The planned Trump-Putin summit in Budapest has been shelved. The White House says there's no point meeting unless "we're going to make a deal." Some view this as a setback for diplomacy, but it may well be the clearest moment in a long struggle to curb Russia's appetite for war. Russian President Vladimir Putin made the decision to invade first in 2014 and then again in 2022. Western policy has long assumed that peace depends on his will. Under U.S. President Donald Trump, that belief was paire

The ongoing and escalating slaughter of Ukrainian civilians depends on two preconditions: Moscow’s determination to erase Ukraine, and the tacit permission it receives from America and Europe. On Monday, a Russian missile tore through a residential building in Kyiv, leaving at least six civilians dead and over a dozen wounded — including women and children pulled from the rubble in the early hours. "This is what happens when the U.S. withholds air defenses because it doesn’t want to upset the k

Editor's note: This opinion first appeared in German in Süddeutsche Zeitung. Russia’s President — a wanted war criminal — Vladimir Putin failed to show up in Istanbul for the “direct talks” with Ukraine that he himself proposed. For the Kremlin to wage an unprovoked war of conquest, reject a ceasefire, and call it a peace effort is nothing new. Russia lies. In 2022, building up troops at the Ukrainian border, the Kremlin told us it had no intentions of invading. Russia lied. Eleven years ago,

News of Victoria Roshchyna’s brutal death at the hands of Russian captors shocked Ukraine and the world last week. Her body was returned mutilated — eyes gouged out, brain removed — bearing evidence of unspeakable brutality. It wasn’t an accident of war. It was a signature of it. This is what Russia does — and has done since its 2014 invasion of Ukraine. A day after the world discovered what had happened to Roshchyna, the White House celebrated a long-awaited minerals deal signed with Kyiv. As

On Nov. 5, everything changed —and yet, nothing changed. As Americans cast ballots in what many called the most consequential election of our time, Nov. 5 was predictably horrifically marked by the death and devastation Russia brought to Ukraine — largely unseen, unheard, and unnoticed in the most powerful country on Earth. Moscow’s criminal war of aggression, coupled with nuclear blackmail, is a century-defining event — far more consequential than any U.S. political shifts. Make no mistake: it

“What’s the point of a world without Russia in it?” asked a well-known politician, now a wanted war criminal, back in 2018. A less prominent Russian figure echoed this sentiment in 2024, though less threateningly, when he remarked, “The disintegration of Russia would be a catastrophe, not only for our country and people but a tragedy for the world." The first quote belongs to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the second to one of his biggest critics, dissident Illya Yashin. Despite their ma

‘With Ukraine, as long as it takes,’ we proclaimed. But in Moscow, they heard something else: the West is more terrified of Ukraine winning than losing. To dispel any doubts, the Kremlin unleashed death and destruction on Ukraine’s cities – on the eve of a NATO summit – killing dozens, including children receiving cancer treatment in a Kyiv hospital. Let's be clear: Russia alone is culpable for the war crimes it commits. But the grim reality is that the missiles that struck Ukraine could have b