November 27, 2025
DIANE FRANCIS
Steve Witkoff is a real estate developer and a pal of President Donald Trump. Both men have done extensive business with Russian oligarchs over the years, so in October, Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, secretly met in Florida at a Russian oligarch’s hotel with Putin’s investment guru, Kirill Dmitriev, to launch a process aimed at stopping the war against Ukraine. They compiled, then leaked, a list of 28 Russian war aims that were misrepresented as a “peace plan”. The news hit like a bomb from the Kremlin. It was shamelessly pro-Russian and prepared without US State or Defence Department oversight. But it wasn’t surprising. Witkoff is an aggressive dealmaker, an avowed Russophile, and Trump’s Special Envoy regarding Ukraine. According to tapes obtained by Bloomberg, he even “coached” Russian officials and urged them to compile their 28-point wish list to get Trump’s attention, even though the content was unacceptable to Kyiv, Europe, and most Americans. It was a negotiating tactic, not diplomacy.
In one leaked call, Witkoff even told a Russian contact: “Now, me to you, I know what it’s going to take to get a peace deal done: Donetsk and maybe a land swap somewhere.” It was spoken as though Ukraine was a real estate chip being traded over cigars at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump defended his Special Envoy’s actions and even the “coaching” of the Russians by saying, “I haven’t heard it [the tape], but it’s a standard thing. That’s what a deal maker does.” And he is correct. Negotiators label what Witkoff did as an “anchoring strategy”: start with a wildly unreasonable position to shift the entire conversation in your favor. In real estate, for example, this would translate into offering $200,000 for a building worth $1 million, simply to lower expectations and reduce the counteroffer. But this is not about money. It’s about morality, about good versus evil, and about the need for America and the West to stomp out an evil regime that terrorizes the world and currently holds 30 million Ukrainians hostage.
The 28-point proposal should never have been legitimized in any way. It stabs Ukraine in the back, attacks Europe’s sovereignty, and flouts international laws and norms. It demands that Putin be rewarded for mass murder, deported children, and stolen land. It demands no reparations from Moscow for the $1/2 trillion in damages it’s perpetrated. It does not demand the return of tens of thousands of kidnapped Ukrainian children and prisoners of war. It exonerates Russia’s and Putin’s war crimes, and even offers lucrative incentives to end the violence: Putin can keep all territories he has stolen, plus gain the rest of Donetsk; Russia will be reinstated into the G8; and all sanctions will be lifted. It even proposes that the US — not Europe — should be given a chunk of the frozen Russian assets worth hundreds of billions to pay American contractors to rebuild Ukraine.
The “plan” also dictates to Europe what it must do — as if Washington, or rather Trump’s private emissaries, had the authority to decide the continent’s future. Under its terms, Europe is required to unwind its own tough sanctions regime and deny Ukraine entry into the EU or
NATO. It also forbids France, Germany, and the United Kingdom from positioning peacekeeping forces in Ukraine.
Fortunately, Europeans quickly reasserted themselves at the center of all peace negotiations — refusing to allow Moscow or Trump’s Envoy to bypass the countries most affected by this war. Europe has become Ukraine’s primary financial supporter and currently holds the key to the $350 billion in frozen Russian assets that Moscow desperately needs. The Euros have designated those funds to rebuild Ukraine, not to rescue the Kremlin or to pay American contractors to rebuild Ukraine’s infrastructure and cities, as one of Witkoff’s 28 points stipulates.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen minced no words. “From the start, Russia has always believed that it can outlast Ukraine, Europe, and all of its allies.” Every time negotiations gain momentum, she said, Moscow escalates violence. This month’s missile strikes on Ukrainian civilians prove the point. “For them, Ukraine remains a first step in a much bigger game.” Another leader, Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, insisted any peace deal must include limits on the size of Russia’s armed forces, not on Ukraine’s. Kyiv’s army, now up to 850,000 strong, is defending Europe too, and it cannot be capped or weakened under some pretense of balance.
European leaders agree their new policy is to ignore the Witkoff proposal entirely and focus on providing weapons and financing victory for Ukraine using seized Russian money. “It is time we stop discussing different options and move forward,” said Valdis Dombrovskis, Europe’s top economic commissioner. A loan backed by Russian assets would provide substantial support “without putting additional and substantial fiscal burden” on the EU or its citizens. Europeans already provide the lion’s share of financial support to Ukraine’s military and are each increasing their security budgets.
Europe also presented a 19-point counterproposal to the US-backed 28-point peace plan, which was drafted by Britain, France, and Germany. Their revised document drops any forced recognition of new Russian territorial gains. Instead, it proposes freezing the front lines where they currently stand and postponing territorial resolution to future negotiations. It also raises the cap on Ukraine’s peacetime military to 800,000 — up from the 600,000 limit in the Witkoff draft — preserving Kyiv’s ability to defend itself amid ongoing threats. Security guarantees would come through a multilateral “Article-5–style” guarantee from a coalition of willing states, rather than unilateral assurances by the United States. On reconstruction and reparations, the European plan rejects the US proposal to channel frozen Russian assets under American control. Instead, it treats those funds as potential compensation for Ukraine — meaning Russia would bear financial responsibility for war damages.
What Witkoff’s midwifery for Moscow reveals is that Trump’s orbit remains dangerously limited and influenced by years of dealmaking with Russians and other unsavories. The only way this war will end — and Putin be stopped globally — is to ship more weapons to Ukraine, impose punitive sanctions on Russia’s oil customers, increase sanctions on Russia itself, and economically isolate Moscow until it is defeated, surrenders, or collapses. This latest gambit by Trump’s team is very upsetting, but history is often written by fools and amateurs. However,
what’s different this time is that President Trump believes that the worst war since WWII can be ended by a developer with a Rolodex filled with the names of oligarchs. Ukraine is not a deal or a strip mall, and, thankfully, Europe is rich enough and united enough to reject a fool’s suggestion that another crazed dictator be appeased.