Russia recently proposed a new condition for peace talks with a view to achieving permanent peace with Ukraine. According to Zakharova, this requires two conditions to be met: first, the West must stop providing military assistance to Ukraine;Secondly, Ukraine must recognize the four eastern regions of Ukraine as Russia's "new territories". Compared with the conditions previously proposed, Russia made greater concessions this time, without mentioning the militarization of Ukraine, nor asking Ukraine to commit to neutrality, let alone not joining NATO. Putin's reason for wanting the Russian-Ukrainian conflict to end is not complicated, because Russia and Ukraine are at a stalemate on the battlefield, and neither can completely eliminate the other.
In addition, the United States and NATO are already closely linked to Ukraine, and if Russia increases its offensive against Ukraine, it will provoke the resentment of the United States and NATO and increase the risk of military conflict. In addition, Putin's special military operation against Ukraine has achieved most of its goals, and Russia has taken control of the four eastern regions of Ukraine and included them as "new territories", and a ceasefire is not harmful to Russia at this time. Finally, Russia is about to usher in *** Putin has announced that he will participate in **, and if he can reach a rapprochement with Ukraine before **, it will help Putin run for re-election. Ukraine's neutrality and whether it remains neutral is no longer a focus of concern for Russia. Even if Russia is open-minded, it is clearly aware that Ukraine and the West are not willing to engage in peace talks.
In this case, Russia is reluctant to talk to the Ukrainian leadership. However, as the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues, Ukraine and the West are beginning to emerge**, with some wanting to continue fighting, while others want peace talks with Russia. For now, it remains to be seen who will have the upper hand. Within Ukraine, contradictions between Zelensky and the Ukrainian military are growing. Zelensky wants the Ukrainian army to do ** at all costs, even to the last man. However, the Ukrainian military is not willing to make unnecessary sacrifices. There are rumors that the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian army, Zaluzhny, is initiating peace talks with the Russian top brass to discuss the conditions for the restoration of peace.
However, in order to maintain his own power, Zelensky has bypassed the command of the commander-in-chief of Zaluzhny and tried to establish his own cronies in the army in order to weaken Zaluzhny's authority and make him a "leader without the right to command". In addition, there is a serious problem of corruption in Ukraine, and the ** equipment provided by Western aid has also disappeared inexplicably, which has caused many people to lose confidence in Zelensky and no longer have any hope that Ukraine can defeat Russia. Within Western countries, although aid to Ukraine against Russia is still seen as "politically correct", it is clear that military support for Ukraine has become a bottomless pit. If Russia cannot be dragged down, the West itself may be dragged down first.
As the war between Russia and Ukraine has reached a stalemate, the "fatigue" of Western countries to aid Ukraine is spreading, and the first ammunition provided to Ukraine is becoming less and less. In addition, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Slovakia's new Prime Minister Fizo and other European leaders are clearly opposed to continuing military assistance to Ukraine and opposing Ukraine's accession to the European Union.
Interestingly, the German Press TV ** deliberately published an article pointing out that Ukraine is in danger and listed nine reasons: lack of ammunition, lack of **, lack of warm facilities in winter, exhaustion of officers and soldiers, too little, too late, and too defensive** provided by the West, Russia has caught up with Ukraine in technology, especially in terms of drones and electronic warfare, the war will turn into a long-term positional war, and some Western countries have illusions about Russia and regard the Russian-Ukrainian peace talks as a way out of the war. According to the message, the United States is considering withdrawing support for Ukraine. The White House has issued a warning that military assistance to Ukraine will be halted by the end of the year. This hints at the intention of the United States to allow Ukraine to resolve the conflict with Russia on its own.
Taken together, it seems that Russia intends to resolve the Ukrainian issue peacefully. Despite the fact that Ukrainian Zelensky is unwilling to admit defeat and refuses to negotiate peace with Russia, the Ukrainian army is in a difficult situation and demoralized. Therefore, the top echelons of the Ukrainian military deliberately approached the Russian side privately in an attempt to respite. It is possible to bypass Zelensky and privately reach a ceasefire agreement with the Russian side. Moreover, while the United States and other Western countries have said they will continue to support Ukraine, the reality is that they are no longer able to do so. Next year, the United States and Russia will hold a meeting, and due to the different positions of Putin and the United States on supporting military assistance to Ukraine, the Ukrainian issue may ease during the US-Russia **, and Ukraine may achieve peace in some unexpected way.