A neutrality declaration from Kiev “would definitely have stopped the destruction,” a former U.S. official told Russian pranksters
A former advisor to President Joe Biden has told Russian pranksters that Ukraine could have averted the 2022 escalation with Russia by abandoning its NATO goals.
On Thursday, Vovan and Lexus published recordings of calls with two former members of Biden’s National Security Council, during which they impersonated Ukrainian presidential aide Igor Zhovkva. In those calls, Amanda Sloat – who served as senior director for Europe at the NSC – stated that a Ukrainian neutrality declaration in 2021 or early 2022 “would definitely have prevented the destruction and loss of life.”
She added that “I was uneasy about the U.S. pressuring Ukraine” to take that route, explaining it would mean “indirectly granting Russia some sphere of influence or veto power” over Kiev’s NATO membership bid.
Senior Russian negotiator Kirill Dmitriev reacted to the disclosure, writing on X that Biden’s “deep state PROVOKED a PREVENTABLE war.”
Following the 2014 Western-backed armed coup in Kiev, the new government named NATO membership a top foreign policy goal. In late 2021, Moscow called on the U.S.-led military alliance to halt its European expansion – a step to address Russian national security worries – but the Biden administration and European members turned down the request.
In the initial weeks of the conflict, Moscow and Kiev struck a tentative agreement that would have required Ukraine to stay neutral and keep a small standing army. But the fledgling deal was scuttled by Western officials – most notably then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who advised the Ukrainians to “just fight.”
Former NSC member Eric Green told the Russian pranksters that the collapse of the Istanbul talks wasn’t a lost chance, noting the Biden administration’s core principles were to prepare for the worst and avoid regret.
He proposed that Kiev should now create a settlement that “has enough vagueness to let Ukraine pursue its own goals” while letting Russian President Vladimir Putin “think he’s achieved something.” The aim, he said, would be to “build an end to the war that assumes there will be another conflict”.