Imagine that someone—perhaps a man from Florida, or maybe even a governor of Florida—criticized American support for Ukraine. Imagine that this person dismissed the war between Russia and Ukraine as a purely local matter, of no broader significance. Imagine that this person even told a far-right television personality that “while the U.S. has many vital national interests ... becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them.” How would a Ukrainian respond? More to the point, how would the leader of Ukraine respond?

As it happens, an opportunity to ask that hypothetical question recently availed itself. The chair of the board of directors of The Atlantic, Laurene Powell Jobs; The Atlantic’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg; and I interviewed President Volodymyr Zelensky several days ago in the presidential palace in Kyiv. In the course of an hour-long conversation, Goldberg asked Zelensky what he would say to someone, perhaps a governor of Florida, who wonders why Americans should help Ukraine.

Zelensky, answering in English, told us that he would respond pragmatically. He didn’t want to appeal to the hearts of Americans, in other words, but to their heads. Were Americans to cut off Ukraine from ammunition and weapons, after all, there would be clear consequences in the real world, first for Ukraine’s neighbors but then for others:   

If we will not have enough weapons, that means we will be weak. If we will be weak, they will occupy us. If they occupy us, they will be on the borders of Moldova and they will occupy Moldova. When they have occupied Moldova, they will [travel through] Belarus and they will occupy Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. That’s three Baltic countries which are members of NATO. They will occupy them. Of course [the Balts] are brave people, and they will fight. But they are small. And they don’t have nuclear weapons. So they will be attacked by Russians because that is the policy of Russia, to take back all the countries which have been previously part of the Soviet Union.

And after that, if there were still no further response? Then, he explained, the struggle would continue:

When they will occupy NATO countries, and also be on the borders of Poland and maybe fight with Poland, the question is: Will you send all your soldiers with weapons, all your pilots, all your ships? Will you send tanks and armored vehicles with your young people? Will you do it? Because if you will not do it, you will have no NATO.

At that point, he said, Americans will face a different choice: not politicians deciding whether “to give weapons or not to give weapons” to Ukrainians, but instead, “fathers and mothers” deciding whether to send their children to fight to keep a large part of the planet, filled with America’s allies and most important trading partners, from Russian occupation.

But there would be other consequences too. One of the most horrifying weapons that Russia has used against Ukraine is the Iranian-manufactured Shahed drone, which has no purpose other than to kill civilians. After these drones are used to subdue Ukraine, Zelensky asked, how long would it be before they are used against Israel? If Russia can attack a smaller neighbor with impunity, regimes such as Iran’s are sure to take note. So then the question arises again: “When they will try to occupy Israel, will the United States help Israel? That is the question. Very pragmatic.”

Finally, Zelensky posed a third question. During the war, Ukraine has been attacked by rockets, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles—“not hundreds, but thousands”:

So what will you do when Russia will use rockets to attack your allies, to [attack] civilian people? And what will you do when Russia, after that, if they do not see [opposition] from big countries like the United States? What will you do if they will use rockets on your territory?

And this was his answer: Help us fight them here, help us defeat them here, and you won’t have to fight them anywhere else. Help us preserve some kind of open, normal society, using our soldiers and not your soldiers. That will help you preserve your open, normal society, and that of others too. Help Ukraine fight Russia now so that no one else has to fight Russia later, and so that harder and more painful choices don’t have to be made down the line.

“It’s about nature. It’s about life,” he said. “That’s it.”

Our full report from Ukraine will appear in a forthcoming issue of The Atlantic.

The next president will almost certainly inherit some kind of peace in Ukraine. As the economist Herb Stein said, “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.” This war cannot go on forever, certainly not at its current intensity. It will stop or dwindle into a cease-fire, official or otherwise. The potential contenders for the 2024 U.S. presidential election talk about how to deal with the conflict, but by the time one of them gets the job, he or she will most likely face the question of how to deal with the aftermath.

So, in assessing the presumptive candidates for president, a crucial question to ponder is: Who would be the most successful peacemaker?

Ukraine will have to be rebuilt, a mission that will cost hundreds of billions of dollars. Some of that money can perhaps be squeezed from Russia—for example, by transferring frozen Russian assets to Ukraine. But the greater part will likely have to come from Ukraine’s Western allies.

This reconstruction will surely prove a solid investment, as did the outlay to rebuild the liberated former Warsaw Pact countries after the end of the Cold War. From 2004 to 2021, Poland alone received some $225 billion in European Union funds. Over that same period, the Polish economy has nearly doubled in size; the country has roughly tripled its imports from EU trading partners such as Germany, France, and Italy.

[Tom Nichols: DeSantis will betray Ukraine for MAGA votes]

However, it takes vision and generosity to see economic potential amid the ruin left by war. Politicians who shake their heads and mutter about “blank checks” lack that vision and generosity. They follow in the inglorious tradition of Senator Robert Taft, who opposed the Marshall Plan in 1947, because it might cause inflation and raise taxes in the U.S., as well as the creation of NATO in 1949, because the Soviet Union might regard it as provocative.

Russia must somehow be reintegrated into the community of nations. Tough-minded diplomacy will be necessary to offer relief from Western sanctions in return for Russian commitments on peace, security, and economic reconstruction. Russia’s aggression and atrocities have inflamed emotions, especially among its immediate neighbors. Only those Western leaders with clear pro-Ukraine credentials will have the moral authority to persuade all of NATO’s members to accept possibly distasteful compromises and concessions for the sake of peace.

Successful peacemaking will demand creative new ideas about energy security. Russia tried to use gas exports as a weapon against Europe. The weapon did not work as Russia had hoped, but it inflicted cost, pain, and insecurity. After this war, Europe will want to pivot permanently away from Russia as an energy supplier. Organizing a secure transatlantic market in liquified natural gas, and then transitioning away from fossil fuels entirely, will be a huge undertaking that will require close cooperation among its participants. Politicians who distrust European allies as freeloaders—and who reject a transition away from oil and gas as an ultimate goal—are unlikely to succeed in this job.  

The shock of the war in Ukraine has cost Europe dear. Although the EU forecasts no recession in 2023, the outlook is worrying. The energy transition will be expensive. European populations are aging, their workforces poised to shrink. Europe needs a new motor of growth. Trade liberalization is the most promising candidate. Reviving the dormant idea of a Transatlantic Free Trade Area spanning the EU, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the U.S. could help Europe afford its share of Ukraine’s reconstruction. Antitrade politicians will fail as peacemakers.

[David Axelrod: Why neither party can escape Trump]

The peace the next president should pursue is not merely a regional compact. The conflict we all dread most is a war with China, sparked by Chinese aggression against Taiwan or another of China’s neighbors. To safeguard that peace will require new global institutions that have absorbed the lessons of the terrible war in Ukraine—starting with the need for defense cooperation among democratic allies. Politicians who use the word global as an insult will have no grasp of the problems of peacemaking, let alone the capacity to solve them. Both major American parties contain figures who are skeptical of collective security and international alliances. Both also have antitrade politicians. President Joe Biden himself has fallen away from the free-trade principles he held earlier in his career.

But Republicans are the ones who have turned most radically inward. Former President Donald Trump just this month reaffirmed that his idea of peacemaking is not integrating Ukraine into Europe, but conceding parts of Ukraine to Russia. In his response to a questionnaire from Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis explicitly rejected the idea that the peace and security of Europe was a “vital interest” for the U.S. Ominously, recent polling suggests that the Republicans most hostile to aiding Ukraine are also the most resistant to defending Taiwan.

These developments return Republicans to the days of Taft—only worse. At least in the Eisenhower era, Republicans were willing to go toe-to-toe against opponents inside their own party to fight such shortsighted and self-destructive isolationism. We need their like again now, maybe more than ever.