Frank Gardner
In the wake of this week's historic White House meetings, President Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine and its allies are "already working on the concrete content of the security guarantees".
Sir Keir Starmer has been chairing a virtual meeting of those nations prepared to help secure Ukraine after a peace deal - the so-called "coalition of the willing".
And Britain has dispatched its Chief of Defence Staff, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, to Washington to work out how the US can help. The cogs are clearly turning.
But what do "security guarantees" actually mean in practice?
There is a wide spectrum here, ranging from the much overused "boots on the ground" to the threat of crippling economic sanctions on Russia's oil exports.
Let's start with what Ukraine wants, and isn't going to get, at least not for the foreseeable future, and that's membership of Nato.
US President Donald Trump has ruled that out but there are plenty of other Nato members who also quietly oppose it, such as Slovakia, mainly on the grounds it would dramatically raise the chances of the transatlantic alliance getting dragged into a shooting war with Russia.
Clearly Ukraine will need strong security guarantees after a peace agreement is reached, to prevent Russia from coming back and taking a second, or third, bite.
This is why Sir Keir and President Emmanuel Macron of France have been putting together the 30-plus nation "coalition of the willing" with the aim of providing Ukraine with some international reassurance after a peace deal is signed.
Policing Ukraine's airspace is one likely option. This could be done by basing planes at existing airbases in neighbouring Poland or Romania, with US participation.
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