Europe felt a moment of respite on Monday, as the tension triggered by the presentation of a new 28-point plan for achieving ceasefire appeared – momentarily – to have been contained. A senior US official spoke of "significant advancement" after bilateral negotiations in Geneva. On Monday night, Moscow made its retaliation: an extensive attack of missile and drone strikes on Kyiv.
The Pattern of Negotiation and Warfare
The succession of conflicting incidents captured the harsh reality of the outgoing year. By day, diplomatic battles are conducted: positive announcements are issued from different nations. Immense energy is devoted on restraining specific proposals. By night, Moscow clearly shows the world that, for them, war remains the key method for achieving "peace".
Nighttime Reality
As the offensive progressed into the early hours of Tuesday, the current condition of Ukraine's defenselessness was laid bare. Ukraine is capable of detecting missile launches from across the border, a capacity provided through timely intelligence. From witness perspectives, military aircraft that had been scrambled to engage hostile guided weapons flew past – advanced fighter aircraft supplied to Ukraine by Western partners.
Moments later, Kyiv's missile defense thundered: multiple launches targeted at a Russian ballistic missile. This was a advanced protection mechanism at work, probably delivered by Western nations. Every launch shakes the surroundings, rattling buildings. The moment of terror quickly transforms into resigned acknowledgment: maybe the hostile projectile won't strike its target this time, sparing the city from devastation and another blackout.
Persistent Threats
Not long after, a automatic firearm opened up on a drone somewhere nearby, part of a mobile-fire group – most likely Western-made equipment. Regrettably, the shots failed to hit the enemy aircraft – it maintained course toward its destination.
With pauses, this continued until dawn. Kyiv awoke to the early updates: multiple fatalities, devastation and heating outages in multiple buildings as a result of the nocturnal offensive. As customarily, everyone still continued their routines – enduring hostilities. But those entire period demonstrated Ukraine's essential dependence on international aid – a dependence that European nations are demonstrably unable to substitute in the short term.
Unsuccessful Negotiations
The detailed framework from Washington generated strong feelings, debate and profound anxiety – and briefly redirected concern from Ukraine's largest corruption scandal in years. Yet, we have witnessed similar scenarios, after previous diplomatic encounters and bilateral conferences.
Every new approach from US leadership 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 pattern will, undoubtedly, continue.
Tactical Assessments
It is convenient to criticize particular leaders of repeatedly advocating Russian terms. But that does not seem to be the whole story. US administration operates on a premise familiar among experienced diplomats: you cannot secure via talks what you have lost on the battlefield. The US administration presumes that it is impossible to pressure the Kremlin to relinquish the land that it already controls in Ukraine's south or east.
The issue is that while accepting these circumstances, US leadership does little to deter Moscow, through statements or actions, from thinking that the status quo will not change more in its favour in the months ahead.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, the Kremlin is confident that the clock favors them – that Ukraine and its supporters are coming close to fatigue. Their reason to accept conditions that does not give them the largest achievable advantage is virtually nonexistent. There may be numerous efforts to stop fighting, but they will continue as long as Russia's government remains highly assured in the result.
On the contrary, Ukraine's government believes that Ukraine can still hold out, slowly losing people and territory but averting a complete military breakdown until situations evolve in its benefit.
Current Realities
Factually, there are no genuine requirements for a ceasefire. Now, individual motivations are coming into play: personal goals to broker a ceasefire and secure international recognition, and Ukrainian leadership's twin challenges – on one hand, not to alienate a key ally, and on the other, to rally Ukrainians around the flag against any proposal Kyiv finds unacceptable, so that their focus does not switch to homefront challenges. And although their task will now be considerably more difficult after recent developments, it remains highly unlikely that this will alter their fundamental strategy.
These conflicting dynamics are influencing discussions.
Assessment and Future
It took a mere seven days to kill the 28 points of the latest plan. Forceful and unpredictable management of the matter by American leadership, pushback by Ukraine and the rest of Europe, along with calming attempts of representatives, and finally, current information leaks, all did their job.
While new proposals based on established approaches are forthcoming, Kyiv, London and other European capitals should draw one fundamental conclusion: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to fend off diplomatic offensives from Washington that are founded on Moscow's terms and reflect specific hesitation to modify developments, 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 overcome them. In the meantime, Ukraine's capacity to counter nocturnal attacks will, for the foreseeable future, mainly require continued Western support.
