Europe experienced widespread relief on Monday, as the crisis triggered by the announcement of a new 28-point plan for achieving ceasefire appeared – momentarily – to have been contained. A senior US official spoke of "significant advancement" after Ukraine-US talks in Geneva. On Monday night, Moscow made its countermove: an extensive attack of missile and drone strikes on Kyiv.
The Pattern of Peace Talks and Military Action
The chain of conflicting incidents captured the grim essence of the current period. By day, diplomatic battles are fought: positive announcements are issued from different nations. Significant resources is expended on containing particular approaches. By night, Moscow clearly shows the world that, for them, war remains the main instrument for achieving "settlement".
Nighttime Reality
As military strikes progressed into the early hours of Tuesday, the current condition of Ukraine's vulnerability was exposed. Ukraine is capable of detecting rocket firings from enemy soil, a capacity provided through timely intelligence. From vantage locations, defense planes that had been deployed to counter approaching cruise missiles flew past – modern combat jets supplied to Ukraine by European allies.
Shortly after, Kyiv's air-defence systems engaged: defensive missiles targeted at a hostile projectile. This was a advanced protection mechanism at work, presumably delivered by allied countries. Every launch creates sudden vibrations, causing tremors. The brief panic quickly transforms into grim resignation: maybe the approaching threat won't cause damage this time, preventing destruction from catastrophe and additional electricity failures.
Persistent Threats
Following this, a heavy machine gun engaged a drone somewhere nearby, part of a defensive team – almost certainly imported technology. Regrettably, the shots failed to hit the opposing UAV – it pressed on overhead toward its target.
Intermittently, this continued until dawn. Kyiv greeted the morning news: seven people killed, devastation and heating outages in multiple buildings as a result of the evening attack. As typically, everyone still went about their day – experiencing conflict. But those 24 hours illustrated Ukraine's critical military reliance on external assistance – a need that regional partners are clearly incapable to replace in the short term.
Unsuccessful Negotiations
The 28-point plan from US administration sparked intense emotion, debate and profound anxiety – and momentarily shifted focus from Ukraine's largest corruption scandal in years. Yet, we have seen this script before, after prior negotiation attempts and bilateral conferences.
Every new approach from American administration adheres to the identical sequence: a negotiation push against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with other European capitals, manages to fend off. They stabilise the situation but never actually secure success. This cycle will, no doubt, continue.
Political Considerations
It is tempting to accuse specific actors of consistently pushing Moscow's conditions. But that does not seem to be the entire situation. US administration functions according to a principle understood by seasoned negotiators: you cannot achieve through diplomacy what you have lost on the battlefield. The White House presumes that it is unrealistic to compel Moscow to relinquish the land that it currently occupies in Ukraine's south or east.
The challenge is that while acknowledging this situation, American administration does minimal to discourage Russia, through statements or actions, from thinking that the situation will not evolve additionally in its advantage in the coming year.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, Russian leadership is confident that the clock favors them – that Ukraine and its allies are approaching exhaustion. Their reason to agree to terms that does not give them the maximum possible gain is virtually nonexistent. There may be multiple initiatives to stop fighting, but they will persist as long as Russia's leadership remains highly assured in the conclusion.
On the contrary, Kyiv believes that Ukraine can still persist, gradually sacrificing people and territory but averting a entire defensive failure until situations evolve in its favour.
Existing Situation
Objectively, there are no real preconditions for a truce. Now, personal considerations are becoming relevant: personal goals to broker a ceasefire and obtain worldwide acknowledgment, and the government's double obstacles – on one hand, not to alienate a key ally, and on the other, to rally Ukrainians around the national cause against any initiative Kyiv finds unworkable, so that their focus does not move to domestic problems. And although their task will now be much harder after latest incidents, it remains very improbable that this will change their overall approach.
These opposing factors are influencing discussions.
Conclusion and Outlook
It took a only one week to kill the proposed articles of the latest plan. Assertive and inconsistent approach of the matter by US administration, opposition by Ukraine and the other European countries, along with soothing efforts of representatives, and finally, recent disclosures, all achieved their purpose.
While new plans based on previous concepts are forthcoming, Kyiv, London and other Western governments should reach an essential realization: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to resist negotiation assaults from Washington that are founded on Moscow's terms and demonstrate specific hesitation to modify developments, if they remain united and improve their protective measures at a significantly accelerated rate. If they do, no combination of diplomatic or military actions will be able to overcome them. In the meantime, Ukraine's capacity to defend against evening bombardments will, for the coming months, primarily depend on sustained allied backing.
