Proposals, not promises
Published 6 October 2026
Russia's December 2021 documents were proposals, not commitments made by the United States or NATO. The Russian Foreign Ministry says drafts were handed to the US side on 15 December and published on 17 December. One was a proposed bilateral treaty with Washington; the other an agreement with NATO member states.
Article 4 of Russia's proposed US treaty asked Washington to prevent further eastward NATO expansion and deny alliance accession to states that had belonged to the Soviet Union. It also asked the United States not to establish bases in former Soviet states outside NATO, use their infrastructure for military activities or develop bilateral military cooperation with them. The requested restriction therefore extended beyond Ukraine's immediate admission prospects. It sought to constrain the US military relationship with an entire class of countries based on their former membership of the Soviet Union. (Russian draft US treaty, 17 December 2021, Article 4)
The draft also asked both parties to refrain from force deployments in areas where the other could perceive a threat, except on their own national territory. Article 5 addressed heavy-bomber flights and surface-warship deployments outside national airspace or territorial waters from which targets in the other state's territory could be attacked. Article 6 concerned intermediate- and shorter-range ground-launched missiles, including on national territory where they could reach the other party. These proposed clauses joined broad deployment restrictions to weapons-specific limits. (Russian draft US treaty, Articles 5-6)
Article 7 asked the parties to remove nuclear weapons deployed outside their national territories and eliminate the associated infrastructure. It also proposed ending training of personnel from non-nuclear countries in nuclear-weapon use and exercises involving nuclear-use scenarios. The NATO draft added a force-posture baseline of 27 May 1997: Russia and countries already belonging to NATO on that date would not deploy additional forces and weaponry elsewhere in Europe beyond the forces stationed there at that time, except with all parties' consent in exceptional cases. The two drafts thus reached into nuclear arrangements and European deployments as well as future membership. They were Russian negotiating demands, not a recognised entitlement to dictate the security policies of other states. (Russian embassy, published draft agreements, Articles 7 and NATO Article 4)
The Arms Control Association's March 2022 comparison records that the United States and NATO responded with their own written proposals in January. These included discussions of ground-based intermediate- and shorter-range missiles, follow-on arrangements to New START, transparency, risk reduction and reciprocal briefings about nuclear policy. NATO called for recommitment to existing arms-control obligations and Russian engagement on conventional-force transparency. The comparison is a specialist secondary account of the exchanges, not a substitute for every original diplomatic note. It nonetheless supports a specific point: the response was not simply silence. Security and arms-control discussions continued even as the parties disagreed about alliance membership and force posture. (Arms Control Association, Russia, U.S., NATO Security Proposals, March 2022)
The force buildup was separately measurable, though not agreed by both sides. On 18 February 2022, US ambassador Michael Carpenter told an OSCE meeting that Washington assessed Russia had between 169,000 and 190,000 personnel in and near Ukraine, compared with about 100,000 on 30 January. Reuters reported the statement as a US assessment; Russia did not attend the meeting. It is not a later verified order of battle or a count of the troops that crossed the border on 24 February. (Reuters, Russia has massed up to 190,000 personnel in and near Ukraine, U.S.says, 18 February 2022)
Russia's 21 February 2022 recognition of the separatist entities altered the diplomatic framework before the wider invasion. Reuters's same-day explainer said recognition undermined the Minsk arrangements, which had envisaged autonomy for the areas within Ukraine, and opened the way to Russian treaties and military deployment on the basis of the entities' purported independence. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said recognition would further undermine Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity and call Russia's commitment to diplomacy into question. These are the consequences and reactions recorded at the time, not proof that the separatist authorities had gained broadly recognised statehood. The recognition claim belonged to Moscow; Minsk's framework had treated the territories differently. (Reuters, recognition explainer, 21 February 2022)
Russia launched its full-scale invasion by land, air and sea on Thursday, 24 February 2022, and broke the scale of the previous conflict. Reuters' anniversary account describes an operation that Moscow and many military observers expected to end rapidly, followed instead by Ukrainian resistance and counterattacks. The opening assumption of speed mattered. An attacker planning for a short campaign faces different demands from one preparing to sustain years of combat, replacement, occupation and economic pressure.
On Wednesday, 2 March 2022, the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution ES-11/1 with the support of 141 member states. The Assembly's president said the resolution demanded cessation of the use of force and withdrawal of military forces from Ukraine. It also called attention to civilian facilities, humanitarian access and displaced people. The vote placed the legal issue in unusually direct terms: the invasion was not merely a disagreement between two neighbours that could be described without reference to the use of force.
Reporting from the first year documented people saying goodbye at railway stations, families sheltering with newborn children and soldiers moving into defensive positions. Those scenes matter because they show the war entering ordinary decisions. (Reuters)
Russia's December 2021 draft treaties were demands, not agreed security guarantees. On 17 December, Russia's Foreign Ministry published draft agreements that would bar further NATO enlargement, including Ukraine, and limit military activity in states that joined NATO after 1997. A day earlier, NATO's North Atlantic Council had publicly warned of a substantial Russian military build-up around Ukraine and called for de-escalation. (Russian Foreign Ministry, NATO Council)
On 21 February 2022, President Vladimir Putin announced recognition of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk entities; NATO condemned the move as undermining Ukraine's sovereignty. Russia launched its full-scale invasion on 24 February. The UN General Assembly's 2 March resolution condemned the aggression and demanded withdrawal of Russian forces. This sequence separates draft proposals, force build-up, recognition and invasion; none of the Russian proposals became an agreed bargain with Ukraine. (NATO Secretary General)
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