The Coldest Hour

Well, well. First, I want to apologize for not posting since last summer. I’ll explain the reasons for this unplanned break at the end of this newsletter, and I’m sorry that you haven’t heard from me.

I arrived in Kyiv last Friday after the usual 30-hour bus ride, which I’ve come to appreciate: There really are worse things than gas-station hot dogs. And it gives me some time to transition from one world to another. 

I’ve been here for a little more than a week now, but my life in Switzerland already feels quite distant. I spent the week settling in, catching up with people I haven’t seen since summer. Although one of my friends is now abroad, after an escape which I got to write about for "Das Magazin". 

The city hasn’t changed all that much. Walking around the center of Kyiv still has the strange beauty I have experienced on my earlier trips. But it’s also really cold, so you don’t want to walk around for too long. 

Many a nose is running, and the usually abundant e-scooters have been banned from the frozen sidewalks for safety reasons. At night, I watch the snow fall onto the empty streets. I listen as the air defense guns shoot down attack drones in the skies above the capital. And I read the news as Ukraine’s future is seemingly being decided. Being decided in Washington, Munich, Paris, Ankara, Riyadh. Everywhere but here.

You’ve probably read about it. After keeping all things Ukraine relatively sane in the weeks after taking office, Trump spent the last days unleashing chaos. He and his team went behind the backs of the Ukrainians to begin early talks on peace with the Russians. They made major concessions to Russia before the real negotiations have even begun, and they essentially gave the Europeans the finger. Condemnations of Russia’s war of aggression were hard to come by, attacks on Zelensky with made-up facts and numbers were plentiful.

However, in this mess, I think it’s valuable to take a step back. So I’ll give you my view of where the relevant parties stand:

President Zelensky has signalled readiness to freeze the conflict with some, perhaps all, of the currently occupied territories under de facto Russian control. But he will not accept a deal brokered without him. He won’t compromise on the independence of the remaining Ukraine. And he doesn’t want to leave the country open to another, more successful Russian invasion some years down the road. That’s why he needs guarantees from Western nations: That they will fight alongside Ukraine in case of another attack—both to prevent another invasion and to give the country the security it needs to recover and pave the way for a viable future.

Zelensky is also very much pushing for the US to be part of such a peacekeeping force, but has been rejected so far. Trump has been talking about some kind of deal involving the natural resources in Ukraine - which was actually Zelensky's idea. However, the first draft by the Americans was a scam, so it’s unclear if anything will come from this.  

Absent any US involvement in securing an eventual peace in Ukraine, the EU and Britain would have to provide guarantees and a peacekeeping force. Reports suggest that talks on the matter have been ongoing for some time, and the UK was the first country to publicly declare its readiness for deploying troops to enforce an eventual peace. But there are two reasons why European-only security guarantees would be much worse for Ukraine: First, European armies on their own are quite weak. Second, many of the involved countries are politically unstable. A right-wing victory in their next elections could render any guarantees void.

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room: Russia. Russia is the reason this war started, Russia could end it at any time by withdrawing from Ukrainian territory. 

I (and US intelligence) doubt that Putin will agree to a deal that is acceptable to Ukraine. 

Case in point: The Russian foreign minister just said that a peacekeeping force with any NATO countries involved was “of course completely unacceptable”. Which is but one example of the main problem: Ukraine wants a deal that protects its sovereignty - which would kinda defeat the whole purpose of Russia’s invasion.

Now to Trump and the US. Over the weekend, I drafted the following: 

But on Tuesday, Trump claimed that Zelensky had only a 4% approval rating (super not true) and said that Ukraine “should have never started it [the war]” and should have “made a deal” instead. The next day, he went even further, calling Zelensky a “dictator” and threatening that “Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left”.

That's dark, even for Trump. I’m out of analysis. I have no idea what this guy’s plan is, if he has one at all, and what he will do next.

But here’s what I do know: This country yearns for peace. The fathers who have fought in the trenches for years are exhausted. The sons who will have to follow in their footsteps are terrified. But they will not agree to a deal which would only permit Russia to kill them - and wipe out their country - a little while later. They will continue to fight, be it with American aid or just with whatever the Europeans manage to scrape together.

Now: I owe you an apology. When I started this newsletter, I made a you a promise: To send you a newsletter every month. One year on, I have spectacularly failed to deliver on that promise. For that I am deeply sorry. 

I guess couldn’t meet the standard I set for myself—my Documents folder is a scrapyard of half-finished newsletters.

There’s another thing that sidetracked me: I got to publish my first big story in “Das Magazin. You can read it here. You should :).

I am still very thankful for your support, especially to paying members, it enabled me to do what I am doing. However, I totally get if if you want your money back. Just email me at nino.preuss(at)mailfence(dot)com from the email you signed up with. I’ll refund you for the months without a post, no questions asked. To manage your subscription, you can click here.

I am not sure what exactly this newsletter will become next. I want to keep doing something with it but haven’t figured what. I’ll let you know when I do. For now, this is an irregular blog about life in Ukraine by me, a 20-year-old guy from Switzerland. If you keep supporting me, please be aware of that.

Thanks for sticking around. Now that this piece is finished, and the nightly drone attacks seem to be over, I'm going to try and get some sleep. I may have to go to the nearby bomb shelter soon: Russian long-range bombers are flying towards Ukraine. This is often a sign that a major attack is imminent. We'll see.