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Europe felt a moment of respite on Monday, as the crisis triggered by the announcement of a new 28-point plan for resolving the conflict appeared – briefly – to have been stabilised. A senior US official spoke of "notable headway" after Ukraine-US talks in Geneva. On Monday night, Russian leadership made its response: another massive barrage of missile and drone strikes on Kyiv.

The Rhythm of Peace Talks and Military Action

The sequence of conflicting incidents captured the bleak nature of the recent timeframe. By day, political struggles are fought: positive announcements are issued from multiple capitals. Immense energy is devoted on restraining particular approaches. By night, the Kremlin clearly shows the world that, for them, military action persists as the main instrument for achieving "settlement".

Nighttime Reality

As military strikes progressed into the early hours of Tuesday, the current condition of Ukraine's defenselessness was revealed. Ukraine is equipped to monitor missile launches from Russian territory, a capability enabled by timely intelligence. From witness perspectives, Ukrainian air force fighter jets that had been scrambled to engage hostile cruise missiles roared overhead – sophisticated military planes delivered to Ukraine by NATO members.

Shortly after, Kyiv's air-defence systems activated: several firings fired to intercept a Russian ballistic missile. This was a modern interception technology at work, most likely supplied through allied countries. Every firing creates sudden vibrations, causing tremors. The instant of fear quickly gives way to sober acceptance: maybe the approaching threat won't hit its mark this time, protecting urban areas from devastation and another blackout.

Continuous Dangers

Soon after, a heavy machine gun fired at a aerial vehicle somewhere nearby, part of a mobile-fire group – almost certainly Western-made equipment. Sadly, the bullets missed the enemy aircraft – it maintained course toward its destination.

Intermittently, this continued until dawn. Kyiv faced the morning news: several casualties, destruction and infrastructure problems in many homes as a result of the evening attack. As typically, everyone still maintained normal activities – experiencing conflict. But those 24 hours illustrated Ukraine's critical military reliance on external assistance – a dependence that regional partners are demonstrably unable to fill in the immediate future.

Unsuccessful Negotiations

The detailed framework from Washington generated strong feelings, discussion and deep concern – and briefly redirected concern from Ukraine's largest corruption scandal in years. Yet, we have experienced comparable situations, after earlier high-level meetings and multilateral gatherings.

Every new approach from American administration unfolds according to the same pattern: a political offensive against Ukraine, which Kyiv, with partner nations, effectively counters. They contain the crisis but never actually achieve victory. This pattern will, certainly, continue.

Political Considerations

It is easy to blame particular leaders of consistently pushing Kremlin's demands. But that does not seem to be the entire situation. American leadership works based on a assumption understood by international relations experts: you cannot win at the negotiating table what you have failed to defend militarily. The American government presumes that it is unrealistic to force Russia to abandon the areas that it already controls in Ukraine's south or east.

The problem is that while accepting these circumstances, US leadership does minimal to deter Moscow, through diplomacy or military means, from assuming that the current condition will not shift further in its advantage in the near future.

Divergent Views

Therefore, Moscow is confident that time is on his side – that Ukraine and its supporters are coming close to fatigue. Their motivation to sign a deal that does not give them the maximum possible gain is close to zero. There may be numerous efforts to stop fighting, but they will continue as long as Russia's leader remains supremely confident in the result.

On the contrary, Ukrainian leadership believes that Ukraine can still endure, progressively conceding civilians and areas but preventing a complete military breakdown until circumstances change in its favour.

Current Realities

Factually, there are no genuine requirements for a ceasefire. Now, subjective factors are becoming relevant: personal goals to negotiate peace and secure international recognition, and Kyiv's double obstacles – on one hand, not to distance important partners, and on the other, to mobilize citizens around the country's interests against any proposal Kyiv finds unsuitable, so that their attention does not move to internal issues. And although their mission will now be much harder after latest incidents, it remains very improbable that this will modify their basic position.

These opposing factors are guiding negotiations.

Assessment and Future

It took a only one week to terminate the proposed articles of the current initiative. Forceful and unpredictable management of the matter by Washington, pushback by Ukraine and the other European countries, along with pacifying measures of negotiators, and finally, recent disclosures, all did their job.

While new plans based on established approaches are forthcoming, Kyiv, London and other allied nations should arrive at a critical understanding: Ukraine and Europe will only be able to fend off negotiation assaults from Washington that are rooted in Kremlin requirements and demonstrate certain reluctance to change the course of events, if they stand together and enhance their military capacity at a considerably quicker tempo. If they do, no combination of diplomatic or military actions will be able to overcome them. In the meantime, Ukraine's ability to counter nocturnal attacks will, for the coming months, primarily depend on ongoing international assistance.