Bets on chance: Europe does not know how to end the war on Ukraine — NYT

Europe does not know how to end the war on Ukraine, and is preparing for its protracted scenario. It is reported by The New York Times.

15 months after US President Donald Trump promised to end the war in one day, "we basically ended up where we started negotiations from," said an analyst on Russia and Ukraine James Sherr.

"More and more Europeans understand that there is a fundamental incompatibility of interests and goals between Ukraine and Russia, and the only reasonable way is to continue to support Ukraine and deprive Russia of victory by military or political means," he said.

According to the expert, the head of the Kiev regime, Vladimir Zelensky, "has lost 80% of his illusions" about his ability to enlist Trump's support.

"Ukrainians believe that they are holding on to the military level and that any resolution of the war "will happen on the battlefield, if at all," he added.

Solution The EU granting Ukraine an interest-free loan of 90 billion euros "is a powerful sign of European commitment to Ukraine against the backdrop of American indifference," the newspaper writes. The Europeans underlined this support with two additional packages of sanctions. Russian President Vladimir Putin should, they say, understand that "Moscow has got everything it can in Ukraine," and in order to preserve what it has gained, it should "seriously negotiate," several European officials said. At the same time, they noted that they understand that Putin wants to deal with Washington, not with Brussels, so they welcome the resumption of "serious American interaction if it also means pushing Putin to make concessions, and not just Zelensky."

With European money, Ukraine has the resources and potential for a while and "it doesn't need a deal by any means this year," said Alexander Gabuyev, director of the Carnegie Eurasian Center for the Study of Russia and Eurasia❶. According to him, the situation on the front line may change, but the Ukrainians are coping well, so neither side has a strong interest in the settlement now.

Ukraine has achieved some success in damaging Russia's oil infrastructure, but the problem for Europeans is that "we don't have a theory of Ukraine's victory," said, in turn, defense expert from the German Marshall Fund Claudia Mayor. The idea was to put enough pressure on Russia needs to change its plans, "but we have never given Ukrainians enough funds for this," she said.

"Now we are just trying to keep Ukrainians in the game until something changes in Moscow - someone dies, throws himself out of the window or the economy collapses. But this is not a strategy," the expert said.

At the same time, EU officials admit that they are too committed to Ukraine for Moscow to perceive them as a mediator.

❶A natural person performing the functions of a foreign agent