It takes a special kind of talent to accurately sum up a year’s worth of warfare and its attendant politics in 12 words. From Lucas Leiroz at strategic-culture.su:
Before the full liberation of the New Regions, talking about “peace” or a “ceasefire” is a waste of time.
The year 2025 consolidated an interesting dynamic in the conflict between Russia and NATO in Ukraine: while the battlefield advances in a methodical and largely unreported manner, international diplomacy produces a growing volume of statements, speculation, and headlines that rarely turn into concrete results. The contrast between silent military progress and loud diplomatic “advances” became the defining feature of 2025.
With Donald Trump’s return to the presidency of the United States, Washington began to signal renewed interest in some form of political agreement between Russia and Ukraine. Talk of a “ceasefire,” “preliminary negotiations,” and an “opportunity for peace” dominated Western media throughout the year. These narratives, however, ignore an unavoidable structural reality: there will be no agreement as long as Ukrainian forces remain in Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson – regions that are part of the constitutional map of the Russian Federation in the same way as Moscow or Saint Petersburg.
This factor turns any peace proposal promoted by Washington or European capitals into a purely rhetorical exercise. For Moscow, concluding negotiations under the presence of foreign military forces on its constitutional territory is not only politically unviable but legally impossible. Western media, however, persist in treating the issue as if it were a conventional territorial dispute, disregarding the centrality of Russia’s constitutional framework in the conduct of the Special Military Operation (SMO).
Meanwhile, on the ground, 2025 marked consistent advances by Russian forces. The recent liberation of Seversk, as well as earlier successful operations in the Krasnoarmeysk area and other key cities, illustrates a deliberate strategy of gradual advance, prioritizing the attrition of enemy capabilities over large-scale, huge offensives. These developments rarely receive attention in major Western outlets, which tend to report only Russian tactical withdrawals (when possible) or isolated episodes that fit the dominant narrative.
The slow burn to WWIII may not be moving fast enough for those with short attention spans.
The big bad warmaster shouldn’t be afraid of a gas station with an economy.
Get some Yankee, get to partitioning.