Attention to the Unseen

Reuters reports: Vladimir Putin’s chief envoy on Ukraine told the Russian leader as the war began that he had struck a provisional deal with Kyiv that would satisfy Russia’s demand that Ukraine stay out of NATO, but Putin rejected it and pressed ahead with his military campaign, according to three people close to the Russian leadership. The Ukrainian-born envoy, Dmitry Kozak, told Putin that he believed the deal he had hammered out removed the need for Russia to pursue a…

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Alexey Kovalev writes: A new Russian protest movement is coalescing, but it’s neither pro-democracy nor anti-war. Instead, it’s the most extreme of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s supporters, who have grown increasingly furious at the unfolding military disaster for Russia in the six-month-long war in Ukraine. They want Putin to escalate the war, use more devastating weapons, and hit Ukrainian civilians even more mercilessly. And they’ve openly attacked the Russian military and political leadership for supposedly holding back Russia’s full might—even…

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The New York Times reports: The strategy behind Ukraine’s rapid military gains in recent days began to take shape months ago during a series of intense conversations between Ukrainian and U.S. officials about the way forward in the war against Russia, according to American officials. The counteroffensive — revised this summer from its original form after urgent discussions between senior U.S. and Ukrainian officials — has succeeded beyond most predictions. Ukrainian forces have devastated Russian command and control, and appear…

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euronews reports: The European Union will survive “Russia’s blackmail” of energy supplies and the looming “long winter” but only if the bloc maintains its “unity, determination and courage,” said Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin. “Russia may challenge us, blackmail us and threaten us, but we will not give in,” she told the European Parliament in Strasbourg, speaking in Finnish. “Russia’s actions have unified the West as never before, while Russia is lonelier than ever.” During her speech before the plenary,…

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Phillips Payson O’Brien writes: What happens on the battlefield is rarely the thing that decides a war. Normally, the preparations beforehand determine what happens when the fighting begins—and these preparations are what settle the outcome of the war itself. This truth is playing out along the roads and in the towns of Kharkiv Oblast, the province that includes Ukraine’s second-largest city. The stunningly swift advance of Ukrainian forces, which started around September 1 and sped up soon after, has easily…

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