According to the Washington Post, not long ago, Trump and Putin had the longest phone call this year, and the two sides discussed a number of issues including the conflict in Ukraine. Among them, Putin proposed a new truce condition to Trump: Ukraine should use the Ukrainian-controlled area of Donetsk Oblast in Wudong in exchange for part of the Russian-controlled area of Kherson Oblast and Zaporizhzhia Oblast in Wudong. Although the report did not give the specific details of what Putin was willing to exchange, it means that Russia has made full control of Donbass a prerequisite for a ceasefire.
Why did Putin throw out a ceasefire plan of "exchanging Khersson and Zaporizhe for Donbas" at this time? After all, Zaporozhye has Europe's largest nuclear power plant, and Kherson is an important transportation hub in southern Ukraine. How can Putin be willing to spit out this piece of fat meat but be obsessed with getting Donbas?
Simply put, the logic behind this is both political consideration and the calculation of economic and military strategies, but ultimately it is a real choice.
“Donbas” is the abbreviation of “Donetsk Basin”, mainly comprising the Donetsk and Lugansk states, located in eastern Ukraine, is an important land passage connecting Russia with Crimea and the Black Sea. The area is about 50,000 square kilometers, pre-war population about 6.5 million, of which more than half speak Russian, many have Russian ethnic origin.
Before the middle of the 18th century, Donbass was almost uninhabited. Later it was gradually incorporated into the chart of Russia and quickly became an energy base because of the discovery of coal fields. After the establishment of the Soviet Union, the degree of industrialization of Donbass continued to deepen. Especially in the 1930s, Stalin massively developed the coal mining and metallurgical industries, attracting a large number of Russian labor to the country. Industrial development not only brought economic change, but also placed Donbass at the core of the Soviet industrial system, but also contributed to the Russian-language culture, education and media.
After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the older generation of local workers generally missed the stability and social welfare of the "Soviet era". In addition, Ukraine vigorously pursued a nationalist policy of de-Russianization after its independence, which made Russian-speaking residents of Donbas feel uneasy and worried about their cultural and economic status being marginalized. This nostalgia and identity anxiety laid the foundation for later separatism.
Meanwhile, local oligarchs, who have close ties with Russia, attempted to gain greater autonomy through a political game with Kiev. In the 1990s, some politicians even proposed the idea of a “federal” or “Donbas Republic” as a tool for negotiating a price with the central government. Among them, Yanukovych, born in Donetsk, was the representative of the “Donbas Group” interests. In 2010, he was successfully elected President of Ukraine with the support of the ruler of Donetsk, Ahmetov.
In 2014, Ukraine’s “Platz Revolution” overthrew Yanukovych’s government, and the pro-Russian population in Donbass rapidly intensified, and the wave of protests quickly evolved into a separatist movement. With the permission and support of Moscow, armed uprisings broke out in Donetsk and Lugansk, proclaiming the establishment of the “Republic of Donetsk” and the “Republic of Lugansk”.
Later, under the mediation of France and Germany, Russia and Ukraine signed the Minsk Agreement, which gave Donbass "special autonomous status" and tried to promote a ceasefire. But as Kiev refused to amend the constitution and Donbas militias refused to withdraw their troops, the agreement became a dead letter. Since then, the war in eastern Ukraine has continued, and Donbas has gradually become a semi-independent "Russian-controlled area."
The reason why Putin wants to support Donbas is not only his close historical and cultural ties with Russia, but also to safeguard the concept of "Russian World" he advocates.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, about 25 million Russian-speaking inhabitants were cut off by new national borders, and a concept of "compatriots abroad" emerged in Russia. In 2001, Putin formally proposed the idea of "Russian world" at the first World Russian-speaking compatriots conference, emphasizing the creation of a civilized community based on common history, culture, language and Orthodox beliefs.
Therefore, when Putin launched the “Special Military Operation” in February 2022, he gave seven reasons in a television speech, in addition to opposing NATO’s east expansion, de-militarizing Ukraine, de-nazism, preventing Ukraine from obtaining nuclear weapons, including “liberating” Donbass, and liberating the “suffering compatriots” who suffered the “persecution” of the Ukrainian government because of “pro-Russia.”
In other words, whether Donbas can be completely occupied is not only a key indicator to measure the success of the "special military operation", but also a necessary condition for the Putin government to be politically accountable to the domestic people.
Of course, in the international games, politics is often just an excuse, and Putin wants to get the Donbass region in addition to political reasons, and its irreplaceable economic value.
The Donbass region has more than twenty strategic minerals such as coal, iron, lithium, uranium, uranium, shale gas, and is known as the "subterranean industrial treasury", even in the vast and resource-rich Russia, the region is a rare pool of treasures.
Among them, Donbas' coal resources account for more than 90% of Ukraine's national reserves. It has the world's largest anthracite coalfield, and a considerable part of it is high-grade coking coal, which can be directly used for steelmaking. In addition to coal, oil shale and shale gas resources are also distributed underground in Donbas, which was once regarded by Western energy companies as a potential fulcrum for Ukraine to get rid of its dependence on Russian natural gas.
Because of this complete energy base, Donbas built an industrial system integrating coal, steel, machinery, and chemicals as early as the Soviet era, forming a strong closed-loop industrial chain. Its structure is complex and its production capacity is huge, extremely rare throughout Eastern Europe. Therefore, Donbas is also known as the "industrial lung of Ukraine." Before the war, it contributed more than one-tenth of the country's tax revenue, one-fifth of GDP, and one-quarter of industrial output value and exports. It was the pillar of Ukraine's fiscal revenue and foreign exchange sources.
It can be said that the whole of Ukraine, whether metallurgy, steel, machinery, chemical or electricity, relies on the energy and technological systems of Donbass. Take Donetsk and Mariupol, for example, their steel plants, metallurgy units and car manufacturing plants, support the roots of the Ukrainian military-industrial system. Therefore, if Donbass is lost, it means not only the collapse of Ukrainian energy self-sufficiency, the breakdown of the national industrial system, but also means that Ukraine can only rely on agriculture and foreign aid to survive.
For Russia, Donbas also has extremely high strategic and economic value.
Geographically, Donbass is connected with industrial regions such as Rostov and Kursk in southern Russia, forming a natural economic and industrial expansion zone.
First, it can immediately access mature energy, metallurgical and machinery manufacturing capacity to make up for Russia's long-term shortage of coking coal and directly guarantee the demand for military, shipbuilding and railway steel in the Azov Sea and Black Sea direction.
Secondly, Donbas is rich in resources such as lithium, titanium and shale gas, which can be integrated into the "Eurasian Industrial Chain" map led by Moscow to provide new materials, new energy and high-end manufacturing in Russia. Provide long-term raw material support.
More importantly, Donbass's well-developed power grid, railway and port system, once fully connected with the southern port area of Russia, will form a strategic resource corridor through "Russia to Donbass to the Black Sea".This corridor will not only significantly reduce Russia's dependence on the Baltic Sea and Far East ports, but also enable Russia to "resource-industrial-transport" self-connection in the energy export and industrial logistics system, further consolidating its economic and strategic depth in the Eurasian continent.
Despite the economic importance of the Donbass region, its most important advantages remain in its important military value.
In August this year, Russian troops captured Chasovar, an important town in Uzbekistan. This means that the Russian army has finally opened the door to further attacks on the "fortress zone" of Wudong.
The so-called "fortress zone" refers to the Ukrainian army's terraced defense system in northern Donetsk Oblast based on urban agglomerations such as Slovyansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Kostyukinnivka. It combines highlands and rivers. It is generally arc-shaped, with a total length of about 50 kilometers and a depth of about 20 - 30 kilometers.
In July 2014, after the Ukrainian government troops defeated the pro-Russian armed forces in Slavyansk and Kramatorsk, they established a line of defense based on the use of underground mines, abandoned factories and city defense works left in the Soviet era, which is also a prototype of the "fortress zone".
In 2015, after the Minsk Agreement freeze line was formed, the Ukrainian army expanded this line of defense: it built a reinforced concrete bunker group, opened up horizontal railways and highways, and formed a "forward blocking zone","main defense zone" and "rear mobile belt" three-layer defense system. After 2020, existing fortifications have been reinforced and upgraded in accordance with NATO technical specifications. After the fall of Bakhmut in 2023, the Ukrainian army once again reinforced this line of defense and added several kilometers of bunkers, trench networks, minefields and tank traps. This formed the most solid military fortress in the Ukrainian East region and even the entire Ukraine.
For the Russian army, whether it is to advance to the west of Ukraine or to seize the entire region of Donbass, it must break through this “fortress zone.”
But the problem is that this line of defense has been polished for more than ten years. It is neither a single fortress nor a few isolated positions, but a complex system formed by the mutual support of multiple urban agglomerations, fortifications and natural terrain. If you try to break through head-on, you will definitely pay heavy casualties. Bakhmut, known as the meat grinder, is a living example. In 2023, the Wagner Corps fought hard for 10 months to capture a small city of only 23 square kilometers, but it paid a heavy price of 20,000 people killed and 40,000 injured.
Therefore, in order to avoid falling into another "meat grinder" battle again, after Bakhmut, the Russian army changed its tactics and adopted a more detailed and systematic combat approach. In particular, the attack on the "fortress zone" was even more cautious. They tried to create conditions for the eventual collapse of this line of defense by gradually capturing the peripheral strongholds, outflanking them in a circuitous way, cutting off supplies, and moving step by step. But this also means that every step the Russian army takes now, it has to be carefully calculated.
And this is why it took the Russian army 16 months to advance from Bakhmut to Chasov Yar, a short distance of six or seven kilometers. Moreover, Bakhmut and Chasov Yar are only peripheral strongholds of the "fortress zone", which is enough to show that the "fortress zone" of the Ukrainian army is by no means in vain.
The reason why the Ukrainian army worked hard to manage this line of defense was not only because it guarded the throat of inland places such as Dnipro, Ijumm, and Kharkiv, but also because it was the last barrier from Ukraine to the central and western regions. The terrain here is commanding high, making it easy to defend but difficult to attack, and further west, there is basically a flat land, with no danger to defend.
However, it is no easy task to break through this line of defense. In Chasovyar and its corridors leading to Kramatorsk and Slavyansk alone, the Ukrainian army deployed as many as 35 brigade-level units and battalion-level units, most of whom were in positional defense. In a state, the Russian army had to break through these highly fortified positions layer by layer before it could move forward. The American Institute for War Studies estimates that it will take at least several years for Russian troops to seize this area, and will pay a very huge price.
For this reason, both Europe and Ukraine believe that if Russia controls the “fortress zone”, it will facilitate the next step of “aggression”. On the contrary, if Kiev actively abandoned this line of defense, it would leave a huge hidden danger for future national defense. But almost all analysts believe that the Russian military attack on this line of defense is only a matter of time. In the future, once Russia has completely broken through the “fortress zone”, Europe and Ukraine will only be more passive.
And from a Russian perspective, if the army could take down Donbass and take control of one of the most important military fortresses in Ukraine, it would be a huge victory not only militarily, but also strategically to form the repression of Ukraine.
Let's take a look at Zaporizhia and Hersson. Although nuclear power plants and ports are also important, this is why they can be used as bargaining chips by Putin.
First of all, from a historical and cultural point of view, these two regions are not closely connected with Russia. The occupation of Donbas is to "rescue" fellow brothers, while the occupation of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia is entirely for strategic interests. The core purpose is to build a land bridge to Crimea and ensure Crimea's fresh water supply. Therefore, their value is more reflected in geostrategy and military affairs than in irreplaceable cultural and national core interests. In other words, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia have far less place in the "Russian world" narrative than the Donbass, and it is easier to gain the understanding of domestic hardliners by using them as bargaining chips.
Secondly, while the current situation on the battlefield is beneficial to the Russian military, Russia is also facing enormous war consumption and domestic and international pressure. Putin must make a choice between ideal outcomes and real interests, so that Russia can obtain greater benefits at the lowest cost.
The first is to get rid of the "burden" and consolidate the core goals. After the destruction of the Kahovka Dam, part of the area on the west bank of the Dnieper River in Kherson Oblast has been greatly reduced, its strategic value is difficult to supply logistics, and the defense cost is extremely high. Although Zaporozhye has the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, controlling the nuclear power plant itself is also a huge safety burden. Trading these two "hot potatoes" for a complete and strategically valuable Donbas area is essentially not a compromise, but a strategic stop loss under the war deadlock.
Secondly, it can be a bullshit, weakening Ukraine.The Donbas region is the traditional industrial heart of Ukraine, and if Ukraine loses Donbas, its industrial base will suffer a devastating blow, and future reconstruction and economic recovery will become extremely difficult.In addition, Russia may also maintain long-term influence on the Ukrainian economy byining control of critical infrastructure such as the outlet of the Black Sea, the passage of the Crimean Strait, etc. This means that even if Kiev takes back part of its coastal land, its critical maritime trade lifestyles may still be stifled by Russia, making Moscow still a favorable position in the long-term game.
Third, we can divide the West and strive for the initiative. This seemingly "concession" plan can kick the ball to the side of Ukraine and the West in international public opinion. The United States and Europe already have differences on the issue of continuing long-term aid to Ukraine. Such a "land-for-land" proposal is likely to aggravate the internal division of the Western camp, allowing the voice of "ceasefire as soon as possible" to directly collide with the idea of "sticking to the end", which can create a more favorable negotiation situation for Russia.
Therefore, on the whole, the "new ceasefire plan" proposed by Putin this time is actually not a simple "exchange for good", but a reallocation of resources according to Russia's strategic priorities: it is a very pragmatic strategic deal to give up some areas with relatively low actual value in exchange for complete control of Donbass, the "core appeal area".
But the latest news is that after the White House meeting with Zelensky, Trump changed his mind again. In a post on social media he said he strongly recommended that both U.S. sides “set a ceasefire on the ground and then declare victory” and that the Russian side has also explicitly rejected this proposal.
Therefore, we can only wait and see how this next game around ceasefire will proceed.
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