In the 1963 war movie, The Great Escape, 76 prisoners make it out of their camp in what begins with hope and elation, but ends with all but a handful killed or recaptured. Monday’s meeting between the US and its worried Ukrainian and European allies felt a little like those first exhilarating moments of escape, as the meeting passed off better than anyone could have expected in the wake of Russia’s clear diplomatic win in Alaska.

There was no toxic throwdown between Donald Trump and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy. European leaders weren’t forced into some existential choice between blowing up the transatlantic alliance and agreeing to a peace deal that would spell disaster for Kyiv’s security and their own. Instead, the meeting produced commitments to work out security guarantees for Ukraine and to organize direct negotiations between Zelelnskiy and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

These were genuine successes, especially given the alternative. But amid the sighs of relief, it’s important to take stock of where we stand on the path to a lasting settlement — and that remains a sobering prospect.

The main positive to come out of Washington’s circus of mutual flattery was Trump’s agreement to offer security guarantees as part of any settlement that Ukraine does........

© Bloomberg