Last night, David Ignatius described, in a Washington Post opinion piece, a joint four-point peace plan for Russia and Ukraine being put together by the U.S. and Europe, with elements not previously advocated by Europe. He cited a Washington official familiar with the developments to report on the Oct. 9 Miami meeting organized by the U.S. Presidential Envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner with representatives from Ukraine, accompanied by representatives from the UK, France and Germany, and lasting six hours.

Previously it has been claimed that the U.S. confronted Kiev with yet another call to stop striking Russian oil refineries and reported to Kiev that Washington was making a deal with Moscow on diesel fuel. Now, it is reported that the four-point plan includes both security guarantees for Russia and renewed oil deals between Russia and Europe—both elements missing in the past. The plan supposedly makes an attempt on designing the way out of the conflict by addressing longer-term solutions. The U.S. is said to be trying to formulate a package of measures that accounts for the post-war needs of both Ukraine and Russia.

The first core component is the reconstruction of Ukraine, where negotiators have already requested detailed cost estimates from Kiev, along with arrangements to prevent funds from being gobbled up in embezzlement. Second is security guarantees for Ukraine and Russia, where Kiev gets a non-NATO version of Article 5 and Moscow gets agreements with Europe that address Russia’s security concerns. Third is the economic integration of Russia, Ukraine and Europe via an energy agreement, with Russian oil and gas resuming a regular westward path. In this context, economic sanctions would be lifted. Fourth is a ceasefire along the current front line.

Ignatius cited a European diplomat who said that, while European leaders were angry about Trump’s diesel deal, they appear committed to a diplomatic process led by Kushner and Witkoff. The diplomat explained: “It’s a moment to take heat out of the situation and get back to work.” Separately,European Pravda reported that Zelensky’s communications adviser Dmytro Lytvyn downplayed Europe’s interest in the plan. He stated: “It is not ‘the US and European countries'. This is an outline of the view of some members of the US team at the meeting in Florida, which was attended by the Americans, Ukrainians and Europeans. Good PR by the Americans.”

There are certainly reasons to doubt this package would work in its present form, yet a key element may be Washington’s seriousness over the next month on the diesel deal with Moscow and the amount of muscle applied to Zelensky and his European allies to walk back from their present course. Ignatius summarized: “The message to Putin would be: ... Make an economic and security deal with Europe that would restore stability to the region... We need to make the problem and the solution bigger to help both sides see what the postwar situation would be—and then make concessions.” The principle is “whenever you run into a problem you can’t solve, make it bigger.”