Free Republic

There are four reasons why the coming year could be the year the Ukraine war ends—and plenty of reasons why it might continue for the foreseeable future. Principal among these is the huge gap between Putin and Zelensky on potential terms. The factors favoring an end to the war appear to be gaining. What are these factors? First, there is Ukraine’s brilliant and bold military move into Russia in the Kursk region.

Conflict will end on Russian terms, and soon

The latest Russian Defense Ministry daily bulletin was issued on Tuesday afternoon, July 9. Since then the Pentagon and the White House have been as silent as the tomb. Make that thirty-five American tombs. “During the day [July 9],” said the Defense Ministry briefer [3] in Moscow, “the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation carried out a group strike with high-precision weapons on American HIMARS multiple launch rocket systems prepared for strikes on the territory of Crimea, as well as the venue of an official meeting of the AFU [Armed Forces of the Ukraine] command staff. The objectives of the...

Ukraine is on an “irreversible” path to NATO membership, the 32 members of the alliance affirmed in a joint communique released Wednesday on the second day of the summit being held in Washington. Allies had negotiated for months over what language would be published in the joint communique, but discussions on specific words — including “irreversible” — had continued in D.C. throughout the first days of the summit.

The president of Poland on Tuesday sharply rejected any cease-fire deal for the Ukraine war that would require Kyiv to cede territory to Moscow — drawing a clear line in the sand at a moment when China, fellow NATO ally Hungary and some leading American politicians are growing louder in their calls for a rapid negotiated end to the conflict. Polish President Andrzej Duda, whose nation is the most powerful NATO member state bordering Ukraine, stood firm on the issue in a wide-ranging exclusive interview with The Washington Times, just as a key summit of NATO leaders got underway in...

Western leaders rejected Vladimir Putin’s framework for a ceasefire while backing Ukraine’s demands that Russia return all occupied territories as the basis for any potential peace agreement. The “first annual Global Peace Summit” held in the luxury Swiss resort of Burgenstock, which did not include any representatives from Moscow, concluded with the status quo essentially remaining the same, with Ukraine continuing to demand that Russia cede territory in the East and Crimea as a prerequisite for actual peace talks to begin, a likely non-starter for Vladimir Putin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin promised Friday to “immediately” order a cease-fire in Ukraine and begin negotiations if Kyiv started withdrawing troops from the four regions annexed by Moscow in 2022 and renounced plans to join NATO. Ukraine responded by calling Putin’s proposal “manipulative” and “absurd.”Putin’s remarks came as Switzerland prepared to host scores of world leaders -- but not from Moscow -- this weekend to try to map out first steps toward peace in Ukraine.They also coincided with a meeting of leaders of the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations in Italy and after the U.S. and Ukraine this week...

Long gone are the days when Ukraine was at least winning the war on the western news sites’ headlines.Now, slowly but surely, the MSM has had to face the fact that the outmanned, outgunned and outmaneuvered Ukrainian forces will not win this war on the battlefield, will not get back to pre-war borders, much less reincorporate the Crimean peninsula.And up until a minute ago, to state the obvious fact that Ukraine will have to cede territory during peace negotiations with Russia got you branded as a ‘Kremlin stooge’ or worse, and only the most courageous politicians, such as Hungarian Viktor...