Victory Brings Its Own Dangers
With each step Ukraine takes toward winning, the lack of consensus around its war aims looms larger.
Last weekend I was in Kyiv, where European, American, and Ukrainian officials were mingling with journalists and policy experts at the Yalta European Strategy conference. With Ukrainian troops liberating Izium, Balakliya, and other northeastern towns, the atmosphere was triumphant. Until the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014, the conference had been held in Yalta, and some participants began to speculate that, given the Ukrainian military’s sweeping gains, the conference might soon return to its original home. And as the meeting ended, here and there I heard: “See you next year in Yalta.”
When President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived early on the first
