Europe breathed a deep collective sigh of relief on Monday, as the tension caused by the announcement of a new 28-point plan for achieving ceasefire appeared – momentarily – to have been stabilised. A American diplomat spoke of "substantial progress" after diplomatic discussions in Geneva. On Monday night, Moscow made its response: another massive barrage of rocket attacks on Kyiv.
The Pattern of Negotiation and Warfare
The sequence of opposing developments captured the harsh reality of the recent timeframe. By day, political struggles are fought: optimistic declarations are issued from different nations. Significant resources is expended on containing specific proposals. By night, Russian leadership brutally reminds the world that, for them, military action persists as the main instrument for achieving "peace".
Nocturnal Warfare
As Russia's attack progressed into the early hours of Tuesday, the immediate reality of Ukraine's defenselessness was revealed. Ukraine is capable of detecting projectile deployments from across the border, a ability enabled by timely intelligence. From vantage locations, Ukrainian air force fighter jets that had been dispatched to intercept incoming guided weapons roared overhead – modern combat jets supplied to Ukraine by European allies.
Soon thereafter, Kyiv's missile defense engaged: several firings deployed against a hostile projectile. This was a advanced protection mechanism at work, presumably provided by partner states. Every launch creates sudden vibrations, causing tremors. The brief panic quickly becomes resigned acknowledgment: maybe the hostile projectile won't strike its target this time, sparing the city from devastation and further power outages.
Ongoing Risks
Following this, a large-caliber weapon fired at a aerial vehicle somewhere nearby, part of a defensive team – probably allied-provided weaponry. Unfortunately, the bullets missed the opposing UAV – it pressed on overhead toward its target.
Intermittently, this continued until dawn. Kyiv awoke to the morning news: seven people killed, devastation and utility failures in many homes as a result of the night's assault. As customarily, everyone still maintained normal activities – living the war. But those 24 hours demonstrated Ukraine's critical military reliance on international aid – a need that neighboring countries are clearly incapable to fill in the immediate future.
Ineffective Peace Efforts
The 28-point plan from American leadership provoked deep reactions, debate and serious worry – and momentarily shifted focus from Ukraine's most significant graft case in years. Yet, we have witnessed similar scenarios, after earlier high-level meetings and multilateral gatherings.
Every new approach from American administration adheres to the identical sequence: a political offensive against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with partner nations, succeeds in resisting. They stabilise the situation but never actually secure success. This trend will, undoubtedly, endure.
Tactical Assessments
It is easy to blame specific actors of persistently promoting Kremlin's demands. But that does not seem to be the whole story. American leadership works based on a assumption familiar among seasoned negotiators: you cannot secure via talks what you have been unable to protect through force. The US administration presumes that it is unrealistic to force Russia to relinquish the areas that it currently occupies in Ukraine's occupied territories.
The problem is that while recognising this factual reality, US leadership does little to deter Moscow, through diplomacy or military means, from believing that the current condition will not shift further in its benefit in the months ahead.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, Russian leadership is confident that duration works to their advantage – that Ukraine and its allies are approaching exhaustion. Their reason to sign a deal that does not give them the maximum possible gain is close to zero. There may be multiple initiatives to end hostilities, but they will carry on as long as Russia's leadership remains highly assured in the outcome.
On the contrary, Ukraine's government believes that Ukraine can still endure, progressively conceding lives and land but avoiding a complete military breakdown until situations evolve in its favour.
Current Realities
Objectively, there are no actual prerequisites for a armistice. Now, individual motivations are becoming relevant: leadership ambitions to negotiate peace and secure international recognition, and Ukrainian leadership's dual difficulties – on one hand, not to distance important partners, and on the other, to unite the population around the flag against any initiative Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their attention does not move to internal issues. And although their task will now be significantly challenging after latest incidents, it remains very improbable that this will alter their fundamental strategy.
These two forces are influencing discussions.
Conclusion and Outlook
It took a just a single week to eliminate the proposed articles of the most recent proposal. Forceful and unpredictable management of the matter by US administration, pushback by Ukraine and the rest of Europe, along with pacifying measures of negotiators, and finally, latest revelations, all did their job.
While new proposals based on previous concepts are approaching, Kyiv, London and other European capitals should arrive at a critical understanding: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to fend off negotiation assaults from Washington that are based on Russian demands and reflect particular unwillingness to modify developments, if they maintain solidarity and strengthen their defence capabilities at a considerably quicker tempo. If they do, neither external pressure nor military threats will be able to defeat them. In the meantime, Ukraine's capacity to counter nocturnal attacks will, for the predictable period, largely rely on continued Western support.
