Why does Putin want Ukraine’s Donbas region?

0:00Hello, Ed Conway here. Here is what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods, bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common? On the surface, not very much. But on my podcast, Stuff Matters, I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how together they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow. Today on the Sky News Daily with me, Tamara Cohen. Russia has been fighting for control of Ukraine's Donbass region for years.

0:38So why does Vladimir Putin want it so badly? Hello, Ed Conway here. Here is what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods, bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common? On the surface, not very much. But on my podcast, Stuff Matters, I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how together they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow. Putin is demanding that Ukraine surrender the Donbass as the price for peace.

1:17This industrial region bordering Russia in Ukraine's southeast has been partially occupied since 2014 and has seen some of the most intense fighting of the conflict. Strategically important and heavily fortified, it's basically holding the front line. We'll hear from our international affairs editor, Dominic Wagcorn, who's in Kiev, in a bit about how Ukrainians feel about the prospect of losing the Donbass. But first, let's speak to our security and defence analyst, Michael Clarke, about why this region is at the heart of a possible deal. Michael, tell us a bit about the Donbass region. It has just under a million people.

1:58So it's not huge in terms of territory. But why is it so important for the Ukrainians? And why does Vladimir Putin want it so much? The importance of the Donbass as a region is that it's industrial. It has a lot of coal mines in it. It was the heart of Ukraine's defence manufacturing sector during the old Soviet years. There is still quite a lot of manufacturing in the Donbass. These are sort of heavy industrial towns and cities by and large. And not least, there's quite a lot of minerals there. So there are quite big deposits of lithium, titanium, non-ferrous metals, and there's a big belt of rare earth minerals.

2:38And, of course, you know that everyone's talking about rare earths these days. A big belt of rare earth minerals that run sort of north-south, right along the border between Donetsk and the next oblast, Dnipo-Petrovsk. and that's an area which at present is under Ukrainian control, and if they gave up the area that Putin demands, those rare earths would be under Russian control. It's quite important to say that there has been fighting going on in Donbass way beyond the last three years. If we go back to 2014 when the Russians invaded Crimea, pretty soon after that, fighting began in the Donbass region.

3:17Tell us a bit about what happened then. The Russians stimulated pro-Russian militias to declare independence. They wanted to grab the Luhansk and Donetsk as sort of separate entities, which, of course, then would unite with Russia at some point. It was all engineered from the Kremlin. But the symbolic importance was also that Slavyansk, which is the northernmost city in the area we're talking about, the area that the Ukrainians still control, was the first to be grabbed by these militias. And it became the symbol of this attempt to split the Donbass off in favor of Russia. Now, the Ukrainians then liberated Slavyansk and they've held on to it ever since.

3:58They've been fighting for to retain this territory since 2014. And I mean, at the beginning of this round of the war, 2022, when the full scale invasion was launched, the pro-Russian militias held about 30 percent of the Donbass, about 30 percent of Luhansk, about 30 percent of Donetsk. And now they've got, you know, almost all of Luhansk and about 70 percent of Donetsk. So they've actually increased their holding there since 2022. But what they haven't got is this string of fortifications which go from Slavyansk in the north right down to Kostyantinivka in the south. There's a string of cities that are powerfully defended and all the settlements in between them are well defended.

4:41So it's like a belt of fortifications which the Ukrainians have successfully defended a great cost in lives and money for 11 years now. And it has been one of the most deadly front lines in the war, hasn't it? Trench lines, frozen lines of defence from 2014 onwards, and those trench lines became fairly well established. And they didn't change all that much. There'd be occasional movement on one side or the other or attacks on one side or the other. Very like the First World War. But what's happened since 2022 is that the cities themselves have now been bombarded. I mean, before 2022, the Russians weren't close enough with their artillery to actually bombard the cities.

5:24I mean, artillery ranges are about 15 to 18 miles. So as long as the forces are further away than that, then they can't bombard the city. But I mean, since 2022, first of all, they've got their artillery closer. Secondly, they've used aircraft now that they're officially, as it were, completely at war with Ukraine. They've used aircraft and they've used drones to bombard the cities. Very big attack on the railway station in Kramatorsk just a few months after the start of the war, which killed many civilians. And when you talk about the total losses, the Russians have now lost over a million, which is that's dead and seriously wounded.

5:59I mean, so seriously wounded, they can't go back to the front. The Ukrainians seem to have lost about 400 ,000. So this conflict has already cost about a million and a half lives. And probably 50 % of those losses are effectively in the area that we're talking about. The Ukrainians obviously feel that they fought very hard for this region. It'd be very difficult to give it up. The Russians have, over the last few weeks, been really pushing their offensive there, haven't they? I mean, the Russians, in anticipation of what's been going on in Alaska, had a really big push to try to grab as much territory as possible.

6:36And we now know, as a result of the last 24 hours, what's been leaking out of Alaska, as it were, of those meetings there. The Putin was saying to Trump, apparently, look, I've almost taken the Donbass. Let's agree that you give it to me or that the Ukrainians will give it to me. Now, the Ukrainians are very clear that, no, you haven't taken the whole of the Donbass and you can't. This big offensive last week at east of Dobropilya was a failure. I mean, the Russians did push about 20 kilometers north, but they only pushed in small groups. They were not particularly well supported. The Ukrainians moved in the 33rd Brigade and at least two of the, I think, two of the brigades of their new Azov Corps.

7:13And they've snuffed them out. And I think they've killed a lot of the Russians who were there. The others who were not dead have been taken prisoner. So the Ukrainians have stabilized their position in that part of the front. And it isn't the case that the Russians are just going to roll up the rest of the Donbass. If they could, they would have done that a long time ago. They are geographically, if you look at it on a map tomorrow, you know, on a map, they're not many miles away from the big cities of Slavyansk and Kramatorsk. But that's a flat map. If you look on a relief map, you would see how difficult the terrain is to attack.

7:45And if you put on a relief map, all of the fortifications, you'll see that these fortresses will take some taking. And so although the Russians are actually close to these areas, they've spent two years and not got closer than they are now. So this is basically a very cynical demand from Putin. What Vladimir Putin wants is the whole of Ukraine. And I think there's a fair idea that he wants to put forward a demand that the Ukrainians are bound to reject, which is that he has to have the whole of the Donbass. Because when the Ukraine is then rejected, I think the calculation is the Americans will then blame Zelensky for the lack of progress and pull the plug on military aid altogether.

8:24And so by demanding the Donbass, this may be a ploy by Putin to get the Americans out of the war completely. And then the Russians will feel that they've got a much easier job in achieving their full objective, which is take the rest of Ukraine. Just finally, what are the options now and are they all dependent on what Donald Trump wants? The big question is, is America prepared still to help Ukraine, at least with intelligence support and support through the Starlink program, which is really important to their day to day military operations? Elon Musk's Starlink. I mean, they have about 50 ,000 terminals, which are paid for by the Polish government, incidentally.

9:05But those terminals are really important to the way Ukraine conducts the war. So do the Americans let them carry on fighting with a little bit of help or do the Americans say, well, you know, it's your fault. the war's continuing. You should have surrendered when you had the chance. We're going to pull the plug on it all. And then, if that's the case, then we'll find out how brave the Europeans are. Are they prepared to keep Ukraine going? Is Ukraine prepared to keep fighting? And at the risk of a real transatlantic split between the Europeans and the United States, are we prepared to keep on supporting Ukraine for as long as it takes, as our politicians keep saying?

9:41Well, I guess we'll find out. Thanks, Michael. Let's speak now to Dominic Waghorn, our international affairs editor, who's in Kyiv. Dominic, how have people been reacting to what's happened in Alaska over the weekend?

9:53Dominic Waghorn:People are really worried. They are very frustrated. They are deeply concerned about the future and they were sickened by what they saw from Alaska over the weekend. To see Vladimir Putin courted and welcomed so enthusiastically by Donald Trump really sickened them to the back teeth. And they're very worried about where this is going to go next. In the words of one woman who we spoke to on the streets of Kiev, she said it was a disaster. And for her, it was like Munich, 1938. It's a diplomatic failure in the first place. And it shows that Trump inviting and greeting Putin that way just shows that he legitimises the war crimes.

10:31He legitimises the kidnappings of children. It's just like 1938 when Chamberlain basically sold off Czechoslovakia. And this is basically what's happening now.

10:42Dominic Waghorn:And they're saying it's not just them that should be worried. It should be the whole of Europe that should be worried by the direction Donald Trump is taking. What would this mean for Ukrainians, the idea that Russia could have the Donbass region? Well, it would mean surrender as far as they're concerned. It's giving land to the Russians. And the crucial distinction between this plan and the one that Steve Wyckoff discussed with the Russians back in April, Steve Wyckoff, of course, Donald Trump's confidant, former golfing buddy, real estate lawyer turned rookie negotiator. Back in April, he was discussing the possibility of the front line being frozen, the Russians getting all the land that they had taken to the east and the Ukrainians keeping the land on the west.

11:21Dominic Waghorn:Now, that would be a bitter pill for the Ukrainians to swallow. But what is now being proposed is land being handed to the Russians that they haven't even taken yet. And this is really crucial, strategically important, symbolic land as well. We spoke to one soldier who'd just come back from there over the weekend, spoke to him yesterday. And he described, you know, what is a very nasty, difficult war being fought there now, mainly by drones, with soldiers fighting on both sides, avoiding attacks from drones, a kind of sci-fi, apocalyptic scenario he was depicting for us. And he said he's lost friends who've died in the battle.

11:57Dominic Waghorn:He's been fighting in the Donbass since 2015. He'd seen, I think he said, 60 soldiers in his unit killed when the terminal of the airport in Donetsk was attacked. So for him, yeah, this is very, very personal. And the sacrifices he and his colleagues and comrades have made cannot just come to nothing if this land is handed over to the Russians. They've never held it before. And for Zelensky, it would be political suicide to agree to this, but also strategic, because these fortress cities are so important. They would open up a whole chunk of territory for the Russians to then try and attack again, should Putin want to come back for more, if a peace deal is done in a few years' time.

12:35The Ukrainian people who've been living under occupation in the Donbass for several years have obviously suffered a lot. And the prospect of handing that land over to their enemies must be particularly difficult for them to swallow.

12:47Dominic Waghorn:Ukrainian states have this idea of, talk about land swaps or handing over land. Don't forget land has people on it. It's not just land, obviously. And on the land that Putin has taken, he has done terrible things to the Ukrainians there. You know, any member of the former Ukrainian government disappears into detention, is tortured, as are the colleagues who have documented in Kherson and other parts of Ukraine. And the work we've done has been looking at Ukrainian orphans and children who are taken into Russia. They're either adopted by Russian families or they're put into institutions where many of them are indoctrinated and brainwashed by the Putin regime.

13:24Dominic Waghorn:And many of them are then put into, if they're old enough, put into fighting service to fight against their own country. And of course, it's Putin's involvement in that large scale mass deportation and abduction of children that has earned him the indictment at the ICC. So he's an indicted alleged war criminal because of his involvement in that. Another reason why it really stuck in the craw of Ukrainians to see this alleged war criminal being feted in Alaska. If the Ukrainians even wanted to give away any territory, this isn't something that you can just achieve by signing on a dotted line, is it?

14:01Ukraine is a sovereign country. It's been independent from the Soviet Union since 1991. And it has a constitution. To give away any territory or swap any land, as Donald Trump puts it, what would they need to do?

14:14Dominic Waghorn:It would be unconstitutional for Zelensky to give up land in perpetuity. He's not going to do that. What I've been trying to be persuaded to do by people like Mark Rutter, who got a lot of flat for it, the Secretary General of NATO, is to agree to de facto cession of the land. So to accept that the land that the Russians have taken by force remains in Russian hands for now. That's very different to de jure cession, the Latin for by law, which is actually handing over land and accepting it's been annexed by the Russians. So it's impossible for Zelensky to do that politically. Although Donald Trump has sounded very impatient about that.

14:47Dominic Waghorn:When asked about that, he said, well, nothing in the Ukrainian constitution stops Zelensky getting into this war and killing thousands of people, which was a grotesque and perverse misrepresentation of history, of course. But that seems to be where Donald Trump is coming at this from. He doesn't believe there are any sort of constitutional impediments to Zelensky giving up the land. And that's the big challenge, I think, for Zelensky in the Oval Office, is dealing with someone who doesn't really understand some of the fundamental truths at the heart of this conflict. Isn't there a war weariness, though, in Ukraine?

15:20People feeling like they don't want this to carry on indefinitely. They don't want their sort of teenage sons to be fighting in the war in years to come.

15:28Dominic Waghorn:Yeah, you're right. There is a growing sense, I think, amongst Ukrainians that this war is going to go on and on and on. and they're currently losing it because the Russians are finally getting their act together on the front and coming up with tactics that are working quite well for them. And there is, as you say, a real war weariness out there. You know, you talk to Ukrainians and they're actually more willing to entertain the idea of the land that the Russians have taken being kept by the Russians for now, at least, if they can be certain that peace will follow. But I think there are two caveats to that.

15:58Dominic Waghorn:One is that the land that is given to the Russians for now is always going to remain Ukrainian in their minds and will have to be taken back at some point by force or diplomatically. But the other caveat is that they will only agree to this if there are security guarantees, which we hear a lot about. And what that means really is Ukrainians need to know if they do agree to a deal where land has given up, the Russians can't come back for more in a few years' time. And what they'll say is that it's not just their future, it's also the whole of Europe's because if Putin's encouraged by this, if force prevails, if might is proven right by this, he does succeed in his acts of aggression, he will be tempted to do so again, possibly with other European nations and the Baltics.

16:39Dominic Waghorn:And therefore, he needs to be given a really clear sense that he can't come back for more, that NATO will have to give it the kind of guarantees and protection in the future that will deter him from doing so in the future. Thanks for listening to today's Sky News Daily. I'll be back tomorrow. In the meantime, for the very latest on what happens in the Oval Office as Trump meets Zelensky, and other European leaders, listen to Sky's Trump 100, which you can find wherever you found this podcast.

17:16Hello, Ed Conway here. Here's what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods, bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common? On the surface, not very much. but on my podcast Stuff Matters I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how together they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow.