Notes

When will the war in Ukraine end? And 9 more questions about Russia's invasion : NPR
As painful as it is to make compromises in a negotiated settlement, Mr Cancian says Kyiv and Moscow may one day decide peace is the only way forward. "[Russia is] facing three or four generations, 60 or 80 years, of guerilla war, because they're up against a population of 44 million people who are now completely and utterly Ukrainian men," Professor Clarke said. Ukrainian officials believe an emboldened Russia is preparing for another offensive as early as today, having begun the preliminary phase earlier this month. Germany and France have announced more support through air missile systems and AMX-10 RC light armoured vehicles, while the US tipped in another $US3.75 billion in new military assistance last month. "The current rate of Ukraine's ammunition expenditure is many times higher than our current rate of production. This puts our defence industries under strain," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned this month. After years spent scaling-back artillery, ammunition and tank investments, Europe has cleared out old warehouses to supply Ukraine with the weapons it wants and needs to fight Russia.


But industrial capacities are spotty, and nations have started to scrutinize how much equipment they can spare while maintaining their own self-defense requirements and that of NATO. Defense News spoke with national security analysts, lawmakers and retired officials, asking each how the conflict could end. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data. While some Western governments will secretly balk at the ongoing costs of supporting Ukraine (the U.S. has already pledged over $40 billion in security assistance to Kyiv) many understand the high stakes, Barrons said.

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It has brought the transatlantic alliance together, even if it is propelling European countries to build more independent capabilities as well, which constitutes a diplomatic win for the Biden administration. Yet the Russian invasion also marks the definitive end of the US-run liberal international order that was founded after the Cold War. Even if Russia is assured of some support, obtaining that assistance will most likely involve giving over its crown jewels, such as energy and minerals assets, to Chinese investors at fire-sale prices now that Western companies are beating down the door to leave the country. Moscow’s deepening dependence on Beijing will no doubt grate on the Russian psyche and spur resentment in China.


When President Bill Clinton signed that law in 1996, several countries accused the U.S. of violating their sovereignty, passing their own laws to make the U.S. regulation effectively unenforceable. From the very beginning of the war, President Putin has drawn parallels between the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany in World War II and the current military campaign against supposed "neo-Nazis" in Ukraine. That hasn't let up, if only because it's a powerful emotional and recruitment tool. Twenty million Soviets — Russians, Ukrainians and others — died fighting Hitler's armies. 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.

Ukraine invasion — explained
European security was also fundamentally changed by Russia's invasion on February 24 and many states outside of Russia and Ukraine have a stake in its outcome, analysts said. The Russian leader's future may depend on the country's powerful security forces, such as those led by Yevgeny Prigozhin or Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. A ceasefire would give the Ukrainians a reprieve without backing Mr Putin into a corner, preventing a possible escalation in which he resorts to extreme measures such as attacks on Western energy infrastructure or the use of nuclear weapons. All signs are pointing to a renewed push from Russian forces, likely involving thousands of soldiers in battalion and brigade-sized attacks, as Moscow continues to hammer Ukraine's energy network. While Ukrainian forces still have momentum, Russia currently controls about 18 per cent of Ukraine, including much of Donetsk and Luhansk in the east, as well as Crimea, which it illegally annexed in 2014.

"We are in for a very long fight, this is not going to be short, this is not only going to be about Ukraine. ... This is probably the biggest challenge that we are seeing in Europe since World War II," he said. The war in Ukraine assumed international dimensions the moment Russian armoured columns rolled across the border in February 2022. "Today I am submitting to the Verkhovna Rada a key draft law that will allow the adoption of comprehensive legislative amendments and the introduction of multiple citizenship," Zelenskyy said in a statement. Although it is tempered by a grim knowledge that one wrong move could escalate the conflict into a situation once considered unthinkable. As the scale of the attack became clear, and the Ukrainian military worked to respond, many questioned whether the country would be able to resist the military might of its neighbour. American leadership has so far been largely united in their support for Kyiv.
Moscow accused Kyiv of launching a missile strike on a market in Donetsk city, killing at least 25 people and wounding 20 others, Russian officials said. Ukrainian armed forces operating in the region denied they had carried out the strike, stating that they "did not conduct any combat operations with means of destruction." Over the holiday period, Russia continued its daily attacks against mostly civilian targets in Ukraine. For example, on December 29 a massive barrage of missile strikes and drone attacks hit infrastructure facilities in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Lviv, Odesa, and government-controlled areas of the contested Donetsk oblast.

Equally, worrying for Kyiv is a potential further strengthening of ties between Russia and China. So far, China has been careful in balancing its ideological proximity to Putin’s Russia with its economic ties with Ukraine’s western partners. But at a video summit between Putin and Xi Jinping at the end of December, the Chinese president stressed Beijing’s preparedness to increase its strategic cooperation with Moscow.

Putin ousted
Ukraine has declared martial law - which means the military takes control temporarily. It has cut diplomatic ties with Russia, offered weapons to anyone who wants them and declared an overnight curfew for Kyiv. But later on Thursday President Zelensky said Ukraine had suffered losses and a lot of aircraft and armoured vehicles had been destroyed. The Russian offensive was preceded by artillery fire and there were injuries to border guards, the DPSU said.

A lot of the Ukrainians I've talked to, while they appreciate the Western weapons supplies, say this is their war to fight. Apart from https://rentry.co/ , almost all of the tens of thousands of people who have died in this war have been on Ukrainian territory. The invasion has been a disaster for President Vladimir Putin and in order to justify it at home he at least has to take control of Ukraine's Donbas region, after which he can falsely claim that the army saved Russian citizens persecuted by Ukraine. Wars often do not end predictably, and a failure to achieve hoped-for victories often leads to a sudden change of government. Ukraine appears very dependent on Volodymyr Zelenskiy in terms of its public diplomacy, but he does not direct its military strategy in detail and the country’s desire to fight runs very deep.

"If it's a smaller front-line, and less fighting, they'd both be building up and looking for a way to break through. But, at least for a while, they'd have a way to rebuild. Jones said that there were big risks involved in using nuclear weapons, especially if Putin detonates them in territories he has been claiming are Russian. It would make success dependent on events we cannot predict or control, including on the outcome of elections in Western countries, including the United States. Russia has since been focusing its military operations in the south, east and north-east of Ukraine, seizing large areas. “You end up with something between a frozen conflict and an everlasting war, in which neither side has the energy or economy to win,” Nixey said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war of choice in Ukraine is a world-historical event, marking the final act of the post-Cold War period and the start of a new era, yet unwritten. The spectrum of possible outcomes ranges from a volatile new cold or hot war involving the United States, Russia, and China; to a frozen conflict in Ukraine; to a post-Putin settlement in which Russia becomes part of a revised European security architecture. With the West leveling unprecedented sanctions against Russia in record time and the real potential for a descent into nuclear war, we are in uncharted territory. Since the counteroffensive was launched in June, only a handful of villages have been recaptured. Ukrainian armed forces operating in the region denied they had carried out the strike, stating Sunday that they "did not conduct any combat operations with means of destruction."

But industrial capacities are spotty, and nations have started to scrutinize how much equipment they can spare while maintaining their own self-defense requirements and that of NATO. There are reports of attacks on Ukrainian military infrastructure across the country, and Russian convoys entering from all directions. By early summer Ukraine will be able to use US-made F16 fighter jets for the first time, which it hopes will improve its ability to counter Russian aircraft and strengthen its own air defences. This would bear similarities to the situation after the initial Russian incursions into Ukraine in 2014 – but this time the west would be left facing an implacable, large hostile actor in Moscow. That scenario could embolden critics of the war; increase public discontent with continued funding for Ukraine; and pose a problem in terms of arms production and supplies for the West. The West makes clear that if Putin goes and is replaced by a more moderate leader, then Russia will see the lifting of some sanctions and a restoration of normal diplomatic relations.
Germany’s sea change hasn’t just resulted from developments in Ukraine. Many Germans and other Europeans have lacked trust in the United States since then-US President Donald Trump denigrated Germany and the NATO alliance. Despite Biden’s efforts early in his administration to repair this damage, many Germans and Europeans are appalled by the divisions and partisanship they see in US politics. Ukrainian refugees are being welcomed with open arms despite their numbers reaching far beyond the over nine hundred thousand refugees who came to Europe in 2015 to escape the wars in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Back then, German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to admit Syrian refugees split the EU, boosting populists and the radical right. This time around, more unity has suddenly been achieved—with all twenty-seven EU members agreeing to take in Ukrainian refugees for at least one year, with rights to work, housing, and health care.


More European nations are now talking about the need to step up aid in light of concerns that the US is weakening in its resolve. The military course of this war in 2024 will be determined in Moscow, Kyiv, Washington, Brussels, Beijing, Tehran and Pyongyang more than in Avdiivka, Tokmak, Kramatorsk or any of the devastated battlefields along the frontlines. Russia lacks the equipment and trained manpower to launch a strategic offensive until spring 2025, at the earliest. It would be wrong to say that the front lines in Ukraine are stalemated, but both sides are capable of fighting each other to a standstill as they each try to take strategic initiatives.

The Russian leader's future may depend on the country's powerful security forces, such as those led by Yevgeny Prigozhin or Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. It would be wrong to say that the front lines in Ukraine are stalemated, but both sides are capable of fighting each other to a standstill as they each try to take strategic initiatives. Any progress towards talks would likely start with a ceasefire or a similar type of temporary arrangement that would enable both sides to suspend fighting, the analysts suggest. Russia is throwing waves of recruits and mercenaries into close-quarters battles around towns like Bakhmut and Vuhledar.
Earlier today, a Russian official said air defences had thwarted a drone attack on the Slavneft-YANOS oil refinery in the city of Yaroslavl. Moscow has claimed its forces have taken control of the village of Tabaivka in Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region. But the idea that Ukraine can be pressured into some kind of peace is “incorrect” and “denies Ukraine their agency”, said Branislav Slantchev, a professor of politics at the University of California, San Diego, and a specialist in war negotiations and how conflicts end. No indictments or arrest warrants against political and military leaders, including Putin, have been issued in the context of Ukraine so far. But with the situation before the International Criminal Court, this could change. While it will be difficult to execute such warrants, they’re likely to affect negotiations.

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