Notes

Zelensky: Only diplomacy can end Ukraine war
Massive cyber-attacks sweep across Ukraine, targeting key national infrastructure. President Zelensky is either assassinated or flees, to western Ukraine or even overseas, to set up a government in exile. President Putin declares victory and withdraws some forces, leaving enough behind to maintain some control.


But Russia under Putin has
never ended its wars at the negotiating table; at best it has frozen them, keeping its options open. Russia has shown zero interest in making concessions that would come close to the minimal requirements of Ukraine and its allies. As long as his military avoids total collapse, and he believes there is a chance of political change in the West, Putin will likely keep sacrificing Russians to stay in the fight. A second way for Ukraine to win — at least theoretically — would be through a diplomatic agreement. Meanwhile, there is no guarantee that the United States and its allies will continue paying for Ukraine’s offensive operations for as long as it takes.

Leadership change
"I believe that the war may stretch well into 2025 and the international support for both sides would prolong the war as neither Ukraine nor Russia can achieve major breakthroughs and declare victory," Gok told Newsweek. There is a difference between keeping options open, perhaps seeing what response tentative, private probes might get, and going public with a concrete proposal. Most likely a new diplomatic effort would start with a third party initiative. Anything that generated any momentum would certainly change the context. Then both sides would have to show they cared about peace, even while reserving their positions.


Never,” United States President Joe Biden said in Poland last week, a day after a previously unannounced visit to Kyiv. The money is coming through and Kyiv is still holding steady, battered and bruised but determined to resist Russian aggression. Putin can’t keep his forces on the offensive all year long and now has to keep an eye out for new Ukrainian strikes on assets not only in Crimea (such as the recent hit on a large landing ship in the Black Sea port of Feodosia in occupied Crimea) but also in Russia proper.

News in language
American leadership has so far been largely united in their support for Kyiv. An inability to do so could foster economic discontent capable of turning public opinion against the war, Lichfield told Defense News. Russian forces are already trying to slow down tanks in Ukraine with mines, trenches, and pyramidical, concrete “dragon’s teeth,” a type of fortification not seen in combat since World War II.

For democracies, long-term consensus in support for war has always been more complicated than for autocrats with no accountability. Putin’s grim determination to keep building up more forces and expand attacks on civil targets make any true form of Ukrainian victory a very uncertain proposition. Phillips P OBrien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St Andrews, wrote in an analysis piece that the potential return of Donald Trump to the White House could see the US "neuter" the Western military alliance.
Now, a collection of Western tank-type vehicles is slated to arrive on the front lines this spring, with training already underway in donor countries. The vehicles carry the hope of enabling battlefield wins for Ukrainian forces that will lead to some kind of war-ending scenario — if the weapons arrive in time. “Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia — never,” President Joe Biden said in a speech in Poland this year, and rightly so. https://www.openlearning.com/u/michaelsenbishop-s2dhzs/blog/ExploringTheMeaningBehindWhenIGotTheNewsTodayLyrics , another senior Nato military chief said countries needed to be on alert "and expect the unexpected". Adm Rob Bauer, who heads the alliance's military committee, said the public needed to change their mindset for an era "when anything can happen at any time".

Zelenskyy: Ukraine's nearly million-strong army encounters Russian casualties in Avdiivka
Given the probable level of mutual tension, it might require a demilitarized zone (DMZ) and a UN or independent peacekeeping force. Even if such a zone were created, both sides would also continue to build up their military capabilities and positions on the edge of any ceasefire line or DMZ. Its attacks to date on Ukraine’s civil facilities have had a serious impact but have not yet had the character of systematic efforts to cripple key civil systems and functions and do so on a nationwide level. Russia has also shown more skill in dealing with sanctions and economic warfare than the U.S. and other planners estimated when they imposed them. If the war continues into the next fall and winter, Russia may find it easier to ride out the current patterns of economic warfare than a democratic Europe.

Russia's defence budget has tripled since 2021 and will consume 30% of government spending next year. It has its own internal failures, as its recent anticorruption drives have shown. Polls in Ukraine show that the public overwhelmingly rejects concessions to Russia.
Both sides seem resigned to a long conflict, with the high numbers of casualties, equipment losses and economic damage since it started on February 24, 2022 set to escalate. The current war is different, with Western support helping Ukraine regain large parts of the territory Russia grabbed in the early weeks after last year’s invasion. Emory University’s Reiter listed two main reasons for the lack of appetite in Ukraine for any negotiations that would mean accepting the loss of territory. “The war has been so absolutely brutal that they’re fearful of what will happen in territories handed over to Russia,” he said. He said there is little the West can do to stop Ukrainians from trying to take back all of their country’s territory currently held by Russia — including parts that Moscow has formally, though illegally, annexed. It has a homegrown war machine and enormous reserves of manpower and resources, and Morris believes there is a good chance Russia can sustain the conflict for years to come.

He said there is little the West can do to stop Ukrainians from trying to take back all of their country’s territory currently held by Russia — including parts that Moscow has formally, though illegally, annexed. Instead, its forces are facing a 600-mile front line and extensive Russian defensive fortifications — in some places up to 19 miles deep — that were built in winter while Ukraine was waiting for more heavy weaponry from its allies before launching its counteroffensive in June. That could end up looking something like the Korean peninsula, with a demilitarised zone between Ukrainian and Russian-controlled territory, or a grinding perpetual conflict that flares up and down, eventually resulting in an uneasy truce. But it could also, at least temporarily, halt the advance of the Ukrainian Army.
Website: https://www.openlearning.com/u/michaelsenbishop-s2dhzs/blog/ExploringTheMeaningBehindWhenIGotTheNewsTodayLyrics