Europe breathed a deep collective sigh of relief on Monday, as the tension triggered by the presentation of a new 28-point plan for resolving the conflict appeared – briefly – to have been stabilised. A American diplomat spoke of "significant advancement" after bilateral negotiations in Geneva. On Monday night, Russian leadership made its retaliation: an extensive attack of aerial bombardment on Kyiv.
The Rhythm of Peace Talks and Military Action
The succession of opposing developments captured the grim essence of the recent timeframe. By day, negotiation efforts are waged: positive announcements are delivered from various governments. Considerable effort is devoted on restraining specific proposals. By night, Russian leadership clearly shows the world that, for them, conflict continues to be the main instrument for achieving "resolution".
Nocturnal Warfare
As Russia's attack developed into the early hours of Tuesday, the current condition of Ukraine's exposure was laid bare. Ukraine is equipped to monitor missile launches from Russian territory, a ability afforded by current data. From observation points, military aircraft that had been deployed to intercept incoming cruise missiles flew past – sophisticated military planes provided to Ukraine by Western partners.
Shortly after, Kyiv's missile defense activated: several firings targeted at a Russian ballistic missile. This was a sophisticated defense system at work, presumably provided by Western nations. Every launch creates sudden vibrations, shaking the windows. The instant of fear quickly gives way to grim resignation: maybe the approaching threat won't strike its target this time, protecting urban areas from ruin and additional electricity failures.
Continuous Dangers
Following this, a automatic firearm opened up on a drone in the vicinity, part of a mobile-fire group – probably Western-made equipment. Sadly, the bullets missed the opposing UAV – it maintained course toward its objective.
Intermittently, this carried on until dawn. Kyiv awoke to the early updates: multiple fatalities, destruction and heating outages in many homes as a result of the nocturnal offensive. As always, everyone still went about their day – experiencing conflict. But those full day demonstrated Ukraine's essential dependence on external assistance – a need that regional partners are demonstrably unable to substitute in the short term.
Ineffective Peace Efforts
The comprehensive proposal from US administration sparked intense emotion, controversy and deep concern – and temporarily diverted attention from Ukraine's largest corruption scandal in years. Yet, we have witnessed similar scenarios, after previous diplomatic encounters and bilateral conferences.
Every new proposal from American administration unfolds according to the consistent cycle: a diplomatic cavalry charge against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with allied governments, succeeds in resisting. They stabilise the situation but never actually achieve victory. This pattern will, no doubt, persist.
Political Considerations
It is easy to blame certain parties of repeatedly advocating Kremlin's demands. But that does not seem to be the complete picture. Washington functions according to a premise well known to international relations experts: you cannot achieve through diplomacy what you have been unable to protect through force. The White House assumes that it is unrealistic to pressure the Kremlin to abandon the land that it already controls in Ukraine's occupied territories.
The problem is that while accepting these circumstances, American administration does nothing to prevent Kremlin actions, through statements or actions, from believing that the status quo will not evolve additionally in its benefit in the near future.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, Moscow is confident that time is on his side – that Ukraine and its partners are coming close to fatigue. Their incentive to accept conditions that does not give them the maximum possible gain is almost completely absent. There may be multiple initiatives to end hostilities, but they will persist as long as Russia's leader remains supremely confident in the conclusion.
On the contrary, Ukraine's government believes that Ukraine can still persist, slowly losing people and territory but avoiding a total frontline collapse until circumstances change in its advantage.
Current Realities
Factually, there are no actual prerequisites for a ceasefire. Now, individual motivations are becoming relevant: political desires to broker a ceasefire and achieve global acclaim, and Kyiv's dual difficulties – on one hand, not to distance important partners, and on the other, to rally Ukrainians around the national cause against any proposal Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their attention does not switch to internal issues. And although their objective will now be much harder after recent developments, it remains quite doubtful that this will alter their fundamental strategy.
These two forces are guiding negotiations.
Assessment and Future
It took a just a single week to terminate the suggested clauses of the most recent proposal. Forceful and unpredictable management of the matter by Washington, opposition by Ukraine and the rest of Europe, along with pacifying measures of representatives, and finally, recent disclosures, all did their job.
While new proposals based on previous concepts are imminent, Kyiv, London and other Western governments should reach an essential realization: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to counter political attacks from Washington that are rooted in Kremlin requirements and show specific hesitation to change the course of events, if they maintain solidarity and enhance their military capacity at a significantly accelerated rate. If they do, neither external pressure nor military threats will be able to break them. In the meantime, Ukraine's capability to counter nocturnal attacks will, for the foreseeable future, largely rely on sustained allied backing.
