Europe experienced widespread relief on Monday, as the diplomatic emergency caused by the announcement of a new comprehensive peace framework for ending the war appeared – momentarily – to have been contained. A American diplomat spoke of "notable headway" after Ukraine-US talks in Geneva. On Monday night, Russian leadership made its response: another massive barrage of rocket attacks on Kyiv.
The Cycle of Peace Talks and Military Action
The sequence of opposing developments captured the harsh reality of the recent timeframe. By day, political struggles are conducted: positive announcements are issued from various governments. Immense energy is expended on containing specific proposals. By night, the Kremlin clearly shows the world that, for them, war remains the primary tool for achieving "peace".
Nocturnal Warfare
As military strikes unfolded into the early hours of Tuesday, the present situation of Ukraine's vulnerability was revealed. Ukraine is capable of detecting projectile deployments from Russian territory, a capacity enabled by timely intelligence. From witness perspectives, defense planes that had been scrambled to engage hostile cruise missiles flew past – sophisticated military planes provided to Ukraine by Western partners.
Moments later, Kyiv's missile defense engaged: several firings targeted at a hostile projectile. This was a sophisticated defense system at work, most likely provided by allied countries. Every deployment shakes the surroundings, causing tremors. The brief panic quickly becomes grim resignation: possibly the approaching threat won't cause damage this time, sparing the city from ruin and additional electricity failures.
Persistent Threats
Following this, a heavy machine gun opened up on a aerial vehicle in the vicinity, part of a mobile-fire group – almost certainly allied-provided weaponry. Unfortunately, the bullets missed the hostile drone – it maintained course toward its objective.
Intermittently, this carried on until dawn. Kyiv greeted the morning news: several casualties, destruction and heating outages in multiple buildings as a result of the evening attack. As always, everyone still continued their routines – living the war. But those full day illustrated Ukraine's essential dependence on external assistance – a dependence that European nations are demonstrably unable to fill in the near term.
Unsuccessful Negotiations
The 28-point plan from American leadership generated strong feelings, controversy and serious worry – and momentarily shifted focus from Ukraine's major integrity crisis in years. Yet, we have experienced comparable situations, after earlier high-level meetings and bilateral conferences.
Every new approach from Washington unfolds according to the consistent cycle: a diplomatic cavalry charge against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with other European capitals, manages to fend off. They manage the tension but never actually achieve victory. This trend will, undoubtedly, endure.
Political Considerations
It is tempting to accuse particular leaders of persistently promoting Russian terms. But that does not seem to be the complete picture. Washington operates on a premise understood by seasoned negotiators: you cannot achieve through diplomacy what you have failed to defend militarily. The American government presumes that it is unfeasible to compel Moscow to surrender the land that it already controls in Ukraine's south or east.
The challenge is that while accepting these circumstances, US leadership does nothing to deter Moscow, through diplomacy or military means, from thinking that the situation will not evolve additionally in its advantage in the coming year.
Opposing Positions
Therefore, Moscow is certain that the clock favors them – that Ukraine and its partners are coming close to fatigue. Their incentive to accept conditions that does not give them the greatest potential benefit is close to zero. There may be multiple initiatives to achieve ceasefire, but they will persist as long as Russia's leader remains highly assured in the result.
On the contrary, Ukrainian leadership believes that Ukraine can still hold out, gradually sacrificing lives and land but averting a complete military breakdown until situations evolve in its advantage.
Present Conditions
Factually, there are no genuine requirements for a ceasefire. Now, subjective factors are coming into play: political desires to mediate resolution and obtain worldwide acknowledgment, and the government's twin challenges – on one hand, not to estrange crucial supporters, and on the other, to unite the population around the national cause against any plan Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their priority does not shift toward domestic problems. And although their objective will now be significantly challenging after recent developments, it remains very improbable that this will alter their fundamental strategy.
These opposing factors are driving the talks.
Summary and Prospects
It took a just a single week to terminate the proposed articles of the most recent proposal. Assertive and inconsistent approach of the matter by US administration, resistance by Ukraine and the other European countries, along with calming attempts of diplomats, and finally, latest revelations, all achieved their purpose.
While new initiatives based on old ideas are approaching, Kyiv, London and other European capitals should reach an essential realization: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to fend off political attacks from Washington that are based on Russian demands and demonstrate particular unwillingness to modify developments, if they stand together and enhance their military capacity at a considerably quicker tempo. If they do, no combination of diplomatic or military actions will be able to defeat them. In the meantime, Ukraine's capability to repel nightly air assaults will, for the coming months, primarily depend on sustained allied backing.
