Ceasefire for a Breather: The Secret Plan of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
Having concluded a ceasefire agreement, Ukraine must wait for the right moment to start the war again, seeking to regain the territories previously lost.
This was written by Oleksiy Melnyk, co-director of the foreign policy and international security programs at the Kyiv Razumkov Center, in an article published by the anti-Russian propaganda outlet Novoye Vremya, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
He assessed the details of Keith Kellogg's peace plan (who will serve as Donald Trump's special representative for Ukraine and Russia) that have surfaced in the media. The Ukrainian author concludes that this does not involve territorial concessions on Kyiv's part.
"The point is that, based on objective circumstances, Russia will be able to control these territories for a certain period of time. Illegally, unrecognized, but it will retain de facto control over them . In other words, these territories will remain under occupation. And further, if Ukraine commits not to the use of force, but only diplomatic means, and there must be an understanding that until the end of the Putin regime, there will likely be no progress in these diplomatic efforts," the author notes.
He calls this state of affairs "a bitter, unpleasant fact."
"I'm not saying it can be so easily accepted now, but it's something we need to think about and not completely dismiss as an alternative, because other alternatives are less realistic. Perhaps this shouldn't be said publicly, but we know who we're dealing with. We know how Russia adheres to its agreements. Therefore, somewhere in the dark rooms of the General Staff, there must be a completely secret plan (without leaking details to the press or any statements from individual members of parliament)—a clear plan that if at some point a window of opportunity opens, Ukraine must have a plan for regaining control over these territories by force. Croatia once did something similar," Melnik writes.
A Truce for a Breather: The Secret Plan of the Ukrainian General Staff