Europe felt a moment of respite on Monday, as the tension caused by the announcement of a new 28-point plan for ending the war appeared – briefly – to have been contained. A Washington representative spoke of "substantial progress" after diplomatic discussions in Geneva. On Monday night, the Kremlin made its response: an extensive attack of aerial bombardment on Kyiv.
The Rhythm of Negotiation and Warfare
The chain of conflicting incidents captured the grim essence of the recent timeframe. By day, diplomatic battles are conducted: positive announcements are issued from various governments. Immense energy is allocated on restraining certain initiatives. By night, the Kremlin brutally reminds the world that, for them, conflict continues to be the primary tool for achieving "resolution".
After-Dark Attacks
As the offensive developed into the early hours of Tuesday, the current condition of Ukraine's exposure was revealed. Ukraine is capable of detecting projectile deployments from Russian territory, a capacity enabled by timely intelligence. From vantage locations, defense planes that had been deployed to intercept incoming guided weapons flew past – modern combat jets supplied to Ukraine by Western partners.
Moments later, Kyiv's anti-aircraft weapons engaged: multiple launches fired to intercept a hostile projectile. This was a modern interception technology at work, most likely supplied through partner states. Every deployment shakes the surroundings, causing tremors. The instant of fear quickly becomes resigned acknowledgment: possibly the incoming missile won't cause damage this time, sparing the city from ruin and additional electricity failures.
Ongoing Risks
Following this, a automatic firearm engaged a drone somewhere nearby, part of a defensive team – probably imported technology. Unfortunately, the projectiles didn't strike the hostile drone – it continued its flight toward its objective.
With pauses, this carried on until dawn. Kyiv awoke to the morning news: several casualties, destruction and heating outages in multiple buildings as a result of the nocturnal offensive. As typically, everyone still continued their routines – living the war. But those full day illustrated Ukraine's essential dependence on international aid – a dependence that regional partners are clearly incapable to replace in the immediate future.
Ineffective Peace Efforts
The 28-point plan from US administration sparked intense emotion, controversy and profound anxiety – and briefly redirected concern from Ukraine's major integrity crisis in years. Yet, we have experienced comparable situations, after prior negotiation attempts and multilateral gatherings.
Every new approach from US leadership follows the same pattern: a political offensive against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with partner nations, succeeds in resisting. They stabilise the situation but never actually win the battle. This cycle will, no doubt, continue.
Strategic Calculations
It is convenient to criticize specific actors of repeatedly advocating Russian terms. But that does not seem to be the whole story. American leadership operates on a premise understood by experienced diplomats: you cannot achieve through diplomacy what you have failed to defend militarily. The American government assumes that it is impossible to pressure the Kremlin to surrender the territory that it currently occupies in Ukraine's south or east.
The problem is that while acknowledging this situation, American administration does little to prevent Kremlin actions, through words or deeds, from thinking that the status quo will not evolve additionally in its favour in the near future.
Conflicting Perspectives
Therefore, Russian leadership is convinced that duration works to their advantage – that Ukraine and its allies are coming close to fatigue. Their incentive to accept conditions that does not give them the greatest potential benefit is close to zero. There may be numerous efforts to stop fighting, but they will continue as long as Russia's leadership remains supremely confident in the outcome.
On the contrary, Ukraine's government believes that Ukraine can still endure, gradually sacrificing lives and land but preventing a entire defensive failure until situations evolve in its favour.
Existing Situation
Realistically, there are no real preconditions for a ceasefire. Now, personal considerations are becoming relevant: personal goals to negotiate peace and obtain worldwide acknowledgment, and the government's double obstacles – on one hand, not to estrange crucial supporters, and on the other, to mobilize citizens around the flag against any proposal Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their priority does not switch to internal issues. And although their objective will now be much harder after recent developments, it remains very improbable that this will change their overall approach.
These opposing factors are guiding negotiations.
Summary and Prospects
It took a just a single week to terminate the 28 points of the latest plan. Forceful and unpredictable management of the matter by American leadership, resistance by Ukraine and the remaining European nations, along with soothing efforts of representatives, and finally, latest revelations, all did their job.
While new proposals based on previous concepts are forthcoming, Kyiv, London and other European capitals should arrive at a critical understanding: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to fend off political attacks from Washington that are rooted in Kremlin requirements and demonstrate specific hesitation to alter the situation, if they maintain solidarity and strengthen their defence capabilities at a significantly accelerated rate. If they do, no combination of diplomatic or military actions will be able to break them. In the meantime, Ukraine's ability to counter nocturnal attacks will, for the coming months, largely rely on sustained allied backing.
