Europe experienced widespread relief on Monday, as the tension caused by the announcement of a new comprehensive peace framework for achieving ceasefire appeared – momentarily – to have been stabilised. A Washington representative spoke of "notable headway" after bilateral negotiations in Geneva. On Monday night, Moscow made its retaliation: a renewed assault of rocket attacks on Kyiv.
The Pattern of Negotiation and Warfare
The chain of conflicting incidents captured the harsh reality of the outgoing year. By day, negotiation efforts are conducted: optimistic declarations are issued from various governments. Considerable effort is allocated on managing certain initiatives. By night, Moscow forcefully demonstrates the world that, for them, war remains the main instrument for achieving "settlement".
After-Dark Attacks
As Russia's attack unfolded into the early hours of Tuesday, the immediate reality of Ukraine's exposure was laid bare. Ukraine is capable of detecting projectile deployments from Russian territory, a capability provided through timely intelligence. From vantage locations, military aircraft that had been deployed to counter approaching aerial threats flew past – advanced fighter aircraft provided to Ukraine by Western partners.
Shortly after, Kyiv's air-defence systems activated: defensive missiles targeted at a hostile projectile. This was a modern interception technology at work, probably provided by partner states. Every deployment jolts you unexpectedly, rattling buildings. The moment of terror quickly transforms into grim resignation: possibly the hostile projectile won't strike its target this time, preventing destruction from devastation and another blackout.
Persistent Threats
Soon after, a heavy machine gun fired at a drone somewhere nearby, part of a mobile-fire group – almost certainly allied-provided weaponry. Regrettably, the projectiles didn't strike the opposing UAV – it pressed on overhead toward its objective.
Intermittently, this continued until dawn. Kyiv awoke to the early updates: multiple fatalities, damage and infrastructure problems in numerous residences as a result of the nocturnal offensive. As always, everyone still maintained normal activities – living the war. But those entire period encapsulated Ukraine's vital need on external assistance – a need that neighboring countries are demonstrably unable to fill in the near term.
Ineffective Peace Efforts
The detailed framework from US administration generated strong feelings, debate and deep concern – and momentarily shifted focus from Ukraine's major integrity crisis in years. Yet, we have experienced comparable situations, after prior negotiation attempts and multilateral gatherings.
Every new initiative from US leadership unfolds according to the identical sequence: a diplomatic cavalry charge against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with other European capitals, succeeds in resisting. They manage the tension but never actually achieve victory. This cycle will, certainly, persist.
Tactical Assessments
It is tempting to accuse certain parties of consistently pushing Kremlin's demands. But that does not seem to be the entire situation. Washington operates on a principle well known to international relations experts: you cannot secure via talks what you have lost on the battlefield. The American government believes that it is unrealistic to force Russia to relinquish the territory that it already controls in Ukraine's occupied territories.
The issue is that while recognising this factual reality, Washington does minimal to discourage Russia, through diplomacy or military means, from thinking that the situation will not shift further in its favour in the coming year.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, Moscow is certain that duration works to their advantage – that Ukraine and its partners are approaching exhaustion. Their incentive to sign a deal that does not give them the greatest potential benefit is almost completely absent. There may be numerous efforts to achieve ceasefire, but they will persist as long as Russia's government remains highly assured in the outcome.
On the contrary, Ukraine's government believes that Ukraine can still endure, progressively conceding lives and land but averting a entire defensive failure until circumstances change in its favour.
Existing Situation
Objectively, there are no actual prerequisites for a armistice. Now, subjective factors are entering the equation: leadership ambitions to negotiate peace and achieve global acclaim, and Ukrainian leadership's double obstacles – on one hand, not to distance important partners, and on the other, to mobilize citizens around the country's interests against any proposal Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their focus does not shift toward internal issues. And although their objective will now be considerably more difficult after latest incidents, it remains highly unlikely that this will alter their fundamental strategy.
These opposing factors are influencing discussions.
Summary and Prospects
It took a only one week to terminate the 28 points of the most recent proposal. Aggressive and erratic handling of the matter by US administration, pushback by Ukraine and the rest of Europe, along with soothing efforts of negotiators, and finally, current information leaks, all did their job.
While new plans based on previous concepts are approaching, Kyiv, London and other allied nations should draw one fundamental conclusion: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to counter political attacks from Washington that are founded on Moscow's terms and demonstrate specific hesitation to alter the situation, if they stand together and enhance their military capacity at a considerably quicker tempo. If they do, neither external pressure nor military threats will be able to break them. In the meantime, Ukraine's ability to defend against evening bombardments will, for the coming months, primarily depend on continued Western support.
