As the mood darkens in Ukraine, the majority still oppose negotiation

From 2014, when Vladimir Putin first invaded Ukraine, until a few months ago, Western opinion was virtually unanimous. “Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine,” the saying went, meaning there could be no negotiations with Russia and no concessions except those agreed to by Ukrainians. 

Today, that consensus is eroding. No one is talking about negotiating without Kyiv, but there is growing sentiment, especially among Republicans who question U.S. support for the war, that Ukraine should be pressured, whether by a withdrawal of U.S. aid or other means. 

What these hardliners forget: unlike Russia, Ukraine is a democracy. The U.S. and other Western allies providing military and financial aid hold enormous sway in a country where their assistance is a de facto lifeline. 

But Ukrainian public opinion also counts, and as history shows — decades of popular uprisings and mass street protests — Ukrainians are anything but shy about expressing their views. President Volodymyr Zelensky serves at the pleasure of Ukrainian voters, and tired as they are after nearly two years of grinding war, the majority remain opposed to negotiating with Russia. 

The full-scale war has done nothing to dampen public debate in Ukraine. Under martial law, Kyiv controls television content, but fewer than one-third of Ukrainians get their news from television. Three-quarters rely on social media, most commonly Telegram chat channels that compress the news to snappy headlines but allow for robust public discussion. 

It isn’t unusual for online petitions to gather tens of thousands of signatures. Public opinion polling is extensive, with a half-dozen major outlets providing regular updates on the nation’s mood. And of course, everyone has opinions about the war — usually strong opinions. 

The mood has shifted perceptibly in recent months. 

Almost everyone now acknowledges that last summer’s counteroffensive fell short of expectations. Hardly any territory changed hands, leaving the two sides pinned down in deadly trench warfare. Parliament is debating legislation that would mobilize another half million men for active duty. Moscow has escalated its daily missile attacks on Ukrainian cities. It’s uncertain if or when the U.S. or the European Union will send further aid and Ukrainian fighters — those on the front lines and those defending civilians against air attacks — are running out of ammunition.  

No wonder people are exhausted, and there’s been a small shift in the share willing to consider negotiations with Moscow.  

From February 2022, when the full-scale war began, through May 2023, most polls showed little vacillation. Depending on how the question was phrased, between 80 and 95 percent of respondents agreed that winning meant pushing the invaders back to the status quo before the 2014 invasion. A similar share agreed that there could be no negotiating with Russia before victory. 

Recent surveys show that 5 to 10 percent of the population have softened their views. 

According to the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, which has been asking the same questions every few months since the start of the war, 19 percent — up from 9 percent last May — are now willing to consider territorial concessions. 

Gallup also sees a small shift. In 2022, 26 percent of Ukrainian respondents told the U.S. pollster that their country should “seek to negotiate an end to the war as soon as possible.” By summer 2023, 31 percent held that view. 

But both these polls and others continue to show a strong majority opposed to trading land for peace. According to the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, 74 percent still believe that “under no circumstances should Ukraine give up any of its territory.” Gallup found that those willing to consider negotiations were outnumbered 2 to 1 by those who think Ukraine “should continue fighting until it wins the war.” 

How to understand the thinking behind these numbers? Telegram is a good place to start. 

The chat channels come in many flavors — there’s an online forum for every social niche and every political opinion. The most popular feature is a mix of content: news headlines, minute-by-minute accounts of incoming missile trajectories and graphic images of explosions on the front line, along with heart-warming videos of fighters reuniting with their families. Many also air rapid-fire video forums: A cameraman stands in the street and asks a dozen passersby what they think about a topic.  

One of the most widely read channels, Trukha Ukrayina, has 2.6 million subscribers, and it’s not unusual to see 350 of them respond when a foreign commentator suggests negotiating with Moscow. 

“If he’s so smart, let him give part of his country to the [Russians],” one recent post read, using a common derogatory term for Russians. Many of the other reactions were unprintable. 

But there are a few common threads — the most frequently voiced arguments against negotiating. 

The case starts with practicality. “There’s no one to talk to,” a well-dressed matron recently told an inquiring videographer. There is no reason to believe that Putin is prepared for meaningful negotiations.  

Other skeptics argue from the experience of the past two years. “After all the boys we’ve lost?” someone asked on Telegram. “We can’t betray that sacrifice.” 

“We can’t give up now,” a friend agreed, “that’s what the war is all about — asserting our right to exist in our own territory.” 

“Negotiate about what?” a pedestrian asked a cameraman in Kyiv. “Are we going to give them part of our country?” 

Still, others reluctant to make concessions don’t trust the Russians to keep their word. 

“You can’t negotiate with terrorists,” a young woman told a roving photographer. “They’ll just regroup and strike again.” 

History bears her out. Since Ukrainian independence in 1991 and indeed for centuries before, Moscow violated truce after truce and trampled on virtually all its agreements with Kyiv. 

“Russians will negotiate, but they won’t retreat,” someone else noted in a Telegram chat. “Power is the only language they understand. If we negotiate without victory, the war will spread to Europe.”  

But perhaps the most powerful argument against negotiating springs from hope. The same Kyiv International Institute of Sociology survey that found a 10 percent shift in opinion asked respondents how they thought the war would end and found their views strongly correlated with whether they were open to negotiations. 

But even among those who were willing to make concessions, 71 percent believed that with enough Western aid, Kyiv would ultimately prevail, and 91 percent of those reluctant to begin talks were convinced Ukraine could win with the right Western weapons.  

“A stalemate is not the same as failure,” a friend explained to me. “The Russians want to wipe us off the map. They’re the ones who have failed. And Ukrainians aren’t going to negotiate unless and until it’s the last option.” 

Tamar Jacoby is the director of the New Ukraine Project at the Progressive Policy Institute.