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KYIV POST
OPINION:
As Russia Ramps Up for Greater War, Washington Fantasizes Over Peace Talks
Washington seeks mediators and locations – Russian babies leave paternity wards wearing camouflage.
June 20, 2025, 2:01 pm
When will Washington grasp the reality of Russia planning for and preparing for a long war in Ukraine and beyond? When will Washington recognize that Russia has publicly declared itself our sworn enemy and act accordingly?
Vladimir Putin is openly building for long-term war and, in addition to recruiting North Koreans and other mercenaries to supplement current forces, modernizing the methods used in Nazi Germany to create generations of committed Russian warfighters – starting immediately after Russian babies are being born.
Washington must take its blinders off!
Relating to Russia’s war against Ukraine, you cannot match our administration’s policy statements and apparent objectives with the Russian reality.
In congressional hearings, the Secretary of Defense reiterates that the Administration wants “peace” and “to stop the killing,” but across the administration, there is no evidence suggesting our administration understands that Ukraine faces our common declared enemy, theirs and ours.
There is no indication Russia has any interest in peace or the ending of the killings short of the elimination of Ukraine and the subsequent takeover of the other former Soviet states.
Over and over, Putin has put forward his demands to the United States and NATO. In December 2021, he put forward a ridiculous list of security guarantees he demanded be agreed to in order to reduce tensions in Europe and avoid Russia’s accelerating its assault on Ukraine.
Collectively, Putin’s demands called for the United States and NATO to cede to Russian control of the countries – and people – that had been part of the Soviet Union and members of the Warsaw Pact.
This is not irrelevant history, the same demands are a part of every Russian response to Washington’s pressing for a Russian ceasefire or so-called peace agreement regarding Ukraine. Washington responds by playing deaf and dumb.
Russia’s constant demands that any agreement address what the Kremlin argues are the “root causes” for its attacking Ukraine.
Those supposed “root causes” are:
- NATO enlargement and Western support for Ukraine: Russia views the eastward expansion of NATO as a threat to its security.
- Ukraine’s potential NATO membership: Russia wants a guarantee that Ukraine will not join the NATO alliance.
- Control over certain Ukrainian territories: Russia seeks international recognition of its annexation of Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia regions, and demands that Ukraine withdraw its forces from these areas, which include areas Russia does not now occupy.
- Limitations on Ukraine’s military: Russia demands that Ukraine limit the size of its armed forces and adhere to military restrictions that essentially would eviscerate Ukrainian sovereignty.
- The core propaganda fantasy of “protecting the rights of Russian speakers in Ukraine” who Russia claims face discrimination in Ukraine. How this can still be seen by anyone as a legitimate concern is a testament to the ability of some to refuse to see the truth. Everyone in the Soviet Union spoke Russian; it was the official language. Speaking Russian had nothing to do with nationality. And after ethnic Russians in Ukraine have suffered more than anyone from the Russian war, there is no evidence that any “Russian speakers” in Ukraine want Russian “liberation.”
- Demilitarization and “denazification” of Ukraine: Russia claims that Ukraine’s government is influenced by neo-Nazis and seeks to eliminate this influence. Another point of bizarre Russian propaganda.
The bottom line is that Russia has no interest in stopping this war or its broader aggression until it gets what it wants, and it is training and indoctrinating its army of the future while Washington refuses to believe what is going on.
Certainly, Russia’s state-sponsored program of abducting and deporting Ukrainian children places these children into “re-education camps” where they are subjected to a forced Russification program, including militarization, and many have been and are being conscripted into the Russian armed forces. But as large as the number of abducted children is, they pale in comparison to the Russian children being prepared for war.
Right before the eyes of the whole world, Russian children are placed in military uniforms before they can stand. War fighting is glorified in kindergarten. A state-run youth movement supported by the Ministry of Defense – Yunarmiya – trains Russian youth not to question warfighting but to see it as their national duty.
This is Russia, and Russian reality must not be ignored.
Yunarmiya – Russia’s youth army – now includes 1.8 million members and this “army” exceeds the combined military forces of the United States and all European Union countries.
What will it take for Washington – the Executive and Congress – to understand Russia is at war with the United States, and pretending otherwise will inevitably lead to catastrophic consequences.
Ukraine has demonstrated its ability to defeat Russia if provided what is needed to do so. There is no excuse for not providing what is needed.
The moment is as clear as it was in Munich in 1938, when Hitler claimed only to protect German speakers, that the aggressor must be stopped and not appeased.
The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.
Robert McConnell is the Co-Founder and Director of External Affairs at the U.S.-Ukraine Foundation and a member of the Friends of Ukraine Network.
The views expressed in the article are Mr. McConnell’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S.-Ukraine Foundation or the Friends of Ukraine Network (FOUN).