RussiaUkraine war could last for years say western leaders Ukraine

Russian ground troops moved in quickly and within a few weeks were in control of large areas of Ukraine and had advanced to the suburbs of Kyiv. The ISW does note that Russia's advances might be the result of Ukrainian forces withdrawing to "more defensible positions" near Robotyne. The village of Robotyne in the Zaporizhzhia region could offer a similar stepping stone but Russian forces are reported to have made some advances in the area. Ukraine first announced it had made a breakthrough in mid-November - the river had separated Ukrainian and Russian forces since Moscow's troops withdrew from Kherson a year ago. For his part, Trump has said that he'd be able to resolve the Ukraine war "in one day" if he was reelected, saying he'd convince the leaders of Ukraine and Russia to make a deal. Ukrainian pilots are beginning their training on the jets now but it could be a number of months before they're deployed in Ukraine.

• Gideon Rachman How do you assess the incentives of the Ukrainians?









• But as GOP lawmakers fight for immigration reform, particularly on the U.S. southern border, ahead of financial support for Ukraine, "it would not be unreasonable to expect Biden to, at the very least, attempt to extend the conflict into 2025."









• Ukraine has been calling for a large influx of western weaponry so that it can try to push back the Russian invaders, but what has been offered so far is less than Kyiv has requested.









• Mr Szijarto will be in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhhorod with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba and presidential chief of staff Andriy Yermak.









• Says more than 8 million Ukrainians fled to Europe since the start of the invasion.

Ukraine's intelligence agency confirmed a prisoner exchange had been scheduled but did not take place. The head of Ukraine's air force slammed what he described as Russian "propaganda" over the shooting down of a Russian plane transporting Ukrainian prisoners of war on Wednesday, saying Moscow was trying to discredit Ukraine. Fragments of what appears to be an anti-aircraft guided missile were found at the crash site of the downed Russian military transport plane, Russian new agency TASS reported Thursday. The mobilization of thousands of men to fight in Russia's armed forces has also likely led to a workforce shortage across all industries, including heating engineers and plumbers, the ministry noted in an intelligence update.

Is Russia still using the concept of denazification as justification for the war? — Anya

You can’t kill just Ukrainians and no Russians and therefore swing the tide on the battlefield. If he uses a nuke against a civilian target, I mean, the whole world is gonna be against them, you know. And that may take longer to fight, but the whole world will mobilise against him, support the Ukrainians, and there’s no way he’s gonna win. http://budtrader.com/arcade/members/lycrasatin38/activity/5858637/ can see Putin use nuclear weapons goes back to this story that I told earlier about the western allies and particularly the people in Germany, who are very, very skittish about nuclear weapons. So that’s the only strategy that I can see Putin really using nuclear weapons.

• Do they think that Putin, after he has been successful and shown that he’s been a great leader, and he won against the mighty Nato alliance and all this force, that he’s gonna stop?









• And even once Russian forces have achieved some presence in Ukraine's cities, perhaps they struggle to maintain control.









• Since the counteroffensive was launched in June, only a handful of villages have been recaptured.









• After Russia first invaded in 2014, the U.S. military stepped up training for the Ukrainian military in western Ukraine.

While the bipartisan majority of lawmakers support arming Kyiv, 57 Republicans voted against a $40 billion emergency aid supplemental in May. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., made several concessions to those Ukraine aid skeptics to secure the votes to win his protracted speakership battle. But Smith also said ATACMS producer Lockheed Martin no longer makes the missiles, and the U.S. military still needs them in its stockpiles. Smith indicated he disagrees with the Biden administration’s decision not to send long-range missiles, noting every Ukrainian official assured him they would not use them to attack Russia. “It would have to get pretty bad for the Russians to get there,” he said, adding that there’s no way of knowing how many reserves the government stashed away after years of fat checks from energy sales.

Ukraine invasion — explained

The EU's decision to open membership talks with Ukraine and Moldova is more than just symbolic. It implicitly means continued backing for Kyiv, as a future in the EU for Ukraine would be impossible with a full-blown victory for Russia. The US defence aid package is held hostage by what President Biden rightly labelled "petty politics" in Washington.

"The only way I can foresee the Ukraine war possibly ending in 2024 is if Vladimir Putin dies," Beth Knobel, professor of communications and media studies at Fordham University, and former CBS News Moscow bureau chief, told Newsweek. Outlier events cannot be ruled out, such as the brazen challenge to Putin's authority by Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, whose death in a plane crash followed his seizure of military facilities in Rostov-on-Don and a march on Moscow. Also, the Kremlin has repeatedly dismissed rumors about Putin's health.

At the onset of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, US intelligence assessed that Russia could conquer Kyiv in just three days. Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been highly critical of the EU's financial and military aid for Ukraine and has maintained close ties with Russia. A little earlier, we told you about a report in the Financial Times that the EU was proposing to sabotage Hungary's economy if Budapest blocks further aid for Ukraine this week. Peter Szijjarto has arrived in Ukraine for talks with senior officials today. This could see states like Poland and the Baltics decide to aid Ukraine on their own, which "might leave NATO's eastern front vulnerable and cause a crisis within the EU and European NATO".

• Hein Goemans Well, the Germans quote unquote, “lost” on the battlefield and they kept fighting another four years.









• A spate of Ukraine-linked attacks on Russia's oil infrastructure have reportedly led Moscow's energy ministry to propose restricting flights over energy facilities.









• But Ukraine's air defenses were surprisingly effective, shooting down many Russian fighter jets and helicopters in the first couple months of the war.









• There’s no way they’re gonna push back Russia to the 1991 borders and they may have to accept the four annexed areas as part of Russia forever.









• Meanwhile, Putin can look to the post-Soviet space for an example of how to play the long game, said David Rivera assistant professor of government at Hamilton College, Clinton, New York.

Russian forces are already trying to slow down tanks in Ukraine with mines, trenches, and pyramidical, concrete “dragon’s teeth,” a type of fortification not seen in combat since World War II. Ukrainian forces, once equipped and trained for combined arms warfare and tank tactics, will be “designed to punch a hole through a defensive network,” Donahoe predicted. “I would love to think the kinetic phase could end in 2023, but I suspect we could be looking at another three years with this scale of fighting,” Roberts said. Russia was not present at the discussions, however, and U.S. national security spokesperson John Kirby stated ahead of the talks that the White House did not expect any "tangible deliverables." It's become clear that the counteroffensive won't produce quick results and that success — however that might be measured in terms of retaking Russian-occupied territory — is not guaranteed. Ukraine will do all it can to keep pressure on the Russians there to make it untenable for the Russian navy in Sevastopol, the handful of air force bases there and their logistics base at Dzankoy.

"Russia can win the war, or the Ukrainians can win the war. And, as you're seeing things now, if you really think about it, what has been achieved this year? Very little has been achieved by Russia, and you can say the same thing for the Ukrainians," he said. Ukraine disrupted Russia's operations around occupied Crimea, damaging Russian radars, air defense and ships on the Black Sea. Ukrainians troops have also broken through Russian defenses on the Dnipro River. "I don't think people in the U.S. should assume that Ukraine's continuing efforts to dislodge the Russians hinge entirely on U.S. or even West European actions," said Rachel Epstein, professor of International Relations and European Politics at the University of Denver. But as GOP lawmakers fight for immigration reform, particularly on the U.S. southern border, ahead of financial support for Ukraine, "it would not be unreasonable to expect Biden to, at the very least, attempt to extend the conflict into 2025." Zelensky's visit to Washington, D.C., on December 12, was lower key than the red-carpet treatment he previously received.

Ukraine's army said Wednesday that it would continue to "control the airspace" to reduce the threat of missiles, "including in the Belgorod-Kharkiv direction," after a Russian military transport plane crashed in the Russian border region of Belgorod. Under this scenario, Russia escalates its military operations. There are more indiscriminate artillery and rocket strikes across Ukraine.

"Ukraine may shift tactics to deal with a downturn in Western aid, but I don't believe they will surrender." "However, that does not mean that there are likely to be serious peace talks and a possible end to the war in 2024. Russia blamed Ukraine for what it called the "barbaric" shooting down of the Russian military transport plane over the border Belgorod region, killing all 65 Ukrainian POWs on board and nine Russians. "The goal is obvious — they want to reduce international support for our state. It doesn't work! Ukraine has the right to protect and destroy the means of an aggressor's air attack," he said in comments translated by NBC News. Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov responded to Zelenskyy's comments Thursday, saying "if he means an international investigation into the criminal actions of the Kiev regime, it is definitely needed," news agency Interfax reported. Russia’s battlefield losses are so huge that western officials doubt it has the capacity to mount an offensive on the same scale again.