Follow us on social

||

Diplomacy Watch: Ukraine takes the war inside Russia

Will the assault give Kyiv leverage at the negotiating table?

Reporting | QiOSK

For the first time since the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian military this week launched what appears to be a major operation inside Russian territory, raising questions about why Kyiv is doing this now, what its overall strategic goals are, and whether Ukraine is violating prohibitions on the use of U.S.-supplied weapons inside Russia.

While Ukrainian officials have so far largely remained quiet about the operation, Russian sources are saying that the assault has involved at least 1,000 Ukrainian troops (quite possibly thousands more) supported by tanks, armored vehicles, drones and artillery. Those forces have reportedly advanced as far as six miles from the Ukrainian border into the Kursk region of Russia, toward the town of Sudzha, where Russian natural gas flows into Europe through a pipeline in Ukraine.

According to Reuters, some pro-Russian bloggers are also saying the Ukrainian forces are advancing toward a nuclear power station almost 40 miles northeast of Sudzha, but that claim has yet to be verified.

While some observers have questioned the strategic value of such a Ukrainian operation, possible motives could be to show Russians that they are increasingly vulnerable as the war drags on, to stop gas flows into Europe, to boost Ukrainian morale, or to force Moscow to redeploy defense forces from elsewhere along the Ukrainian front.

Or, the assault could be related to larger diplomatic efforts. According to the Washington Post, Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, said on Ukrainian TV this week that — without specifically referencing the assault — any Ukrainian incursion into Russian territory “could better Ukraine’s position during future negotiations with Russia to end the war.”

The Biden administration had previously forbidden Ukraine from using U.S.-supplied weapons for any attacks inside Russian territory in an effort to prevent escalating the conflict. However, President Biden relaxed those rules in May, saying that the Ukrainian military could hit military targets inside Russia that were supporting Moscow’s offensive against the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv in the northeast. In June, the Pentagon announced that those rules would be relaxed further so that Ukraine could use U.S.-supplied weapons to attack military targets inside Russia anywhere along the border, not just near Kharkiv.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller on Thursday said he wouldn’t comment on the Ukrainian assault but insisted that Russian attacks on Ukraine had come from the Kursk region, and thus Ukraine was adhering to the new, more relaxed policy. “Yes, in the area where [the Ukrainians] are currently operating across the Russian border we have seen attacks come from there,” he said.

In other diplomatic news related to the war in Ukraine:

Reuters reported that Niger’s ruling junta cut diplomatic ties with Ukraine this week in response to Kyiv purportedly supporting rebel groups with ties to terrorist groups — including al-Qaida — in neighboring Mali that were fighting the Wagner Group, a Russian mercenary force. Mali’s junta had previously cut ties with Ukraine over the incident. The Russians accused Kyiv of opening an “African front” in their ongoing war in Eastern Europe.

— Quincy Institute Eurasia Research Fellow Mark Episkipos wonders whether we’ve seen a similar pattern of U.S. decision making regarding the war in Ukraine. “America’s trademark technical prowess … failed to pierce the fog of war in Vietnam because it proceeded from strategically unsound assumptions about the conflict’s broader dynamics and refused to correct course at key junctures,” he wrote this week in RS. “The variables at play in Ukraine are undoubtedly quite different, but the potential folly — wading knee deep into a protracted conflict without a realistic theory of victory — is much the same, and the stakes are similarly high.”


Diplomacy Watch: A peace summit without Russia

Diplomacy Watch: What’s the point of Swiss peace summit?

Reporting | QiOSK
POGO The Bunker
Top image credit: Project on Government Oversight

Bombers astray! Washington's priorities go off course

Military Industrial Complex

The Bunker appears originally at the Project on Government Oversight and is republished here with permission.


keep readingShow less
Trump Zelensky
Top photo credit: Joshua Sukoff / Shutterstock.com

Blob exploiting Trump's anger with Putin, risking return to Biden's war

Europe

Donald Trump’s recent outburst against Vladimir Putin — accusing the Russian leader of "throwing a pile of bullsh*t at us" and threatening devastating new sanctions — might be just another Trumpian tantrum.

The president is known for abrupt reversals. Or it could be a bargaining tactic ahead of potential Ukraine peace talks. But there’s a third, more troubling possibility: establishment Republican hawks and neoconservatives, who have been maneuvering to hijack Trump’s “America First” agenda since his return to office, may be exploiting his frustration with Putin to push for a prolonged confrontation with Russia.

Trump’s irritation is understandable. Ukraine has accepted his proposed ceasefire, but Putin has refused, making him, in Trump’s eyes, the main obstacle to ending the war.

Putin’s calculus is clear. As Ted Snider notes in the American Conservative, Russia is winning on the battlefield. In June, it captured more Ukrainian territory and now threatens critical Kyiv’s supply lines. Moscow also seized a key lithium deposit critical to securing Trump’s support for Ukraine. Meanwhile, Russian missile and drone strikes have intensified.

Putin seems convinced his key demands — Ukraine’s neutrality, territorial concessions in the Donbas and Crimea, and a downsized Ukrainian military — are more achievable through war than diplomacy.

Yet his strategy empowers the transatlantic “forever war” faction: leaders in Britain, France, Germany, and the EU, along with hawks in both main U.S. parties. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz claims that diplomacy with Russia is “exhausted.” Europe’s war party, convinced a Russian victory would inevitably lead to an attack on NATO (a suicidal prospect for Moscow), is willing to fight “to the last Ukrainian.” Meanwhile, U.S. hawks, including liberal interventionist Democrats, stoke Trump’s ego, framing failure to stand up to Putin’s defiance as a sign of weakness or appeasement.

Trump long resisted this pressure. Pragmatism told him Ukraine couldn’t win, and calling it “Biden’s war” was his way of distancing himself, seeking a quick exit to refocus on China, which he has depicted as Washington’s greater foreign threat. At least as important, U.S. involvement in the war in Ukraine has been unpopular with his MAGA base.

But his June strikes on Iran may signal a hawkish shift. By touting them as a decisive blow to Iran’s nuclear program (despite Tehran’s refusal so far to abandon uranium enrichment), Trump may be embracing a new approach to dealing with recalcitrant foreign powers: offer a deal, set a deadline, then unleash overwhelming force if rejected. The optics of “success” could tempt him to try something similar with Russia.

This pivot coincides with a media campaign against restraint advocates within the administration like Elbridge Colby, the Pentagon policy chief who has prioritized China over Ukraine and also provoked the opposition of pro-Israel neoconservatives by warning against war with Iran. POLITICO quoted unnamed officials attacking Colby for wanting the U.S. to “do less in the world.” Meanwhile, the conventional Republican hawk Marco Rubio’s influence grows as he combines the jobs of both secretary of state and national security adviser.

What Can Trump Actually Do to Russia?
 

Nuclear deterrence rules out direct military action — even Biden, far more invested in Ukraine than Trump, avoided that risk. Instead, Trump ally Sen.Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), another establishment Republican hawk, is pushing a 500% tariff on nations buying Russian hydrocarbons, aiming to sever Moscow from the global economy. Trump seems supportive, although the move’s feasibility and impact are doubtful.

China and India are key buyers of Russian oil. China alone imports 12.5 million barrels daily. Russia exports seven million barrels daily. China could absorb Russia’s entire output. Beijing has bluntly stated it “cannot afford” a Russian defeat, ensuring Moscow’s economic lifeline remains open.

The U.S., meanwhile, is ill-prepared for a tariff war with China. When Trump imposed 145% tariffs, Beijing retaliated by cutting off rare earth metals exports, vital to U.S. industry and defense. Trump backed down.

At the G-7 summit in Canada last month, the EU proposed lowering price caps on Russian oil from $60 a barrel to $45 a barrel as part of its 18th sanctions package against Russia. Trump rejected the proposal at the time but may be tempted to reconsider, given his suggestion that more sanctions may be needed. Even if Washington backs the measure now, however, it is unlikely to cripple Russia’s war machine.

Another strategy may involve isolating Russia by peeling away Moscow’s traditionally friendly neighbors. Here, Western mediation between Armenia and Azerbaijan isn’t about peace — if it were, pressure would target Baku, which has stalled agreements and threatened renewed war against Armenia. The real goal is to eject Russia from the South Caucasus and create a NATO-aligned energy corridor linking Turkey to Central Asia, bypassing both Russia and Iran to their detriment.

Central Asia itself is itself emerging as a new battleground. In May 2025, the EU has celebrated its first summit with Central Asian nations in Uzbekistan, with a heavy focus on developing the Middle Corridor, a route for transportation of energy and critical raw materials that would bypass Russia. In that context, the EU has committed €10 billion in support of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route.

keep readingShow less
Syria sanctions
Top image credit: People line up to buy bread, after Syria's Bashar al-Assad was ousted, in Douma, on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria December 23, 2024. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

Lifting sanctions on Syria exposes their cruel intent

Middle East

On June 30, President Trump signed an executive order terminating the majority of U.S. sanctions on Syria. The move, which would have been unthinkable mere months ago, fulfilled a promise he made at an investment forum in Riyadh in May.“The sanctions were brutal and crippling,” he had declared to an audience of primarily Saudi businessmen. Lifting them, he said, will “give Syria a chance at greatness.”

The significance of this statement lies not solely in the relief that it will bring to the Syrian people. His remarks revealed an implicit but rarely admitted truth: sanctions — often presented as a peaceful alternative to war — have been harming the Syrian people all along.

keep readingShow less

LATEST

QIOSK

Newsletter

Subscribe now to our weekly round-up and don't miss a beat with your favorite RS contributors and reporters, as well as staff analysis, opinion, and news promoting a positive, non-partisan vision of U.S. foreign policy.