The MSM has been going overboard to conflate and confuse when it comes to the possible deployment of peacekeepers in Ukraine. 

President Putin was quite clear in his recent Vladivostock speech that:

• While military operations continue any foreign troops deployed in Ukraine would be legitimate targets (just as North Korean troops became for Ukraine when deployed in Russia).
  
  
• When military operations cease and a long-term peace agreement is made there should be no need for peacekeepers in Ukraine (so there would be no 'targets' legitimate or otherwise).

Politico reported Putin's words:

[https://www.politico.eu/article/western-nato-troops-ukraine-legitimate-target-says-russia-vladimir-putin/]

But the MSM carefully conflated what Putin said in order to continue to confuse their readerships with fake headlines such as:

Washington Post - Putin threatens foreign troops planned for Ukraine [omitted: in wartime]

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/09/05/ukraine-russia-europe-troops-security-guarantees/]

The Guardian - Putin threatens to target any Western troops sent to Ukraine [omitted: in wartime]

[https://guardian.ng/news/world/putin-threatens-to-target-any-western-troops-sent-to-ukraine/]

The Financial Times - Foreign troops in Ukraine would be ‘legitimate targets’ for Russia, Vladimir Putin warns [omitted: in wartime]

Sky News essentially contradicted itself during the same news article:

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said any foreign troops operating as part of a peacekeeping force in Ukraine would be considered a "legitimate target" by Moscow.

Then...

Directly responding to Mr Macron's comments, he said: "If any troops appear there, especially now, during military operations, we proceed from the fact that these will be legitimate targets for their destruction.

By definition, a 'post-war' peacekeeping force cannot operate while the combatants are still fighting, so it's clear he is not referring to peacekeepers as legitimate targets. 

Essentially the MSM headlines all followed a similar construction by banging the drum for the old 'reversed' narrative:

Putin threatens the West! (not the other way around with NATO expansion eastwards).

Few bothered to explain that the war started to prevent Ukraine joining NATO and Russia losing its key Black Sea naval base, so bringing in NATO troops as peacekeepers is obviously nonsense and would never work.

The real agenda behind NATO peacekeepers in Ukraine is obvious and it's nothing to do with peace. 

If NATO is on the ground in Ukraine it only takes one incident - false flag or not - that Russia can be blamed for, to use as a justification for triggering Article 5 and appealing to the USA for help to counter direct Russian aggression against NATO forces.

Not to mention the need to establish numerous NATO 'peacekeeping' (i.e. forward) bases, like Camp Bastion in Afghanistan, all over Ukraine as springboards for a future war.

There is another reason - unstated by the MSM - for Putin to be against NATO peacekeepers. He knows where that road leads to.

Because some European leaders clearly want a real war in Europe.

They want it in order to revive their economies via weapons manufacturing (wartime footing and all that), to distract their electorates from their massive domestic problems, such as unsustainable debt (e.g. in the UK and France - and that's without any sanctions!) and rising prices/inflation due to the cost of energy, with uncontrollable immigration overwhelming their welfare systems, introducing unwanted criminals, people-trafficking gangs and bizarre practices (FGM anyone?) to their societies and diluting their centuries-old cultures.

No wonder they want a war.