department people were involved, leveraging years of experience and knowledge about how to talk to an adversary nation.  

A win-win solution was developed, allowing each country to come away with something they could claim as victory.

We don’t really know what went on when President Trump hosted Russian President Putin in Alaska to try and resolve the Russia-Ukraine war. By all appearances, Trump gave Putin undeserved flattery as a respected world leader, ignored State Department advice, and presumed Putin would stop the war as a favor to a personal relationship between two strong leaders. 

Meanwhile, the war continues and Trump’s promised “severe consequences” still haven’t been implemented.

I do not pretend to be a genius that can resolve world conflicts, but there have to be better ideas than Trump’s embarrassing coddling of Putin. 

Let’s start with Putin’s stated objectives for his invasion of Ukraine. His demands center on: more territory; Ukraine neutrality/no NATO membership; and the demilitarization of Ukraine.

Here’s a deal we could’ve offered Russia.  The fundamental purpose of NATO is to ensure the collective freedom and security of its member states.  Both Russia and Ukraine would be invited to join NATO. More than once, Russia has been invaded by European powers. NATO membership would ensure Russian security along its European borders, eliminating the necessity of demilitarizing Ukraine or denying NATO membership to Ukraine.

Russia would also be invited to join the European Union. The EU is a political and economic union that created a single international market in Europe, standardizing business rules of conduct and enabling the free flow of goods and services across borders. 

Russia’s economy is currently suppressed by economic sanctions and historically suppressed by its communistic government.  EU membership would invite Russian economic productivity and provide open markets for its vast natural resources.

Multiple Russian concessions would be required in the deal. First, the war ends and Russia withdraws from all Ukraine territory, including Crimea. Russia doesn’t need territory; it is almost twice the size of the next nearest geographically large countries. Second, Russia returns the estimated 250,000 Ukrainian children kidnapped during the war. Third, Russia loses its $300 billion assets currently frozen, which will be used to rebuild Ukraine.

To stop this war, Putin has to have a credible claim to victory. Thousands of Russian families have lost a father, son or brother, and politically Putin cannot appear weak.  Ensuring security with Europe and opening the European market to Russia would be valuable wins to brag about.

Ukraine would get all its territory restored, would get a generation of children back, would get money to rebuild, and would have security going forward.

Putin would also need to understand the consequences if he didn’t take the deal. NATO, including the U.S., would provide all modern weaponry short of nuclear weapons to Ukraine for the duration of the war.  As long as Ukrainians were willing to fight for their country, they would have every advantage of modern military technology.

The U.S. and EU would put tremendous pressure on all countries to cease all trade with Russia. Economic sanction loopholes would be closed. Economically, Russia would be isolated to doing business with rogue states such as China, North Korea and Iran.

Basically, this approach calls Putin’s bluff. If the war is really about Russian security and NATO, then the Russians get what they really want. If the war is about seizing territory, the message is clear that this will be resisted fiercely by NATO – including the U.S.

Pulling off this plan would take real negotiation.  The U.S. would have to build consensus with all European countries, Russia, and countries still buying from Russia such as India and Turkey. But there is a win-win in this scenario every leader can claim for their country, and a war is stopped.

Maybe this specific plan is unworkable. However, it is an example of accepting all nations’ concerns as credible and looking for a compromise that provides all with some satisfaction.  

John Foster Dulles was the U.S. Secretary of State during President Eisenhower’s administration.  He managed the Cold War with the Soviet Union following World War II.  He famously once said, “The ability to get to the verge without getting into the war is the necessary art. If you cannot master it, you inevitably get into war.”  

That is real negotiation between nation states.

President Trump’s failings as a real negotiator have come at a dangerous time for our country, all of Europe, and perhaps even the world if China joins Russia in military aggression.  

Let’s hope this administration eventually collects the best minds to conceive of a strategy that isn’t, “I win, you lose,” which is the only game Trump knows – a game that never works to peacefully resolve nation conflict.