This Sunday, we’re featuring two essays by noted scholars—one from 2023 by Carter Malkasian and the other from 2025 by G. John Ikenberry and Harold James—that consider how past peace deals can inform present negotiations to end the war in Ukraine.
The 1953 Korean armistice, which brought an end to open hostilities between North and South Korea, offers a model for today, Malkasian wrote. Although the agreement did not settle many points of contention between the belligerents, the peace it established has held for more than 70 years. A similar deal could now be the “least bad option” for ending bloodshed in Europe, Malkasian argued. “In Ukraine, as in Korea seven decades ago, a static battlefront and intractable political differences call for a cease-fire that would pause the violence while putting off thorny political issues for another day.”
“Indeed, since 1945, partial solutions have been the most successful means of keeping peace,” Ikenberry and James wrote. Historical examples not just from the Korean Peninsula but also in Berlin, Cyprus, and Trieste show that a deal need not be sweeping as long as it includes strong security guarantees. When countries are “relatively secure in the knowledge that the settlements would prevent further fighting,” Ikenberry and James concluded, they see “less need to haggle over where territorial boundaries should ultimately lie.”
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