3 Ideas to Explore

1. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s declaration on Dec. 2, 2025, that the strategically important Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk had fallen was premature in military terms, but, arriving on the eve of negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine war, its timing was perfect in terms of Russia’s highly successful disinformation campaign against Washington, according to the Institute for the Study of War’s George Barros in The Washington Post. Barros characterized Russia’s 20-month long assault on Pokrovsk as a serious loss for Ukraine, but a “Pyrrhic victory” for Russia, who will only take full control of the city after having sacrificed “at least five divisions worth of armored vehicles” and “25,000 Russian troops.” Barros notes that “Pokrovsk’s fall is unlikely to result in a breakthrough for the Russians” because “Russia lacks the troops to decisively punch through at scale—especially since Ukraine maintains a dense field fortification network immediately west of Pokrovsk.” Barros adds that “The Kremlin is hyping the importance of the capture of Pokrovsk in order to portray Russia’s battlefield advances as inevitable. That sense of inevitability is being echoed by some members of President Donald Trump’s negotiating team trying to pull together a peace proposal for the Ukraine war. But nothing is inevitable.” Barros also warns, however, that “as long as Russia keeps making battlefield gains, it is unlikely to pursue meaningful negotiation to end the war,” a point underlined by military analyst Dmitri Kuznets in The New York Times. Stressing the Kremlin’s new focus on drone strikes and infantry infiltration, however, Barros adds that the shift in Russia’s military capabilities is likely to remain “a troubling development” for Ukraine’s defense. Writing in Foreign Affairs, Johns Hopkins historian Sergey Radchenko agrees that Putin is unlikely to accept a peace deal short of his maximalist aims so long as even incremental gains, however costly, are realized, adding that Putin’s constant narrative of inevitable Russian victory is not supported by battlefield reality. “[B]oth countries are losing this war,” Radchenko says. “The question is which one will lose first. There is no reason to believe that Russia—still mired in the Donbas after four years—will suddenly achieve the battlefield breakthroughs that will lead to Kyiv’s immediate capitulation.” Radchenko concludes that “a bad deal is worse than no deal,” adding that “[a]ny premature peace settlement that undermines the prospects of Ukraine’s survival as a sovereign country and lets Russia get away with territorial aggression would fly against Western interests, to say nothing of Ukraine’s.”
2. The National Security Strategy (NSS) for 2025 departs in significant ways from the 2022 NSS or, for that matter, any NSS that preceded it. As New York Times columnist and Harvard Kennedy School Adjunct Lecturer David E. Sanger writes, NSS 2025 is more notable for what it doesn’t contain than what it does. Sanger notes that the focus on superpower competition in the last Trump-issued NSS published eight years ago is nowhere to be found in NSS 2025. According to Sanger: “Russia is mentioned in only four paragraphs, and never in tones of condemnation for its invasion of a neighboring state… Instead, it portrays the United States as something of a neutral negotiator that can diminish tensions between Russia and Europe and ‘reestablish strategic stability’ with Moscow,” Sanger writes. Harvard Kennedy School Professor and former U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns notes in Sanger’s piece that “Nor is there mention of the fact that the EU and NATO countries have been critical partners with us in sanctioning Beijing for its support for Russia in Ukraine, on Taiwan and on human rights—on our side of the strategic competition.” “In fact,” Burns continues, “strangely and falsely, there is more condemnation in the report of our European allies than our adversaries China and Russia.”
3. Extending the New START treaty for a year requires no substantive negotiations, but it would benefit the United States tremendously, argues Rose Gottemoeller in Arms Control Today. “For the United States, the benefit of this move would be buying more time to decide what to do about the ongoing Chinese buildup without having to worry simultaneously about new Russian deployments,” Gottemoeller, the treaty’s chief U.S. negotiator, writes. The limits about to expire would freeze “1,550 warheads, 700 delivery vehicles and 800 launchers” with a “handshake,” and that “while the treaty remains in force, both presidents can actually do better than that… both sides [can] resume implementation measures and do so quickly. This would allow each party to have up-to-date knowledge about the status of the other’s strategic nuclear forces when the treaty does go out of force in just over two months’ time.” And beyond the time needed to work through the implications of China’s rapid nuclear armament, Gottemoeller argues another advantage to the U.S. (and Russia) is the time to work through crucial questions, “including what to do about the proliferation of drones and missiles at all ranges. One approach would be to ban nuclear weapons on missiles and drones in the short to intermediate ranges.” Gottemoeller concludes that “exercising the treaty now—while it remains in existence—is a positive and achievable step. And it does not require negotiation, just the flip of a policy switch.”

I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda

Nuclear security and safety:

“Eliminating Russia’s Nuclear Legacy,” Bellona, 12.02.25.

• Bellona finds that after decades of effort, “Russia lacks a unified state system and a single national operator responsible for a comprehensive solution to the problems of the nuclear legacy,” leading to unsustainable management and an unclear future for hazardous facilities.
• There are “no clear—let alone legally defined—answers to the following questions: What is currently considered nuclear legacy infrastructure in Russia; how the process of eliminating the nuclear legacy should be managed; [or] how to finance the elimination…in border areas, international territories, and marine zones.”
• Since the start of the war in Ukraine, “international assistance ceased,” further stalling remediation, with only 20% of obligations for nuclear legacy cleanup actually secured in Russian law or budget.
• Bellona’s report warns, “At the current pace of work, it would take more than 200 years to dispose of the entire accumulated volume of radioactive waste,” with transparency gone and “political manipulation and the imitation of activity” prevailing.
• The nuclear legacy problem, the report concludes, “goes beyond the span of a single generation of policy decisions,” with the elimination cycle likely to “stretch over more than half a century,” creating mounting economic and environmental risks for Russia and the region

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• No significant developments.

Iran and its nuclear program:

• No significant developments.

Humanitarian impact of the Ukraine conflict:

• No significant developments.

Military and security aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts:

“Drones Fight Other Drones in the Battle for Ukraine’s Skies,” Alistair MacDonald, Ievgeniia Sivorka, Wall Street Journal, 12.04.25.

• Ukraine’s 3rd Separate Assault Brigade intercepted 886 Russian drones in September 2025, up from 507 in June; successful interception rates have jumped to about 50%, compared to just 5% a year ago (Artem Boliukh, air-defense chief).
• The unit’s top drone pilot, “Kratos,” has over 380 confirmed drone interceptions since Jan. 20, 2025, and was awarded the Cross of Combat Merit—though the Wall Street Journal could not independently verify this total.
• The Merops drone interceptor, developed by a company founded by ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt, can travel at over 180 mph, reach up to 16,000 feet, and costs $5,000–$15,000 per unit; success rates against Russian Shahed drones are reported at 65–75%.
• Russia’s falling oil and gas revenue has not yet curtailed its drone production and operations, and both sides are racing to scale up drone defenses with innovations like AI targeting and 3D-printed parts.
• Operators report a growing need for more interceptors as the number of Russian drones rises, with mixed success—25 drones downed by a single pilot in some units, but also frequent losses when targets evade or weather hampers visibility.

“What the campaign for Pokrovsk means for the future,” George Barros, Washington Post, 12.04.25.

• The Kremlin is hyping the importance of the capture of Pokrovsk in order to portray Russia’s battlefield advances as inevitable. That sense of inevitability is being echoed by some members of President Donald Trump’s negotiating team trying to pull together a peace proposal for the Ukraine war. But nothing is inevitable.
• Russia’s campaign for Pokrovsk has lasted 20 months, advancing only about 25 miles from Avdiivka and gaining roughly 12 square miles around Pokrovsk in October at the cost of 25,000 Russian troops. Russian forces lost “at least five divisions’ worth of armored vehicles and tanks (more than 1,000 armored vehicles and over 500 tanks)” in the Pokrovsk region since autumn 2023.
• Pokrovsk’s logistical value comes from its prewar population of 60,000 and location near the E-50 highway and a key railroad, both critical for Ukrainian supply lines to Donetsk’s front.
• Pokrovsk’s fall is unlikely to result in a breakthrough for the Russians. The forces arrayed there, now well-versed in grinding positional warfare, lack the capacity to move quickly to take more land. And with Russia estimated to have suffered more than 1 million casualties and more than 250,000 killed, and with recruitment failing to fully make up the losses, Russia lacks the troops to decisively punch through at scale—especially since Ukraine maintains a dense field fortification network immediately west of Pokrovsk.
• But Barros warns, “as long as Russia keeps making battlefield gains, it is unlikely to pursue meaningful negotiation to end the war,” stressing the Kremlin’s new focus on drone strikes and infantry infiltration is “a troubling development” for Ukraine’s defense.

“Russia expert Fiona Hill on why the war in Ukraine won't end anytime soon,” Scott Tong and Jill Ryan, WBUR, 12.04.25.

• Interview with Fiona Hill, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington DC. She served as deputy assistant to the president and senior director for European and Russian affairs on the U.S. National Security Council under the first Trump administration (from 2017 to 2019).
• Scott Tong: “What should Americans know about Ukraine, its military's innovation and the Ukrainians' resolve in this war? We have not talked too much about military innovation in Ukraine, at least in the U.S.?”
  • Fiona Hill: “No, we haven't, and we haven't also accepted the fact that Ukraine's actually right now got the largest and most capable military in Europe… What you're seeing now is the Ukrainians really picking up the pace of innovation on the battlefield of drones. I mean, yes, the Russians are learning from that as well and doing the same, but they're doing it from the top down. Ukraine is really significant on the grassroots level on the battlefield.”
• ST: “Russia is losing about 7,000 soldiers a week, according to Rubio. How can Putin keep sending so many people to the front lines?”
  • FH: “… Russia's doing something quite remarkable. It's actually using an almost entirely mercenary force in the sense that most of these are contract soldiers, so it's paying for people to go, which is why people continue to go. In the Russian context, it's a lot of money… And the Russians are calculating, and Putin and the people around him are calculating that they can do this for another couple of years.”

“Ukrainian troops near the front doubt the proposed pact with Russia will bring lasting peace,” Isobel Koshiw, Vasilisa Stepanenko, Evgeniy Maloletka, Washington Post, 12.02.25.

• Ukrainian soldiers say “Russia remains determined to conquer Ukraine—either now, or with a fresh army in a few years’ time—no matter what kind of agreement is reached” and that “a truce will be short-term, to restore Russia’s forces… and they will come back.”
• Battalion commander Serhii Filimonov warns, “I don’t believe there can be peace before Russia is destroyed, or at least the leadership is changed,” fearing a deal would simply prepare Russia “for a new war and attack again.”
• Analyst Rob Lee observes “Ukraine lacks manpower, lacks reserves,” making the front fragile: “All it takes is for one Ukrainian brigade to really struggle, and then Russia can advance.”
• Despite Russian advances—such as the battle for Pokrovsk—Ukrainian units are “managing to hold their ground” in key places, thanks to “high motivation and resilience,” but are heavily reliant on Western aid.
• The proposal to limit Ukraine’s military is mocked by soldiers—one calling it “tantamount to making it easier for Russia ‘to kill you’ later rather than now.” Ukraine’s future defense relies on “continued Western support” and on how frozen Russian assets are handled in any peace deal.

“When Defense Becomes Destruction: Austria-Hungary’s Mistake and Ukraine’s Risk,” Franz-Stefan Gady, War on the Rocks, 12.02.25.

• Gady warns, “a ‘no step back’ defense posture by Ukrainian forces risks worsening the relative attrition rate between Ukrainian and Russian forces,” drawing a parallel to the catastrophic losses Austria-Hungary suffered when rigid defense turned from asset to liability.
• He notes that “Ukraine’s General Staff must sign off on any tactical withdrawal or repositioning, thereby depriving frontline defenders of tactical flexibility,” leading to repeated patterns seen at Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and now Pokrovsk, where defense shifted from military necessity to political symbolism.
• “At Pokrovsk, Russian forces are now threatening to cut the last remaining corridor for Ukrainian defenders… the chances of annihilating or capturing Ukrainian forces in the pocket increasing,” Gady writes, highlighting the mounting operational risks of holding ground for its own sake.
• Gady argues that, “preserving trained forces often has greater long-term strategic value than holding specific settlements,” but acknowledges that withdrawals are “fraught military moves” shaped by domestic morale, Western perceptions, and political symbolism.
• He concludes, “Ukraine’s challenge is to internalize this lesson before repeating Austria Hungary’s fate. Every trained Ukrainian soldier lost defending an operationally meaningless urban position is one fewer soldier available for the flexible defense in depth operations that could more effectively attrit Russian forces.”

“Ukraine Targets Russia’s Black Sea Shadow Fleet—and Raises the Cost of Putin’s War,” Georgi Kantchev and James Marson, Wall Street Journal, 12.03.25

• “The Sea Baby drone, developed by Ukrainian security services, slammed into the vessel's hull moments later, triggering a fireball that lit up the pink-hued sky.”
• “In response, Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged to expand strikes on Ukrainian ports and the vessels entering them. ‘The most radical option is to cut Ukraine off from the sea, then piracy in general will be impossible,’ Putin said on Tuesday.”
• Adi Imsirovic (University of Oxford): “That is the best strategy Ukraine has; they can hit the economy to put pressure on Russia in the negotiations.”
• Janis Kluge (German Institute for International and Security Affairs): “If Ukraine intensifies its attacks on shadow fleet tankers, it could choke off one of the most important shipping routes for Russian oil. This could lead to a decrease in export volumes and have a significant impact on the Russian budget.”
  “Ukraine has developed a potent fleet of long-range naval and aerial drones capable of striking Russian warships, ports and infrastructure deep in the Black Sea, offsetting its lack of traditional fleet power.”

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “In the Fight for Pokrovsk, Ukraine Is Down But Not Out,” Stavros Atlamazoglou, The National Interest, 12.05.25.
• “Ukraine’s AI-Driven Sky Sentinel Turret Is Rewriting Air Defense as We Know It,” Brandon J. Weichert, The National Interest, 12.03.25.

Military aid to Ukraine:

“Enough dithering. Europe must pay to save Ukraine,” The Economist, 12.03.25.

• The Economist notes relief after “Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, held lengthy talks about Ukraine with Vladimir Putin in Moscow—and not much happened,” with fears of “an odious stitch-up” for Ukrainian sovereignty somewhat receding as “some of the worst elements” of the Trump–Kremlin peace plan “have quietly been dropped.”
• The article warns that despite this, “Ukraine will need solid military and financial support for the foreseeable future, and it will have to come from Europe… it is still not clear that Europeans grasp this.”
• With Trump in the White House, “the $90bn–100bn it costs each year to support Ukraine’s war effort… must be shouldered by Europe alone,” since “the united front depended on the White House.
• Europe faces three strategic tasks: “to make Mr. Putin realise he cannot win,” to “reassure Ukraine,” and to “show the MAGA crew that Europe is not the feeble, freeriding bloc they say it is.”
• The article describes the EU’s ongoing “squabble over some €210bn ($245bn) of frozen Russian assets,” with plans for a “reparations loan to Ukraine” still stalled, and urges, “If Europe will not, or cannot, deploy the frozen assets, it must use its own balance sheet—soon. That means common borrowing.”
• The Economist concludes that Europe’s “current dribs-and-drabs approach is the opposite of strategic. It forces Ukraine to live from one donor meeting to the next; it encourages Mr Putin to wait the West out; and it offers ammunition to those in Mr. Trump’s inner circle who argue that Europe is incapable of serious statecraft.”

“Ukraine, Europe and the new economics of war,” Elina Ribakova, Financial Times, 12.06.25.

• “Ukraine’s experience since February 2022 has upended long-held assumptions about the economics of war — from the belief that size and industrial capacity are a guarantee of victory to misunderstandings about mobilization, logistics and adaptability,” the author writes.
• “Russia held advantages in key economic factors. Yet its autocratic regime has struggled to convert these strengths into military power. Western support — including capital, technology and intelligence — shifted the balance towards Ukraine; and Ukraine’s own macroeconomic resilience and innovative approach multiplied that effect,” the author argues. “The lesson is clear. Together, European financing and Ukrainian ingenuity can build an effective deterrent against external threats, even as the US pulls back.”
• “For Ukraine, alliances with the west have been decisive. The US, EU and other partners provide advanced weapons, intelligence, financial support, and deep political and economic integration. Western co-operation has reinforced Ukraine’s modernization and institutional reforms,” the author writes. “Russia, by contrast, relies on a much narrower set of economies — primarily China, Iran and North Korea — which supply drones, ammunition, people, cars and consumer goods but do so at a high political and financial cost.”
• “Ukraine has shown that with preparation and allied support, a smaller nation can hold off a much larger aggressor. Allied assistance has been crucial, in fostering reform and innovation, financing military aid and limiting Russia through sanctions, which raised costs for its military-industrial complex,” the author concludes.

“Biden’s Long Shadow Over Ukraine,” Adrian Karatnycky, Foreign Policy, 12.05.25.

• “To this day, [Russia’s] invasion [of Ukraine] has been largely shaped by the Biden administration’s decisions about when and how to arm Ukraine—and by the way the United States used military aid as leverage to constrain how Ukraine fights its war,” the author writes.
• “To be sure, Biden’s Ukraine legacy is not only negative. Without his administration’s substantial support and his successful efforts at shaping an international coalition to support Kyiv, Ukraine likely would not have held on to some 80 percent of its territory,” according to the author.
• “But the failings of the Biden team and its excessive caution in aiding Ukraine’s military should not escape honest appraisal. The first failing—a legacy of the Obama years, when Biden was vice president—was Biden’s refusal to significantly arm Ukraine over the course of the massive Russian military build-up on Ukraine’s borders that began in March 2021,” the author writes.
• “The Biden administration’s fears of nuclear escalation played a crucial role in shaping U.S. support in the years that followed. Aware of these fears, the Kremlin expertly stoked them with frequent threats—a textbook case of what Soviet-era strategists called ‘reflexive control,’ a kind of psychological warfare designed to shape an adversary’s thinking,” the author argues.
• “Biden’s shaping of Ukraine’s war lives on under Trump. And while the latter deserves some credit for his vigorous attempts to push for an end to the fighting, he is unlikely to succeed, as the bungled efforts of his envoy, Steve Witkoff, show. Reaching a lasting peace will require forcing Putin to the bargaining table,” the author concludes.

“Britain’s Economic and Military Dividend from Supporting Ukraine,” Maj. Laurence Thomson, RUSI, 12.05.25.

• “The question confronting British policymakers and the public is not whether Britain can afford to support Ukraine, but whether it can afford not to and risk the security environment that would result from a triumphant Russia,” Thomson writes.
• “Every pound invested in Ukraine today benefits Britain and potentially saves substantially larger expenditures later. These economic and military dividends justify Britain’s commitments not as altruism but as advancement of core national interests,” Thomson argues.
• “A £1.6 billion contract with Thales to manufacture lightweight multirole missiles in Belfast will support 700 existing jobs, whilst BAE Systems and Sheffield Forgemasters secured a £61 million contract to produce artillery barrels for the first time in almost two decades,” Thomson notes.
• “Ukraine functions as a proving ground for British equipment and doctrine under conditions impossible to replicate through exercises. Britain has trained over 60,000 Ukrainian personnel under Operation INTERFLEX, providing British instructors invaluable exposure to lessons from modern warfare’s operational realities,” Thomson states.
• “Every Russian tank destroyed in Ukraine, every Russian casualty, every Russian aircraft shot down diminishes the force potentially threatening British and European security in the future,” Thomson concludes.

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “How to Get Russia’s Billions to Ukraine,” James Stavridis, Bloomberg, 12.04.25.

Punitive measures related to Russia’s war against Ukraine and their impact globally:

• “EU puts Russia on financial blacklist,” Alexander Kolyandr and Alexandra Prokopenko, The Bell, 12.05.25.

Ukraine-related negotiations: 

“Putin Says Nyet Again to Trump,” Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal, 12.04.25.

• WSJ’s editors argue, “Maybe it’s time to conclude that Mr. Putin doesn’t want peace. He wants Ukraine,” after Trump’s envoys’ latest failed Moscow talks, which were termed “constructive” by the Kremlin but yielded no real progress.
• On Putin’s demands, they write, “The Russian wants to swallow the entire Donbas in Ukraine’s east and deny Ukraine the military and the security allies to protect itself in the future,” using negotiations more as a way to “drive a wedge between Mr. Trump and Europe.”
• The board notes, “For months Mr. Putin has refused Mr. Trump’s proposals for even a temporary cease-fire along the current battle lines, which Ukraine accepted.”
• Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery is quoted: “I don’t believe [the Ukrainians will] lose this on the ground on their own,” but warns the U.S. isn’t keeping up in weapons support and “selling arms to Europe isn’t making up the difference.”
• WSJ argues, “Mr. Putin won’t negotiate seriously as long as he thinks he has the upper hand,” calling for a pivot: “snatching Mr. Putin’s frozen assets; ramping up sanctions to include China; and delivering long-range missiles and other weapons to Ukraine.”

“America’s Magical Thinking About Ukraine: A Bad Deal Is Worse Than No Deal,” Sergey Radchenko, Foreign Affairs, 12.04.25.

• Radchenko emphasizes that Trump is “seemingly unwilling to accept that his Russian counterpart does not want to end the war without securing Ukraine’s complete surrender,” describing Trump’s efforts as “chasing a fantasy.”
• The initial U.S.-Russia “28-point peace plan” caused alarm in Kyiv and Europe because “it largely reflected Russian positions on territory and Ukraine’s future.”
• According to Radchenko, “both countries are losing this war. The question is which one will lose first. There is no reason to believe that Russia—still mired in the Donbas after four years—will suddenly achieve the battlefield breakthroughs that will lead to Kyiv’s immediate capitulation.”
• On Russian demands, Radchenko lists: “Putin’s conditions include Ukraine’s permanent neutrality… severe restrictions on the Ukrainian military… weak security guarantees that Russia can veto… [and] Ukraine’s withdrawal from the entirety of Donetsk oblast… He wants sanctions on Russia to be lifted, and for countries to drop any attempt to hold the Kremlin—and him personally—accountable for this war.”
• Radchenko warns, “Any premature peace settlement that undermines the prospects of Ukraine’s survival as a sovereign country and lets Russia get away with territorial aggression would fly against Western interests, to say nothing of Ukraine’s.”
• He argues, “The United States gains nothing from Ukraine capitulating to Russia. It’s quite the opposite… such American commitment will help Moscow reach the conclusion that this war is unwinnable, which may well lead to a real desire for peace.”
• On U.S. strategy, Radchenko concludes, “Deal-making is worthwhile only when those deals serve a clear and well-considered purpose. The United States should not be desperate to bring about a peace that benefits U.S. adversaries at the expense of U.S. allies and the United States itself.”

“Weak Spots Are Few for Russia in Ukraine Peace Talks,” Neil MacFarquhar, New York Times, 12.03.25.

• Macfarquhar reports that after five hours of U.S.-Russia peace talks, “no breakthroughs emerged,” with Putin “critical of the proposals” and asserting, “We are not planning to fight with Europe, but if Europe suddenly starts a war with us, we are ready.”
• Fiona Hill observes, “There are points where Putin’s probably feeling under pressure, but none of them have reached any kind of juncture that he feels he has to make a decision or has run out of options.”
• Despite Western sanctions and falling oil revenue—down 27% year-on-year—Macfarquhar notes, “Russia still pockets enormous sums from its energy industry,” and a real drop would require “much stronger sanctions,” especially on Russian sales to China.
• Clifford Kupchan warns, falling oil revenue is “likely to be a constant toothache that sets into the Russian war effort,” but only “sharply lower income” or a banking crisis might pressure Putin.
• On the battlefield, Russia continues a grinding war of attrition; Dmitri Kuznets, military analyst, says, “The pace of the offensive has been the same for the past year and will continue that way,” signaling no immediate shift in Russia’s approach or willingness to compromise.

“Trump Faces Choices on Russia-Ukraine Talks as Peace Deal Deadline Passes,” David E. Sanger and Anton Troianovski, New York Times, 12.03.25.

• After his peace deadline passed, Trump acknowledged, “It does take two to tango,” noting the difficulty of persuading both Russia and Ukraine while admitting, “I don’t know what the Kremlin is doing.”
• President Zelenskyy said Ukraine remains open to talks: “From Ukraine’s state, there will be no obstacles or delays,” but Putin “was not budging from his hard-line demands,” showing “no compromise option has yet been found on the territorial issue,” according to Putin adviser Yuri Ushakov.
• Secretary of State Marco Rubio described Putin’s position as determined: “‘It may take long—we are going to achieve our objectives’… that’s their mentality,” while adding the U.S. is trying to see if a deal “that protects Ukraine’s future” is possible, but “we’re not there yet.”
• Ukrainian officials insist Western guarantees are essential, with Zelenskyy stressing, “The most important thing is Europe’s effective involvement in our defense, and also in guaranteeing security after this war.”
• Analyst Jennifer Kavanagh said, “Any deal that ends the war is going to be painful and unfair. It still seems like we’re a long way from a set of terms that meets Russia’s minimum acceptable criteria and that is palatable enough to Ukraine that the United States can convince Kyiv to accept it.”

“What Could Make Russia Want Peace?” Neil MacFarquhar, New York Times, 12.03.25.

• Despite nearly five hours of recent U.S.-Russia peace talks, “no breakthroughs emerged” as Putin was openly critical of proposals and “even said he was willing to go to war with Ukraine’s European allies.”
• Analysts say that absent “serious pressure like stronger sanctions by the Trump administration, it comes down to the economy and the battlefield” to force Russia’s hand—yet neither is dire enough yet to give the U.S. real leverage.
• Russian oil and gas earnings fund the war but are down 27% year-on-year; however, “Russia still pockets enormous sums from its energy industry, despite Western efforts” and would need much tougher measures, like blocking sales to China, to make a real impact. • On the military front, Russian advances are “inch[ing] forward” at high human cost, with high soldier pay sustaining recruitment and Putin “seemingly fine with a grinding war of attrition.”
• Putin “has staked his legacy on the outcome of the war,” and continues to assert that “Russia is winning.” As one analyst summarized: “There are points where Putin’s probably feeling under pressure, but none…have reached any kind of juncture that he feels he has to make a decision or has run out of options.”

“The marketplace has superseded diplomacy in Ukraine talks,” Candace Rondeaux, Financial Times, 12.05.25.  

• Rondeaux warns, “The future of the Russia-Ukraine war increasingly looks like it will be negotiated not by diplomats and accountable governments, but by intermediaries, fixers and opportunists positioning themselves to profit from whatever settlement emerges.”
• She highlights Trump’s ad hoc envoys (including Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff) meeting with sanctioned Russian officials, where “discussions of a Kremlin-backed peace plan mixed politics with commercial possibilities—including a suggestion that U.S. firms might tap part of the $300 billion in frozen Russian assets as capital for joint ventures and postwar reconstruction.”
• Rondeaux notes that for Russian oligarchs like Gennady Timchenko and Yuri Kovalchuk, “a settlement isn’t likely to be about security architecture or territorial integrity—it’s about business potential,” observing, “the timing matters less than its commercial terms.”
• In Kyiv, the resignation of Andriy Yermak after corruption allegations is “a victory for Ukraine’s anti-graft institutions,” but also exemplifies an “asymmetry: Ukraine is transparent enough to pursue its own officials even as the war rages, while Russian intermediaries operate without scrutiny.”
• She argues, “Trump’s long, weird waltz with Putin—and his comfort operating through informal, transactional channels—has normalized the very system Ukraine is trying to escape,” leading to a “convergence around the strongman approach, where personal access matters more than institutional process.”
• Concludes that peace talks “negotiated through such channels will collapse. When Russia violates the terms—as it inevitably will—the intermediaries who brokered them will have already extracted their fees and moved on. Ukraine will be left with a worthless agreement and the west with an undesirable precedent: that territorial conquest can be monetized through well-connected brokers.”

“The Donbas region remains an intractable issue in talks between Russia and Ukraine,” Samir Puri, Chatham House, 12.05.25.

• The Donbas (Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts) remains the “intractable” issue in Russia-Ukraine negotiations: Luhansk is nearly fully occupied by Russia, while Donetsk is split and a major battleground, according to Puri.
• Putin’s stated goal is “fully capturing the Donbas,” but Russian forces have only made “incremental gains” and have not matched rhetoric with military results, especially in Donetsk, Puti wrote.
• Trump’s original 28-point plan reflected Russian aims by requiring Ukraine to withdraw from currently held Donbas territory—a demand rejected by Ukraine, which is “bitterly opposed” to ceding ground and argues it would expose their defense lines.
• Russia rejects a ceasefire along the current front; “however slowly—Russian forces are advancing,” so Putin is confident and won’t compromise, while Ukraine has lost hope of fully retaking all occupied land by military means, according to Puri.
• Puri predicts a “de-facto division of Ukraine seems likely” even in the best case; he compares it to Cyprus’s enduring partition—where most of the world never recognized Turkish-occupied land, but practical workarounds emerged, and international partners adapted to the reality.

“Putin’s Threats Against Europe Undermine Russia-Ukraine Peace Talks,” Alexandra Sharp, Foreign Policy, 12.02.25.

• Russian President Putin met with U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Moscow to discuss a proposed peace deal for Ukraine; critics say Witkoff is “too accommodating to Russia.”
• The original U.S.-Russia 28-point framework, drafted without Ukrainian involvement, “included restrictions on Kyiv’s military, ceded some Ukrainian territory to Russia, and barred Kyiv from ever joining NATO.” A revised 19-point framework now “excludes several of these demands.
• • Putin publicly accused Kyiv’s European allies of “trying to undermine the peace process with counterproposals,” and ridiculed Western suggestions as “absolutely unacceptable to Russia.”
• EU foreign-policy chief Kaja Kallas warned, “If Russia’s army is big, if their military budget is as big as it is right now, they will want to use it again,” echoing concerns that a weak peace deal would invite more aggression and threaten NATO membersю
• European officials have been sidelined from the current U.S.-Russia talks, which—along with Putin’s repeated threats and continued advances in Ukraine—has “weakened faith in the peace process.”

“Trump Peace Plan for Ukraine will Consign Europe to Peril and Contempt,” Tim Willasey-Wilsey, RUSI, 12.02.25.

• Willasey-Wilsey argues, “Acquiescence to a bad deal for Ukraine will expose Europe to future security peril and to near-irrelevancy in global foreign affairs. No U.S. backstop can be trusted.”
• He critiques the “sheer absurdity of the 28-point plan which the Americans claimed to be their own creation,” noting it “clearly had its origins in Moscow” and represents a “sucker punch by Washington… to President Zelenskyy.”
• “Europe, of course, had to pretend to take the negotiations seriously. Not to have done so would have enraged Trump and risked retaliatory action… By appeasing the U.S. President since January 2025 the Europeans have become his prisoners,” he writes.
• The article warns, “A poor deal for Ukraine will be bad for Europe in three ways: Russia will likely ‘come back for more’… Moscow will expect more from future European leaders… [and] China and the U.S. will not take Europe seriously as a global power bloc.”
• Willasey-Wilsey cautions, “If Europe ascribes any credence to an American guarantee to provide a kinetic backstop to any agreement then the cycle of self-delusion will be complete… agreement will be taken as a signal to reduce actual defense readiness—beyond a performative percentage figure designed only to appease Trump.”

“Putin’s Choice: Peter the Great or Steve Witkoff,” Gerard Baker, Wall Street Journal, 12.01.25.

• Baker writes, “An old Kremlin joke about Vladimir Putin is that the Russian president has only three trusted advisers: Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great and Catherine the Great.
• I was reminded of the modern czar’s historically animated ambitions by a report in the news pages of the Journal last week. U.S. and Russian negotiators are making diplomatic efforts to end the Ukraine war by establishing the basis for a lasting and mutually beneficial economic relationship between the former Cold War rivals. “
• ““Make money, not war” was the gist of the offer the Russian government apparently pitched to President Trump. We can hazard a well-informed guess how our president responded to that proposition. But there’s a problem. It is not only that we Americans should all feel revulsion at the idea that some free nation’s sovereignty can be violently extinguished as long as we receive a cut of the action. It is that for Ukraine, Europe, the U.S. and the Russian leader too, making money and making war aren’t and never have been mutually exclusive activities,” Baker writes.
• “It’s a beguiling idea: peace through commerce,” Baker writes in reference to Witkoff’s views on the peace talks.
• Baker concludes: “In the end kleptocrats are going to do what kleptocrats always do. For Americans, making money with Russia in the hope of making peace would be a time-tested mistake. But helping to make money for Russia while it pursues its aims of undermining Western freedom and American leadership would be a crime.”Top of Form

“Vladimir Putin answered media questions,” Kremlin.ru, 12.02.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• On Pokrovsk: “This city has indeed been given special importance… because it is not just a major infrastructure site that is part of the network of regional transport links. Most importantly… it is a good bridgehead for accomplishing all the objectives set at the beginning of the special military operation… Today, it is fully in the hands of the Russian army, as the commander of the Centre group of forces reported not long ago.”
• On Kupyansk: “Kupyansk has been effectively under our control for several weeks, completely and in its entirety… Russian troops control both the right-bank and left-bank areas, entirely… An enemy force of 15 battalions is blocked on the left bank of the river. Russian troops have begun eliminating it.”
• On peace talks and Europe: “They [the Europeans] are insulted by what they perceive as their exclusion from the negotiations. However, I must note that no one has excluded them. They have excluded themselves… they abruptly cut off contact with Russia. That was their initiative… Now, seeing that the outcome does not please them either, they have begun to sabotage the efforts of the current United States administration and President Trump to achieve peace through negotiation… all their amendments are directed towards one single aim: to completely obstruct this entire peace process, to put forward demands that are utterly unacceptable to Russia… and thereby subsequently to place the blame for the collapse of the peace process upon Russia. That is their objective.”
• On potential war with Europe: “We are not planning to go to war against Europe. I have said that a hundred times. But if Europe wants to wage a war against us and suddenly starts a war with us, we are ready. There should be no doubt about that… The only question is if Europe suddenly starts a war against us… we will be left with no one to negotiate with.”
• On Black Sea and tanker attacks: “What the Ukrainian armed forces are doing now is piracy… First, we will expand the range of our strikes against port infrastructure and ships that enter Ukrainian ports… The most radical option would be to cut Ukraine off from the sea. Then piracy would be impossible in principle. But these are the things to think about if other measures fail.”

“The Middle East’s moment of opportunity is slipping away,” David Ignatius, Washington Post, 12.03.25. 

• “Trump is now trying to broker a desperately needed Ukraine peace agreement. But his credibility as an omnidirectional mediator will be enhanced if he can demonstrate that he not only announces projects with fanfare but gets them done.”

“Trump’s Russia–Ukraine Diplomacy Is Good. Here’s How It Could Be Better,” Andrew Day, The American Conservative, 12.05.25.

• President Donald Trump’s Russia–Ukraine diplomacy has sparked much criticism. Typically, the critics who grab the most attention are those who accuse the White House of being “pro-Russian.” Given this one-sided political discourse… I reached out to four U.S.-based experts and one former Zelensky aide, all of whom take what I consider a balanced, pragmatic view of the conflict.
• The U.S.-based experts’ insights collectively pertain to three obstacles to settling the war: 1) The Trump administration’s failure, at least early on, to assemble a dedicated negotiating team; 2) obstructionist Russia hawks in Washington (including at the White House) and in Europe who oppose any peace deal that Moscow might accept; and 3) the inherent difficulties of resolving the war given the gulf between Russia’s and Ukraine’s negotiating positions.
• Experts emphasized or at least alluded to the absence of a well-coordinated U.S. negotiating team that could do the long, difficult work of conflict diplomacy… But the failure to assemble a strong negotiating team may have derived, in part, from external political pressures, according to the Quincy Institute’s George Beebe, a former director of Russia analysis at the CIA. Beebe pointed to “Russiagate,” the scandal from Trump’s first term in which the president was falsely accused of colluding with Moscow to steal the 2016 election.
• The experts pointed to Europe as an obstacle to the Trump administration’s peace efforts. Ashford said that most European capitals believe Ukraine can get a better deal later (so it should resist an ugly deal now). All the experts were attentive to serious difficulties of resolving the war… Lieven pointed to Russian demands that he said are nonstarters for Kiev and Europe, namely, “withdrawal from the remainder of the Donbas [eastern region] still held by Ukraine; a formal ban on Ukrainian NATO membership; and an explicit ban on Western troops in Ukraine.”
• Ashford identified an even more fundamental dispute: “Russia still does not recognize Ukraine as a fully sovereign country, and Ukraine wants its territory back, along with the freedom to pursue its own foreign policy.” 

“Why Peace in Ukraine Remains a Distant Prospect,” Ian Bremmer, Project Syndicate, 12.04.25.

• “[D]espite the flurry of diplomatic activity, the odds of a ceasefire remain slim. We are unlikely to see one within weeks, or even within months. The reason is straightforward: Russia and Ukraine still have fundamentally incompatible goals, and neither side has found sufficient reason to compromise,” the author writes.
• “Even if he was so inclined, a politically vulnerable Zelensky cannot support a deal that smells like capitulation, and which his own people and military would overwhelmingly oppose,” according to the author.
• “For its part, Russia knows that it holds the stronger position and is not trying to reach terms that Ukraine might accept. In fact, President Vladimir Putin isn’t trying to end the war at all, because he believes he can achieve better outcomes on the battlefield than at the negotiating table,” the author argues.
• “But Putin’s strategy has limits. Trump has already shown he can turn on Russia, too. … The other limit to Putin’s strategy is that Trump no longer controls Ukraine's lifeline. The US is selling weapons and providing intelligence, but European countries are now fully bankrolling Ukraine’s war effort. That considerably diminishes Washington’s leverage over Kyiv,” the author notes.
• “So, the war will grind through another round of failed talks, another winter, and probably another spring … Peace will come eventually – but only when the battlefield and material circumstances force it. It won’t come from Trump’s current diplomatic push, no matter how many deadlines he sets,” the author concludes.

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “A Ukraine deal would be peace in name only: podcast,” Aimee Donnellan and Jonathan Guilford, Reuters, 12.03.25.
• “Assessing the Current Peace Deal for Ukraine: Opportunity or Strategic Trap?” Sergiy Tsivkach and Romina Bandura, CSIS, 12.05.25.
• “Trump’s Ukraine Peace Plan Means More War,” Project Syndicate Commentators, Project Syndicate, 12.04.25.
• “Transactional Diplomacy Cannot Bring Peace to Ukraine,” Oleksandra Matviichuk and Michael O’Flaherty, Project Syndicate, 12.04.25.

Great Power rivalry/new Cold War/NATO-Russia relations:

“Ukraine Is Still Worth Fighting For,” Bret Stephens, New York Times, 12.02.25.

• Stephens argues that Ukraine’s open corruption investigation—leading even to the resignation of Zelenskyy’s chief of staff—shows accountability, writing “A nation that can investigate its leaders even as it fights for its existence is one worth defending.”
• He describes Trump’s peace team (Witkoff and Kushner) as “authors, with the Putin negotiator Kirill Dmitriev, of a 28-point plan…a Ukraine surrender document,” which The Wall Street Journal reported was essentially an economic bargain to divide Europe and reshape alliances.
• Stephens rejects the notion of “peace through business”: “If Putin were interested in peace and prosperity between Russia and the West, he would have pursued both over his quarter-century in power. But Putin does not want coexistence. He wants dominance, even at the cost of the one million casualties his forces have reportedly suffered so far.”
• He warns, “The significant danger now is that Putin will agree, conditionally, to some sort of Trump-endorsed ‘peace plan,’ putting unbearable diplomatic pressure on Kyiv to accept it,” with risks of fracturing Ukraine and NATO, reviving Russia’s economy, and repeating the broken security promises of 1994.
• Stephens’ broader warning: “The era of Pax Americana may soon be drawing to a close. From then on it will be every region, or country, for itself… For a sense of how to fight, look no further than the Ukrainians whom we abandon at our peril and to our shame.”

“Superpower Competition: The Missing Chapter in Trump’s Security Strategy,” David E. Sanger, New York Times, 12.07.25.

• “The last time President Trump issued a national security strategy, eight years ago, it heralded a return to superpower competition, describing China and Russia as ‘revisionist’ powers seeking to upend American dominance around the world,” Sanger writes.
• “Eight years later, that diagnosis seems truer than ever. … Yet a reader of Mr. Trump’s 2025 strategy would barely know any of that. … [W]hat is most striking about the 33-page document is what it ignores,” Sanger argues.
• “Russia is mentioned in only four paragraphs, and never in tones of condemnation for its invasion of a neighboring state … Instead, it portrays the United States as something of a neutral negotiator that can diminish tensions between Russia and Europe and ‘reestablish strategic stability’ with Moscow,” Sanger writes.
• “The document argues for a quick end to the Ukraine war, on terms that would preserve a Ukrainian state, as a way of achieving that ill-defined ‘strategic stability’ between the United States and Russia,” Sanger notes. “And even though more pages of the document are focused on China than on any other nation, it dwells far more on the commercial relations than the strategic competition.”
• “‘Nor is there mention of the fact that the E.U. and NATO countries have been critical partners with us in sanctioning Beijing for its support for Russia in Ukraine, on Taiwan and on human rights — on our side of the strategic competition,’ [Nicholas Burns] added. ‘In fact, strangely and falsely, there is more condemnation in the report of our European allies than our adversaries China and Russia.”

“The West’s Last Chance: How to Build a New Global Order Before It’s Too Late,” Alexander Stubb, Foreign Affairs, 12.02.25.

• Stubb argues, “Russia’s full-scale war of aggression in Ukraine in February 2022 dealt another body blow to the old order. It was one of the most blatant violations of the rules-based system since the end of World War II and certainly the worst Europe had seen.” He underscores the significance that “the culprit was a permanent member of the UN Security Council… States that were supposed to uphold the system brought it crashing down.”
• He warns against any “Finlandization” solution for ending the war in Ukraine, stating, “Such a peace would come at too great a cost, what would effectively be the surrender of sovereignty and territory.” Stubb insists retaining independence and defending territorial integrity must be non-negotiable principles for Ukraine and the West.
• Stubb asserts that the current contest between “the global West” and “the global East,” led by China and including Russia, centers on influencing the direction of the global South and the world order, noting, “The global West and the global East are fighting for the hearts and minds of the global South.”
• He calls for reform of postwar institutions to address abuses like Russia’s aggression, proposing among other changes, “if a permanent or rotating member of the Security Council violates the UN Charter, its membership in the UN should be suspended. This would mean that the body would have suspended Russia after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.”
• Stubb concludes that the world stands at a turning point: “Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine marks the beginning of yet another change in the world order,” and that the choice before all states is one “between a sphere-of-influence system like Yalta’s and a multilateral system like Helsinki’s.” Stubb argues the West must act now: “This is our last chance.”

“Trump’s Push to End the Ukraine War Is Sowing Fresh Fear About NATO’s Future,” Bertrand Benoit and David Luhnow, Wall Street Journal, 12.01.25.

• “A leaked peace plan and transcripts of a call between Witkoff and a top Kremlin foreign-policy aide have left many with the impression that the Trump administration is more interested in improving ties and economic cooperation with Russia than defending the trans-Atlantic alliance.”
• The 28-point plan “treated Russia as a clear winner and Ukraine as the loser, forcing Kyiv to give up strategic land it hasn’t yet lost, shrink its military and leave it without an ironclad guarantee of protection from either the U.S. or European allies should Russia rearm and come back for more.”
• Carlo Masala, Bundeswehr University, calls it a “Versailles treaty, except one that punishes the victim and rewards the aggressor.” Retired U.S. Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges says, “the reason Trump disregards Europe is because he sees Europe as being inconsequential.”
• Emily Ferris (RUSI) says, “Europe sees Russia rearming and is worried about the next war. The Americans are thinking much more short-term—let’s get this process over the line—cease-fire deal, get Ukraine back on its feet and cobble together some sort of cold peace for another year or two.”
• Analyst Ed Arnold (RUSI) warns, “The U.S.’s latest peace plan would go a long way toward dividing NATO, by proposing what would amount to an amnesty for Russia for the invasion… Politically, Russia is on the cusp of winning.”

“Ukraine War: The EU Is the Wrong Vehicle for European Power,” Marc Champion, Bloomberg, 12.02.25.

• Champion writes that “Europe’s shock at a much more recent, U.S.-Russian plan for Ukraine stems—for all the obvious differences between the two documents—from one critical similarity: Two major military powers are once again colluding to carve up the continent for their mutual benefit,” evoking parallels to the 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.
• He argues “the Trump administration wasn’t interested so much in negotiating a peace deal for Ukraine as in resetting U.S.-Russia relations at the expense of Kyiv and its European backers,” and says the U.S.-Russian 28-point proposal reveals this intent.
• Champion contends, “The honest answer is ‘No.’” when it comes to whether the EU can become a geopolitical player able to hold its own against Russia, China, and the U.S., pointing out the bloc “lacks the ability to project significant amounts of hard power.”
• He warns, “Europe has no choice but to make the leap if it isn’t to become a seal among killer whales, tossed and torn apart as if for sport,” urging European nations to pursue “hard power foreign policy… within NATO when possible and by bespoke coalitions when not.”
• Champion concludes that the most urgent task for Europe is “to recognize Putin’s Russia as such a threat and unite around a common strategy to deal with it,” even if this means “circumventing EU mechanisms for internal conflict resolution… to keep the peace internally, while at the same time projecting power abroad.”

“Europe is going on a huge military spending spree,” The Economist, 12.01.25.

• The Economist notes European governments are “caught between Russian aggression and American unreliability” and are responding with unprecedented defense initiatives, including the EU’s €150bn SAFE fund and the National Escape Clause, which “could unlock a further €650bn of military spending.”
• At NATO’s June summit, “European members committed to raise spending by 2035 from 2% of GDP to 3.5% on ‘core’ military budgets, plus a further 1.5% on defense-related infrastructure.”
• Analyst Bastian Giegerich cautions, “although Russia’s economy is only around a tenth the size of Europe’s, in purchasing-parity terms it will have spent as much as the whole of European NATO this year” and warns that “Russia could pose a direct threat to Europe as soon as 2027.”
• The article highlights Europe’s urgent priorities: “step up support for Ukraine now that America has withdrawn… restore Europe’s own combat formations… and [replace] those capacities for which Europe still depends on America.”
• The Economist concludes that “Europe clearly has the financial, technological and industrial muscle to do what’s needed. The question is whether it has the political will.”

“Europe’s fateful moment,” Edward Luce, Financial Times, 12.05.25.

• “People often wonder how cash-strapped Russia could so easily intimidate Europe. The answer is willpower. Russia is ruled by a ravenous carnivore. Europe is a pasture of well-fed herbivores,” Luce writes.
• “When it comes to decision-making edge, Vladimir Putin’s single-mindedness outweighs the combined wealth of the EU plus Britain and Norway. They add up to roughly 10 times Russia’s GDP,” according to Luce.
• “Unlocking the money to fund Ukraine for the next two or three years would change the weather,” Luce argues.
• “Among Witkoff’s 28 points was the stipulation that America would mediate security talks between Russia and Nato…Another of the document’s points specified that ‘$100bn in frozen Russian assets will be invested in U.S.-led efforts to rebuild and invest in Ukraine; the U.S. will receive 50 per cent of the profits from this venture’,” Luce notes.
• “Europe has run out of excuses to pretend otherwise. The end of self-deception is staring Europe in the face,” Luce concludes.

“Europe Wants Endless War in Ukraine. Trump Should Walk Away,” Doug Bandow, Cato Institute, 12.01.25.

• Bandow argues the original Trump administration 28-point peace plan was “an ugly plan from Kyiv’s perspective, but it was realistic—a serious effort to end the conflict,” yet was rejected by “hysterical opposition” from Europe, which only wants to keep “American dollars and weapons flowing.”
• According to Bandow, European leaders “launched yet another lobbying campaign,” but “offered no realistic program to sustain Kyiv,” nor “an accelerated continental defense program,” and their rhetoric is “reduced to whiny sanctimony.”
• He claims most European governments “simply want to keep the war going, irrespective of the cost to the Ukrainian people, apparently to weaken Russia,” and this “ensures a return to the default setting of a protracted, endless war.”
• Bandow asserts, “If European governments are truly committed to a Ukrainian victory, then they should enter the war,” arguing “it is Europe’s hour: Britain, France and Germany must assume responsibility for the defense of the continent.”
• He concludes, “Instead of embarrassing Uncle Sam by offering another botched peace plan, the Trump administration should turn the issue over to Ukraine and Europe. Then they can decide on their futures. And bear the full cost of doing so.”

“The ‘Useful Idiots’ From America Whom Putin Is Playing Like a Flute,” Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times, 12.04.25.

• Friedman argues Trump and his envoys “are failing and will continue to fail as long as they persist in their naïve view that this is just a big real estate deal,” warning, “Putin is in the real estate business in Ukraine the same way Hitler was in the real estate business in Poland.”
• On U.S. policy, Friedman writes, “I can think of no other American president who would have acted as if America’s values and interests dictated that we now be a neutral arbiter between Russia and Ukraine and, on top of that, an arbiter who tries to make a profit from each side in the process—as Trump has done,” calling this “one of the most shameful episodes in American foreign policy.”
• Criticizing Trump’s posture, he notes: “He has halted all U.S. funding for Ukraine to buy U.S. arms, he has refused to give it access to crucial weapons… and he has baldface lied that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that started the war.”
• Friedman explains the difference between possible settlements: “There is a huge difference between a ‘filthy deal’ that maximizes Putin’s interests, profits and ability to restart the war at any point of his choosing, and a ‘dirty deal’” that secures Western interests and real deterrence.
• He concludes, “The Russian threat to Ukraine will not end until Putin is gone. But getting rid of him is the job of the Russian people. The job of an American president… is to increase the pressure on Putin by, among other things, telling the Russian people—every day—that their leader is stealing all their cards and all of their futures and all of their children’s futures.”

“Tragedy of the West: Sacrificing Ukraine and the Rules-Based Order,” Ariana Gic, Marko Mikhelson and Roman Sohn, RUSI, 12.03.25.

• The authors argue the West’s reluctance to match rhetoric with action emboldened Russia: “The result of Russia's war of aggression is a product of the ambivalence of the West, which by turns supported Ukraine's defense… and refused to escalate its response to a level consistent with the threat Russia poses. The rules-based order is at stake, and Ukraine stands alone in its defense.”
• Trump’s ultimatum for Kyiv to “accept a 28-point framework for Ukraine’s surrender to Russia” is, they write, “legitimizing Russia’s unprovoked, illegal aggression” and rewards the aggressor “while a smaller nation must be punished for its resistance with humiliating concessions.”
• The West’s appeasement, including continued trade, energy partnership, and lack of justice for Russian crimes, “has emboldened authoritarian regimes” and “is now being dismantled before our eyes.”
• They contend Russia’s war is not just about territory: “It is a war of annihilation, genocide, culturecide, linguicide and ecocide,” with Western hesitation dooming Ukraine to “endless destruction.”
• The authors call for robust action: “Ukraine stands as the last warrior on the battlefield, fighting for the preservation of the liberal global order.” Recommended steps include confiscating Russian assets, embargoing Russia, arming Ukraine, prosecuting war crimes, and NATO/European military commitments—warning that “if Russia triumphs in Ukraine, it will set a precedent, encouraging wars of aggression elsewhere and paving the way for the anti-Western axis to expand its influence across Europe.”

“Interview with Aaj Tak and India Today TV channels,” Vladimir Putin, Kremlin.ru, 12.04.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• “Let me remind you: we were not the ones to start this war. The West egged Ukraine on and supported the events, orchestrating a coup d'état. That was the point that triggered the events in Crimea, followed by developments in southeastern Ukraine, in Donbass,” Putin said.
• “Our special military operation isn't the start of a war, but rather an attempt to end one that the West ignited using Ukrainian nationalists. That's what is really happening now. That’s the crux of the problem,” Putin asserted.
• “We will finish it when we achieve the goals set at the beginning of the special military operation—when we free these territories. That's all,” Putin stated.
• “Now they have pretty much fought themselves into a corner, all this boils down to one thing: either we take back these territories by force, or eventually Ukrainian troops withdraw and stop killing people there,” Putin declared.
• "We are indeed one of the biggest ‘movers,’ as you have noted. Speaking seriously, we are not ‘movers,’ we are producers of the world’s most advanced and reliable equipment for nuclear power plants… The Russian company Rosatom builds and operates more nuclear reactors for nuclear power plants abroad than any other company in the world," Putin noted on nuclear cooperation…
• "Russia is probably the only country in the world today capable of building—and actually does build—small nuclear power plants. Such plants are already operational in Russia, and we can make them either floating or ground-based," Putin added.

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “‘You can’t turn Trump into Biden’: Europe needs a new approach in 2026,” Giuseppe Spatafora, EUISS, 12.03.25.
• “Europe’s New Lines of Defense Are Not Maginot 2.0,” Sam Rosenberg, War on the Rocks, 12.02.25.
• “National Cohesion: A Key Element for European ­Resilience Against the Russian Threat,” Stefan Meister and Toms Rostoks, German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), 12.03.25.
• “Donald Trump’s National Security Strategy Takes Aim at Europe,” Marek Magierowski, The National Interest, 12.05.25.
• “If you think Putin is threatening Europe with war, you're not imagining things,” Alexander Shulga, The Moscow Times, 12.07.25. (In Russian.)
• “A line in the sand moment for Europe and the U.S.,” Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 12.07.25.
• “The NSS That Could Destroy the NATO Alliance,” Max Bergmann, CSIS, 12.05.25.

China-Russia: Allied or aligned?

• No significant developments.

Missile defense:

“The Shield and the Sword: The Impact of Ballistic Missile Defense on Missile Proliferation,” Stéphane Delory and Emmanuelle Maitre, The Foundation for Strategic Research, November 2025.

• “In Israel and in Ukraine, major ballistic missile attacks have led to the large-scale use of missile defense, demonstrating its strengths and limitations in protecting military assets and populations from the effects of missile strikes,” the authors write.
• “This massive use of missile strikes on the ground, on the one hand, and the deterioration of strategic relations between major powers, on the other, are leading to a renewed interest in the acquisition of missile defense,” according to the authors.
• “However, the spread and increased capacity of missile defense is also playing a role in missile proliferation. Indeed, countries operating missile forces are incentivized to increase their arsenals in the hopes of overcoming defensive architectures. Missiles are also becoming more sophisticated to avoid interception. Finally, the development of missile defense is leading to a negative spiral regarding the militarization of space,” according to the authors.
• “Arms control may be used to mitigate these dynamics, but it faces many challenges. Non-proliferation tools can be useful but limited, as many of the countries fielding missiles today are also involved in producing them. Confidence-building measures may play a role in restricting destabilizing behaviors in space and limiting misunderstandings linked to the deployment of missile defense assets,” the authors write.

Nuclear arms:

“Getting the Most Out of New START Before It Expires,” Rose Gottemoeller, Arms Control Today, December 2025.

• Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov claims that President Putin’s proposal to extend New START limits for a year past 2026 “contains no hidden agenda and is perfectly clear for understanding. Its practical implementation would not require any special additional efforts. Therefore, we do not consider it necessary to hold in-depth discussions on this proposal… So far, there has been no substantive response from Washington.”
• Gottemoeller observes, “Putin’s proposal does not require any negotiation. Both Putin and Trump could simply declare their intention to continue to abide by the New START limits: 1,550 warheads, 700 delivery vehicles, 800 launchers… This handshake arrangement could hold until one side declared its intention to leave the limits, or started building up beyond the agreed numbers and the other side noticed through its national technical means of verification.”
• She argues that “while the treaty remains in force, both presidents can actually do better than that… both sides resume implementation measures and do so quickly. This would allow each party to have up-to-date knowledge about the status of the other’s strategic nuclear forces when the treaty does go out of force in just over two months’ time.”
• On technical feasibility, she writes, “The two sides would not have to negotiate; they only have to flip the implementation switch back on. Both countries have a legal obligation under the treaty to fulfill these measures which are clearly laid out in treaty protocols and procedures.”
• Gottemoeller asserts, “For the United States, the benefit of this move would be buying more time to decide what to do about the ongoing Chinese buildup without having to worry simultaneously about new Russian deployments.”
• She recommends proactive engagement on emerging threats, stating, “Russia and the United States have crucial questions to wrestle with… including what to do about the proliferation of drones and missiles at all ranges. One approach would be to ban nuclear weapons on missiles and drones in the short to intermediate ranges.”
• Concluding, Gottemoeller stresses, “Exercising the treaty now—while it remains in existence—is a positive and achievable step. And it does not require negotiation, just the flip of a policy switch.”

“Trump’s Nuclear Test Rhetoric and Reality,” Daryl G. Kimball, Arms Control Today, 12.02.25.

• Kimball calls Trump’s Oct. 30 nuclear testing proposal “confusing, counterproductive, and dangerous,” arguing that “the United States has no technical, military, or political reason to resume nuclear explosive testing for the first time in 33 years.”
• “U.S. nuclear explosive testing would violate the country’s legal obligation as a CTBT signatory and undermine the technical and political basis for the U.S. stockpile stewardship program,” Kimball writes.
• Kimball warns, “A resumption of explosive nuclear testing would trigger a global chain reaction of nuclear testing that would raise tensions and blow apart the nuclear nonproliferation system at a time of growing nuclear danger.”
• He notes, “In the United States, opposition to nuclear testing is strong and growing,” citing Nevada’s bipartisan resolution in support of the moratorium and a University of Maryland poll showing “75% of Americans support the global nuclear test moratorium.”
• “If Trump is allowed to follow through on his nuclear testing threat, it would severely damage global security and turn the United States into a nuclear rogue state,” Kimball concludes.

“Tried and tested: Why the CTBT must be preserved,” Protecting the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty project, European Leadership Network, December 2025.

• “This new policy brief from the ELN’s Protecting the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty project argues that sustaining the CTBT is a strategic imperative. The treaty reinforces the NPT by bolstering the nuclear non-proliferation norm and constraining the development of new nuclear warhead types. Undermining the CTBT would deepen divisions among NPT state parties, increase mistrust between Nuclear-Weapon States, and negatively impact long-term international security,” the authors write.
• “There are concrete steps that can be taken to preserve and reinforce the test-ban regime, including:
  • All NPT Nuclear-Weapon States should refrain from a resumption of nuclear weapons tests. They should maintain and publicly reaffirm their unilateral testing moratoria while pursuing early ratification of the CTBT.
  • EU and NATO States should ensure consistent and resolute support for the anti-test norm, emphasizing that any nuclear weapons test, by any actor, would trigger a unified and robust response.
  • All NPT states should reaffirm the CTBT’s centrality to the NPT, use all possible diplomatic channels to promote ratification of the CTBT, strengthen their political and financial support for the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), and support remediation measures and assistance for communities affected by nuclear testing.”

Counterterrorism:

• No significant developments.

Conflict in Syria:

• No significant developments.

Cyber security/AI: 

• No significant developments.

Energy exports from CIS:

“Ukraine Risks Alienating Allies With Oil Infrastructure Attacks,” Sergey Vakulenko, Carnegie Politika, 12.08.25.

• “For Ukrainian commanders tasked with reducing Russia’s oil export revenue, the CPC [Caspian Pipeline Consortium near the Russian port of Novorossiysk] might appear to be just another part of Russia’s oil infrastructure. However, damaging the CPC will cause more problems for some of Ukraine’s allies than it will ever do for Russia,” the author writes.
• “The CPC exports both Russian and Kazakh oil. In 2024, Russian oil (produced in the North Caucasus) accounted for just 15 percent of the pipeline’s daily throughput of 1.2 million barrels. The rest is Kazakh oil pumped from the Central Asian state’s largest oilfields,” according to the author.
• “If the CPC were to stop working entirely … that would cost Russia an additional $600–$650 million a year. That is not insignificant, but it is far less than the approximately $27 billion a year that Astana and the Western firms operating in Kazakhstan would lose,” the author argues.
• “It’s already clear that Western energy firms from countries allied with Ukraine are not happy about what is unfolding. The lobbying power of international oil companies is significant, and is already being directed toward convincing Kyiv to stop its attacks on the CPC,” the author writes.
• “Perhaps Kyiv is trying to make other countries feel the consequences of the war, and, by doing so, push them into making more of an effort to help achieve peace. However, there’s no guarantee that the affected countries will push for a just peace, rather than simply a rapid end to the fighting,” the author concludes.

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Why Ukraine’s Oil Attacks on Russia Aren’t Helping Much,” Brandon J. Weichert, The National Interest, 12.05.25.

Climate change:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian economic ties:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian relations in general:

“Evolving Comparsion of U.S. National Security Strategy (NSS) 2022 AND 2025,” RM Staff, RM, 12.05.25.

“Trump’s United States of the Americas,” Richard Haass, Project Syndicate, 12.08.25.

• “Russia gets off easy [in the NSS-2025]. It is not treated as an adversary. The push for peace in Ukraine is unconditional. And Russian President Vladimir Putin will take comfort in the stated goal of reestablishing ‘strategic stability with Russia’ and in what is said about NATO, namely, that the time has come to end ‘the perception, and prevent the reality, of NATO as a perpetually expanding alliance,’” the author writes.
• “One could be forgiven for reading the strategy document as an implicit embrace of spheres of influence. The US will have the lead in the Western Hemisphere, Russia and the EU will be left to sort it out in Europe, and China will have a large say in Asia’s future so long as it doesn’t go too far. The document doesn’t mince words here: ‘The outsized influence of larger, richer, and stronger nations is a timeless truth of international relations,’” according to the author.
• “Russia and China will find opportunity here while traditional friends and allies in Europe and Asia will experience greater risk and face difficult choices. The only certainty is that a historical era is ending, and a new one is beginning,” the author concludes.

“Trump’s Power Paradox,” Michael Kimmage, Foreign Affairs, 12.08.25.

• “The document [NSS-2025]  is at its weakest when addressing the war in Ukraine. Part of its problem is theoretical. In some passages, the document defines ‘stopping regional conflicts' as a U.S. responsibility. In this view, Washington must prevent any one antagonist (meaning Russia or China) from achieving a position of regional dominance. The war in Ukraine should be Europeanized so that Europe can police its own region and keep Russia from exerting outsize influence beyond its borders,” Kimmage writes.
• “Elsewhere, however, the strategy recognizes ‘the outsize influence of larger, richer, and stronger nations,’ describing their influence as a ‘timeless truth of international relations.’ Some countries are entitled to preeminence, and Russia may be one of these countries. But regional stability in Ukraine and elsewhere will not arise from spheres of influence created by a handful of great powers,” Kimmage argues.
• “The strategy advances the search for ‘strategic stability with Russia’ and blames European elites for standing in the way of peace. It assumes Ukraine will survive the war but is silent about Ukrainian security (apart from predicting that Ukraine will not join the NATO alliance) and about Ukraine’s integration into Europe,” Kimmage writes.
• “The document does not acknowledge that Ukraine could lose the war, which is a real possibility, and it skirts a fundamental dilemma for the United States, which is that strategic stability with Russia can be realized only by giving Russia some degree of control over Ukraine. Yet were Russia to acquire such control, it would destabilize NATO and non-NATO European countries,” Kimmage argues.
• “On Ukraine, the new strategy does little more than make assertions, many of them too sanguine about what the country needs to survive and too credulous about Russia’s potential to serve as a constructive regional actor. The strategy document contends that peace might be at hand in Ukraine, if only Europe’s elites can be bypassed. This understates the conflict’s stakes and in particular the risk of rewarding and thereby normalizing Russia’s zeal to control Ukraine,” Kimmage concludes.

“From Peacemaker to Clown: Trump in Ukrainian and Russian public opinion and in Kremlin discourse,” Elena Koneva, Re:Russia, 12.01.25.

• Early 2025 polling found “61% of Ukrainians and 78% of Russians” believed Trump could strongly influence a potential settlement, but this optimism quickly faded as “the ‘peacemaking process’ began to go in circles,” Elena Koneva writes.
• As Trump’s efforts stalled, “the share of [Russians] favoring the continuation of hostilities rose markedly from 32% to 42%,” showing his peace push ironically “expanded the constituency for continuing the conflict,” according to Koneva.
• The meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump “was perceived as demeaning both to Zelenskyy and to Ukraine as a whole… this turn of events triggered a noticeable radicalization of attitudes in favor of more militant positions,” she writes.
• In Ukraine, “before the Oval Office meeting, 40% of Ukrainians considered it possible to abandon offensive operations… After the meeting, this share fell to 33%, while the share of those insisting on the full liberation of all occupied territories rose from 49% to 57%.”
• The report notes “72% of Ukrainians and 43% of Russians surveyed” believed in early 2025 that Trump was “broadly on Russia’s side;” only “12% [of Ukrainians] and 20% [of Russians]” trusted Trump.
• Content analysis shows that Russian Telegram commentary generally reflected Kremlin cues: “when Trump’s statements aligned with Moscow’s agenda, the reaction was positive; as soon as he deviated, the tone sharply turned negative,” Koneva writes.
• Kremlin discourse promoted the idea of “a ‘bad, unreliable peace’—direct negotiations with Kyiv”—and a supposedly “fair, reliable peace” only possible “when two ‘truly responsible’ actors—Russia and the United States—decide Ukraine’s fate as an object,” according to Koneva.

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “The National Security Strategy: The Good, the Not So Great, and the Alarm Bells,” Emily Harding, CSIS, 12.05.25.
• “The Common-Sense Realism of the National Security Strategy,” Greg R. Lawson, The National Interest, 12.05.25.

II. Russia’s domestic policies 

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

"Russia Calling! Investment Forum," Vladimir Putin, Kremlin.ru, 12.02.25.Clues from Russian Views.

• Putin stressed Russia’s economic resilience, saying “our country and our economy are successfully tackling these challenges” from Western sanctions, and pledged to “continue to build a sovereign economic policy…based on our own national interests and needs.”
• Much of the speech emphasized Russia’s pivot to the “absolute majority” of countries acting “rationally and pragmatically,” citing expanded trade and cooperation—especially with China and India—across sectors like energy, tech, and agriculture.
• He noted macroeconomic stability: “We maintain a record-low unemployment rate of 2.2%,” inflation expected below 7%, and a public debt “below 20% of GDP—one of the lowest levels globally,” while forecasting GDP growth between 0.5–1% this year.
• Domestic financial reforms have enabled the banking sector to “fundamentally reconfigure,” halving external debt for real sector enterprises, and producing “a profit of approximately 3.2 to 3.5 trillion rubles” in 2025.
• Putin called for expanded investment—including foreign capital—via bond offerings, IPOs, sectoral reforms, and incentives for families and businesses to build long-term savings, concluding “Russia is open to cooperation with foreign businesses in trade, the real sector, and the stock market”—despite “external pressure.”

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Russia’s Banks vs. Oligarch-Backed E-Commerce Giants,” Denis Kasyanchuk, The Bell, 12.02.25.
• “A strange rise in productivity,” Alexander Kolyandr and Alexandra Prokopenko, The Bell, 12.03.25.
• “Putin's technocrats are working with bated breath,” Sergey Shelin, The Moscow Times, 12.05.25. (In Russian.)

Defense and aerospace:

“Russian Launch Site Mishap Shows Perilous State of Storied Space Program,” Kenneth Chang, New York Times, 12.01.25.

• Chang reports the “launchpad Russia uses for sending astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station is out of commission after a mishap last week,” with experts calling the platform “heavily damaged” and likely needing to be rebuilt.
• “This has been the only launchpad serving the Russian part of the I.S.S. program since 2019… Russia today lost its ability to launch humans into space, something that has not happened since 1961,” said space commentator Vitaly Yegorov.
• While the rocket successfully carried its crew to the ISS, the accident raises “questions about the future of the International Space Station if the launchpad cannot be quickly repaired,” as only the Russian Progress can deliver critical propellant.
• Analysts suggest the mishap may reflect chronic underfunding and “tie such problems to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has diverted money and resources from its space program,” with sanctions adding further complications.
• Jeff Manber, a U.S. space executive, sees the event as a sign of decline: “This should be a wake-up call… The Russian space program is now a shadow of its former glory.”
• See section Military aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts above.

Security, law-enforcement, justice and emergencies:

• No significant developments.

   

III. Russia’s relations with other countries

Russia’s external policies, including relations with “far abroad” countries:

“India’s Once Unshakeable Ties With Russia Are Fraying,” Mihir Sharma, Bloomberg, 12.07.25.

• “For all the warmth on display [during Putin’s visit to New Delhi last week], relations between India and Russia are plateauing,” the author writes.
• “That’s because they actually don’t have a great deal to offer each other — except perhaps as a hedge against their other friends. Look behind the headlines, and it’s clear that plans for economic integration and a $100-billion trade target are purely aspirational,” the author argues.
• “Trust has broken down. The army is still waiting on two S-400 missile systems; it bought five for $5.4 billion in 2018, but only three arrived,” according to the author.
• “And crude purchases, the backbone of the bilateral relationship, are beginning to be more trouble than they’re worth. The Russians don’t seem interested in buying anything from India in return. Which means they must be paid in dollars, not rupees — but sanctions have tightened and such payments are getting harder each day,” the author writes.
• “A plateau, however festooned it might be with red carpets and welcome banners, is still a plateau. And both Delhi and Moscow must know that they are nearing the edge of what their ‘special and privileged’ partnership can actually provide,” the author concludes.

Ukraine:

“Zelenskyy’s Government Sabotaged Oversight, Allowing Corruption in Ukraine to Fester,” Constant Méheut, Kim Barker, The New York Times, 12.05.25.

• Over the past four years, a New York Times investigation found, the Ukrainian government systematically sabotaged oversight, allowing graft to flourish,” Méheut and Barker report.
• “President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s administration has stacked boards with loyalists, left seats empty or stalled them from being set up at all. Leaders in Kyiv even rewrote company charters to limit oversight,” Méheut and Barker write.
• “Supervisory boards serve an essential oversight function, allowing independent experts, typically from other countries, to scrutinize major decisions inside Ukrainian state-owned companies,” Méheut and Barker explain.
• “Ukraine’s leaders have blocked efforts to prevent corruption,” Méheut and Barker report, describing how “contractors on Energoatom projects had to pay kickbacks of up to 15%, according to investigators.”
• “‘Supervisory boards are just window dressing,’ [Maryna Bezrukova] said in an interview. ‘They’re not real.’”
• “European leaders have privately criticized but reluctantly tolerated Ukrainian corruption for years, reasoning that supporting the fight against Russia’s invasion was paramount,” Méheut and Barker note.
• “‘The Europeans are creating a permissive environment for this kind of backsliding,’ said Tyson Barker, a former State Department official overseeing Ukraine’s economic recovery.”

“Ukraine Can Only Rely on Itself,” Anchal Vohra, Foreign Policy, 12.03.25.

• Vohra argues that any security guarantees in a peace deal “would ever be credible is unclear,” especially as both the U.S. and Europe refuse to commit troops.
• She warns Ukrainians suspect the Trump administration’s focus on “business deals with Russia will undermine its resolve to aid Ukraine,” making any peace deal likely “a stop-gap measure before Russia’s next attempted invasion.”
• Trump’s draft deal called for permanent NATO vetoes, major limits on Ukraine’s army, and “imposing no such condition on Russia,” which Vohra notes would sharply constrain Ukraine’s ability to defend itself.
• The main guarantee, European officials say, must be “the strength of [Ukraine’s] army,” as Europe’s military and financial aid has been “far too slow” and unpredictable to be reliable.
• Vohra concludes, “A militarily weak Ukraine will be a sitting duck for an expansionist Russia… Ukrainians have no other option but to train, arm, and remain wary.”

“Zelenskyy’s right-hand man has gone. Here’s what should happen next,” Orysia Lutsevych, Chatham House, 12.2025.

• Lutsevych writes, “Andriy Yermak had served as the head of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s presidential office for well over five years, long before Russia’s full-scale invasion… All that time he was both a solution and a problem for Zelenskyy.”
• She notes, “For an unelected official, Yermak amassed enormous power,” overseeing executive appointments and “sidelined the parliament to shape the executive, something that goes against the constitution.”
• Lutsevych explains that a corruption investigation “in the energy sector… triggered his eventual fall,” and observes, “at this stage he is not a suspect, but Ukrainian civil society believes that it was Yermak who oversaw efforts to curtail the powers of investigative agencies… that led to massive protests in the summer.”
• She argues Yermak became “a liability” in peace talks: “Zelenskyy could not risk having Ukraine represented by somebody with a dubious reputation—Russia’s propaganda operatives would certainly have used his presence to make their case to U.S. President Donald Trump that Ukraine was hopelessly corrupt.”
• Lutsevych concludes, “Just replacing one head of the president’s office with another will not be enough. Zelenskyy’s team… must come up with a strategy that would strengthen governance in war… This means decentralization of power, strengthening the organs of justice, and injecting new talent into leading state agencies.”

Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:

• No significant developments.

The cutoff for reports summarized in this product was 10:00 am Eastern time on the day this digest was distributed. Unless otherwise indicated, all summaries above are direct quotations. 

*Here and elsewhere, the italicized text indicates comments by RM staff and associates. These comments do not constitute a RM editorial policy.

Slider photo: A Ukrainian soldier goes along a street in the frontline town of Kostyantynivka, the site of heavy battles with the Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (Oleg Petrasiuk/Ukraine's 24th Mechanized Brigade via AP)