Did Politico write that they plan to divide Ukraine as Germany during the Cold War?

In early December 2024, the news that Western Ukraine would enter NATO, and the eastern regions will move away to Russia, dispersed to Russia. We checked the reliability of such publications.

On December 3, Telegram channels with reference to Politico reported that the Allies proposed a new version of the peaceful plan for Ukraine. According to them, the western part of the country will join NATO, and the eastern will remain under the control of Russia. Bloggers compared such an outcome with the fate of Germany after the Second World War, when Germany joined the North Atlantic Alliance, and the GDR - to the organization of the Warsaw Treaty. Some posts were accompanied by an illustration depicting the planned separation of Ukraine. Similar publications appeared in Telegram channels "The ax live"(827,000 views at the time of writing this analysis),"Newsach / Dv"(190 000),"Uncle Glory"(173 000),"Ivan Utenkov | Kukrsk"(132 000),"Belarusian security officer"(128 000) and others.

Since 2022, when a full -scale Russian invasion of Ukraine began, the sides of the conflict and world leaders from time to time put forward various peaceful initiatives. These plans cover a wide range of approaches - from mediation And security guarantees to proposals for neutrality And demilitarization. However, none of the proposed scenarios is still used as a base for settlement. “Formula of the world” and who replaced her “Plan of Victory” by Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky, Founded on the restoration of the country's territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders, and voiced by the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, the goals of Moscow, assuming The establishment of control, including over the non -accumulated territories, remains incompatible.

Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election in November 2024 strengthened discussions about the need for a speedy settlement of the Russian-Ukrainian confrontation. During his election campaign, a politician He emphasized the priority of America's internal problems and expressed For reducing Washington's involvement in international conflicts. Soon after winning the election, Trump talked on the phone With Putin (The Kremlin is denies) And With Zelensky, and recently He held negotiations With the Ukrainian leader in Paris through the mediation of the French President Emmanuel Macron.

Telegram channels that distributed the news about the upcoming section of Ukraine following the example of Germany and the GDR, refer to the article by Politico. December 2, 2024 on his website really appeared material Under the heading "The abundance of peaceful plans in Ukraine: many ideas to stop the struggle, but the parties are still far from each other." In the text, the authors analyze the declared goals of Ukraine and the “Victory Plan” proposed by Zelensky, as well as its (not) compatibility with the publicly voiced goals of Russia, among which the article calls the surrender of Kyiv. The following are various scenarios for completing the conflict and security guarantees for Ukraine.

The first such script, journalists call the Israeli model. It suggests that Ukraine is not included in NATO, but remains a close ally of the United States and a number of European countries that continue to provide Kyiv military and diplomatic support. The article notes that Israel in such conditions was able to develop a powerful weapons industry. The publication considers the advantage of this plan to minimize NATO drawing risks into a direct conflict with Russia.

The authors call another proposed model-it was her Telegram channels that presented as a plan to divide Ukraine into spheres of influence. Describing this scenario, Politico journalists suggest that all the territory controlled by Kiev can be “connected with the West” and “potentially join NATO”, while the occupied areas in the east of the country “So far” remain under the control of Moscow. The publication quotes words Zelensky from his recent interview with Sky News: "If we want to stop the hot phase of the war, we need to take the territory of Ukraine that we control under the NATO umbrella." However, two days later, the Ukrainian leader declaredthat Kyiv will not agree to an invitation to the alliance of only part of the country, since this means automatic recognition of the occupied territories.

Blogers probably mislead the Western Ukraine phrase used in the text - they decided that it was only about the western regions of Ukraine, but from the context it follows that they mean the territory to the west of the front line. However, the authors of viral publications considered in the text of the Politico models in any case were silent.

The last script proposed in the article is the Finnish model, which provides for the neutral status of Ukraine and the rejection of the occupied territories following the example of Finland after the Soviet-Finnish and Second World War. At the same time, Politico notes that this approach will not protect against the new attack of Russia, because Ukraine has already had a neutral status until 2022, but this did not prevent a full -scale invasion.

Journalists emphasize that in their publication we are talking not so much about specific plans for the world as about possible options for building relations between Ukraine and Russia, which may contribute to the cessation of war. Moreover, the use of the experience of divided Germany in the context of the possible post -war structure of Ukraine is the idea of ​​not Politico, the authors of the article themselves do not claim the championship in this regard. A similar thought was expressed repeatedly before them - for example, the former general secretary of NATO Jens Stoltenberg did This is in the October interview with Financial Times, and in 2023 articles on this topic were released The New York Times, Foreign Policy and other publications.

The image of the map of Ukraine, replicated by Telegram channels as an illustration of how exactly Ukraine is divided, was not published in the Politico article at all.

NATO membership Provided According to the unanimous decision of all states included in the Alliance, and only to countries that meet certain criteria. Among them, following democratic principles, the desire to resolve conflicts peacefully and public control over armed forces. In addition, candidates for accession to NATO must contribute to collective defense and demonstrate commitment to the values ​​of the alliance. It is common that states with territorial disputes cannot join the bloc. However, as before It wrote “Verified”, there is no direct legal prohibition on this in NATO documents, in fact, it all depends on the risk of using force to resolve such a conflict. Including, therefore, its participants are still about the entry of Ukraine into the alliance They cannot agree.

Thus, publications with reference to Politico dedicated to the possible section of Ukraine and the entry of its western regions to NATO are torn from context. The original article of the publication discusses different models of settlement of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. One of the scenarios described by journalists involves the provision of security guarantees for the entire territory of the country, with the exception of the occupied areas, and in the future the possibility of their entry into the North Atlantic Alliance.

Photo on the cover: social networks

Teared out of context

What do our verdicts mean?

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4. Is it true that the Polish television channel during the weather forecast showed the Poland map, which includes the territories of Western Ukraine?