UK dusts off Iraq War label in rushing Ukraine peace plan after Trump-Zelenskyy clash 

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer published a four-point Ukraine peace plan on Sunday that includes a limited ceasefire backed up by European and U.S. troops.

But if Europeans are enthusiastic about the proposal, the British prime minister has given it a name that conjures up more reluctance than resolve.  

The plan was unveiled after another European “emergency” meeting on Ukraine that included Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other European leaders who met in London, according to Fox News.    

The British-French plan was put together quickly after Zelenskyy engaged in a public dispute in front of the media at the White House, prior to the scheduled signing of an agreement with the U.S. over rare earth mineral rights. 

The disagreement ended a nearly hour-long, joint news conference held by President Donald Trump and Zelenskyy prior to the scheduled signing of the document.  

After the news conference, Trump canceled the signing of the agreement, with administration officials noting that Zelenskyy needed to be ready for a “constructive conversation” on peace before the U.S. would agree to the mineral rights contract, according to Reuters.  

Trump said that the rare earth agreement was a precondition to continued American military support for Zelenskyy’s country and for U.S. arbitration of a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine. 

During the White House meeting Zelenskyy protested repeatedly against a ceasefire agreement that didn’t include comprehensive security guarantees, vehemently claiming that Russia has violated 25 previous ceasefire agreements. 

Zelenskyy publicly ridiculed the idea of engaging in diplomacy with Russian President Vladimir Putin, asking sarcastically of Vice President JD Vance, “What kind of diplomacy, JD, [are you] speaking about?” 

Vance and Trump were also joined in the Zelenskyy news conference by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. 

“He might have broken deals with Obama and Bush, and he might have broken them with Biden,” Trump told Zelenskyy of Putin. “He did, maybe. Maybe he did. I don’t know what happened, but he didn’t break them with me. He wants to make a deal. I don’t know if you can make a deal,” Trump added pointedly about the Ukraine leader. 

A measure of how unprepared Zelenskyy and European leaders are to discuss peace seriously is that the latest British-French proposal contains nothing that they couldn’t have put forward three years ago if they wanted peace.   

The new Starmer proposal, like the one Trump proposed, would also require a ceasefire agreement prior to a comprehensive agreement, as well as the following: 1) continuing military aid to Ukraine; 2) Ukrainian participation in all peace talks; 3) a coalition of European states that will deter a future Russian invasion of Ukraine; and 4) the support of the U.S. as a “backstop” to European forces. 

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who has supported Trump’s position of a stronger military alliance among European nations to deter Russia, tried to shame his European allies into more than the lukewarm defense of Ukraine. 

“500 million Europeans are asking 300 million Americans to defend them against 140 million Russians,” he said before leaving for London. “Europe today lacks the belief that we are truly a global power.” 

To reinforce the European allies’ tepid response to a Ukraine peace deal, Starmer dusted off a relic of the eight-year U.S. war in Iraq, dubbing the non-NATO force to guarantee the peace in Ukraine the “Coalition of the Willing.” 

The phrase was used contemptuously during the Iraq War to point out ironically how few partners the U.S. actually had during the Middle East war that toppled Saddam Hussein. 

Starmer acknowledged that not all European states are on board with the security guarantees for Ukraine, noting that “not every nation will feel able to contribute.” 

Trump and members of his administration have repeatedly said during the negotiations that while they will give security guarantees to Ukraine, they will never commit U.S. troops to the defense of Ukraine. 

Trump has insisted that Europe needs to stand ready to defend Ukraine by itself, albeit with material support from the U.S. 

During the news conference with Zelensky, Trump repeated the need for Europe to “equalize” the contributions that U.S. has made in defense of Ukraine.  

Some have criticized Starmer’s proposal of using European troops as peacekeepers with American troops as a back-up plan because it makes Europe even more beholden to U.S. support, not less.   

“In other words, after all the talk of Europe ‘stepping up’ and the need for European security ‘independence’ from the United States, this would in fact make Europe even more dependent on Washington, because it would put European troops in an extremely dangerous situation from which (not for the first time) they would expect the U.S. to save them in case of trouble,” wrote Anatol Lieven, a British author, who is currently a visiting professor at King’s College London and a senior fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.   

In what might be a wake-up call for Zelenskyy, a staunch U.S. ally of Ukraine has said that the Ukrainian president may have to resign to usher in peace, calling his conduct at the White House “disgraceful.”  

“I don’t know if we can ever do business with Zelenskyy again,” U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham told the assembled media after the disastrous news conference. 

Zelenskyy has since said that he’s still willing to do the minerals deal, but at least one Trump official has said that the deal is now dead. 

“All President Zelenskyy had to do was come in and sign this economic agreement, and again show no daylight – no daylight – between Ukrainian people and the American people, and he chose to blow that up,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CBS News’ Face the Nation on Sunday about Zelenskyy’s White House performance.