The Berlin Leaders' Statement on Ukraine (December 15, 2025)

The Berlin Leaders' Statement on Ukraine (December 15, 2025) - my thoughts on its strengths and weaknesses.

Anton Gerashchenko.

◼️What is this document, and why is it called a "step forward":

The Berlin Leaders' Statement on Ukraine is a joint political statement by a group of European leaders and the EU leadership against the backdrop of active negotiations to end the war.

Its main difference from previous "vague guarantees" is that it is not limited to the words "we support Ukraine," but attempts to describe how security guarantees should work: a strong Ukrainian army + European participation + the role of the US in monitoring the ceasefire. This is definitely a step forward, but it will only be effective when clear details emerge, including who does what, for how much money, and according to what rules.

◼️What exactly is being proposed (briefly):

The Statement says that the issue of territories should not be resolved "in exchange for a pause" - robust security guarantees must come first. Then, the following commitments are described: support for Ukraine's defense with a target of approximately 800,000 armed forces in peacetime; creation of a European multinational force within the Coalition of the Willing with US support - to help Ukraine restore its military capabilities and secure our skies and seas; a US-led mechanism for monitoring⤵️

and verifying the ceasefire; and a formula for a "legally binding" response to a renewed attack (but with the proviso that each country acts according to its own internal rules).

◼️Strengths:

The strongest aspect here is that the guarantees are presented as a package that should work together, rather than as a set of well-meaning words. The first pillar is Ukraine itself: a large, well-trained army as a "first shield" that makes another attack less advantageous.

The second is European participation: an additional level of support after the ceasefire. The third is the US as an "anchor": monitoring compliance with the ceasefire increases the chance of quickly identifying violations and responding to them. This three-layered program is an attempt to move closer to the logic of "strong guarantees" without formal NATO membership.

The second strength is the order of actions: security first, then discussions about territories.

This is important as a signal that territories should not become a "down payment" for a truce.

Third, the statement attempts to link security to a broader Ukrainian-European track: recovery, discussion of frozen assets, and the prospect of EU membership.

◼️Weaknesses and risks:

The main problem is a lack of specifics about the European multinational force.

There are general functions, but almost no answers to key questions: how many people, where exactly they will be, who will command them, what rules for the use of force will apply, and what to do in case of provocations or escalation. Without clear rules, this could become a "symbolic presence" that does not deter.

The second weakness is the formula "legally binding, subject to national procedures.

" In practice, this means that decisions can be made differently and at different speeds in different countries. And the enemy can count on the allies' response being slow or uneven.

The third risk is dependence on the US. The role of the US in verifying and supporting the coalition force increases reliability, but makes the whole program vulnerable to changes in Washington's policy and the US's willingness to adhere to this for a long time.

The fourth point concerns resources and capabilities.

Even if a political decision is made, such a force requires long-term funding and expensive capabilities (air defense, aviation, logistics, command and control, intelligence).

◼️Conclusion: it's a step forward, but not a ready-made solution.

This is a step forward in creating the conditions for lasting peace, because for the first time, "guarantees" are described as a system rather than general words.

But it is not yet a ready-made plan, because it lacks details: clear rules, real contributions from countries, the role of the US "in numbers and commitments," and understandable legal procedures.

This plan can also be called a step forward for European security because the document records a shift toward European leadership in "strong" security: Europe is taking on the role of organizer of the coalition and multinational force, while the US is defined as a key "anchor" in monitoring and support.

This is a change in logic - from "ask Washington" to "Europe acts, Washington reinforces."The statement was adopted by the following leaders and EU institutional heads: António Costa (President of the European Council), Ursula von der Leyen (President of the European Commission), Mette Frederiksen (Prime Minister of Denmark), Alexander Stubb (President of Finland), Emmanuel Macron (President of France), Friedrich Merz (Chancellor of Germany), Giorgia Meloni (Prime Minister of Italy),⤵️

Dick Schoof (Prime Minister of the Netherlands), Jonas Gahr Støre (Prime Minister of Norway), Donald Tusk (Prime Minister of Poland), Ulf Kristersson (Prime Minister of Sweden), and Keir Starmer (Prime Minister of the United Kingdom).

https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2025/12/15/leaders-statement-on-ukraine/

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, June 7, 2025 - Institute for the Study of War

 O Institute for the Study of War, o mais categorizado think tank nesse terreno, oferece sua mais recente avaliação sobre a guerra de agressão da Rússia contra a Ucrânia:

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, June 7, 2025
Jun 7, 2025 - ISW Press
Olivia Gibson, Anna Harvey, Christina Harward, and George Barros with William Runkel and Nate Trotter
June 7, 2025, 4:15 pm ET
Note: The data cut-off for this product was 11:45 am ET on June 7. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the June 8 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

Russia baselessly accused Ukraine of failing to conduct a prisoner of war (POW) exchange and to repatriate the bodies of killed in action (KIA) soldiers on June 6 — part of the Kremlin's efforts to undermine mutually agreed upon confidence building measures with Ukraine. Russian Presidential Aide Vladimir Medinsky, Russian First Deputy Chief of Information of the General Staff's Main Directorate (GRU) Alexander Zorin, and Russian Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin claimed on June 7 that Russia was prepared to exchange severely wounded and sick POWs, POWs under the age of 25, and 6,000 bodies of KIA soldiers on June 6 as Russia and Ukraine agreed to during the most recent bilateral talks in Istanbul on June 2.[1] Zorin further claimed that Russian representatives waited for Ukrainian representatives on the border of Belarus to work out the technicalities involved in exchanging the bodies, but that Ukrainian representatives never arrived, and Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) Spokesperson Maria Zakharova and Deputy Chairperson of the Federation Council Committee on International Affairs Andrei Klimov claimed that Ukraine refused to repatriate the KIA bodies. The Ukrainian Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of POWs refuted Russian officials' claims and clarified that Ukraine and Russia have not yet agreed upon a date for the repatriation of the bodies and that the two parties are still finalizing lists for the POW exchange.[2] The Ukrainian Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of POWs reiterated that Ukraine remains fully committed to engaging constructively to ensure the successful implementation of the KIA repatriation and POW exchange. The Kremlin remains committed to promoting narratives that vilify Ukraine, likely to socialize its domestic audience ahead of Russia's possible rejection of any peace agreement in the future and to discredit Ukraine on the international stage. The Kremlin's unwillingness to engage in good faith in lower-level confidence building measures designed to facilitate larger peace negotiations further demonstrates Russia's disinterest in peace negotiations.

Russian officials continue efforts to deflect blame away from Russia and onto Western states for the lack of progress toward a peace settlement. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov accused European states of becoming the main obstacle to negotiating peace in Ukraine, as European states seek to disrupt negotiations on June 6.[3] Ryabkov also claimed that German Chancellor Friedrich Merz opposes peace in Ukraine and is trying to convince US President Donald Trump to return the United States to "the path of escalation" in the war.[4] Ryabkov claimed that the United States is aware that Russia will not stray — even in the face of threats of more sanctions — from its position on the need to eliminate the alleged "root causes" of the war (a phrase which Kremlin officials have repeatedly used to call for regime change in Ukraine and changes to NATO's open-door policy and other unilateral American concessions which the Trump administration described as being “too much“).[5] ISW continues to assess that Russia is uninterested in meaningful negotiations with Ukraine and is very likely setting information conditions to protract or possibly expand the war.[6]

US President Donald Trump signaled on June 6 that he could be willing to increase sanctions against Russia. Russia's economic struggles, however, have been and will continue to be driven by Russian military losses on the battlefield. Maximum US economic pressure against Russia is not possible without continued military sales to Ukraine. Trump stated to reporters on June 6 that he would be willing to "use [The Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025, a bill in the US Senate] if it's necessary" and impose additional sanctions on Russia if Russia demonstrates that it will not "make a deal" or stop fighting.[7] The Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025 has wide bipartisan support in the US Senate and has 82 cosponsors as of June 7.[8]

Any increased economic pressure against Russia — while a positive policy development — by itself is insufficient to force Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table or change Putin’s theory of victory. The continuation of Western military aid to Ukraine remains pivotal to the execution of a pressure campaign against Russia that could force Putin to recalculate his theory of victory.[9] Putin's theory of victory rests on the assumption that the Russian military can sustain creeping, incremental advances on the battlefield longer than Ukrainian forces can defend and longer than the West is willing to support Ukraine. Putin's strategy will very likely continue to guide his decision to refuse to engage substantively with the United States and Ukraine in peace negotiations. Achieving a peace in Ukraine that is acceptable for US interests necessitates sustained Russian battlefield losses or a significant Russian battlefield setback. The United States must continue equipping Ukrainian soldiers as Russia’s battlefield losses remain the key driver of Russia's current materiel, manpower, and economic problems. Western aid, particularly of weapons systems that only the United States can provide at scale and quickly, would allow Ukrainian forces to better defend their positions, slow Russian advances, and inflict even more serious losses on the Russian military. Higher and even more unsustainable Russian casualty rates on the battlefield, particularly when they are disproportionate to the territorial gains they generate, would risk Putin's efforts to balance "butter and guns" and maintain domestic support.

Key Takeaways:

Russia baselessly accused Ukraine of failing to conduct a prisoner of war (POW) exchange and to repatriate the bodies of killed in action (KIA) soldiers on June 6 – part of the Kremlin's efforts to undermine mutually agreed upon confidence building measures with Ukraine.
Russian officials continue efforts to deflect blame away from Russia and onto Western states for the lack of progress toward a peace settlement.
US President Donald Trump signaled on June 6 that he could be willing to increase sanctions against Russia. Russia's economic struggles, however, have been and will continue to be driven by Russian military losses on the battlefield. Maximum US economic pressure against Russia is not possible without continued military sales to Ukraine.
Any increased economic pressure against Russia – while a positive policy development – by itself is insufficient to force Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table or change Putin’s theory of victory.
Ukrainian forces advanced near Toretsk. Russian forces advanced in northern Sumy Oblast and near Kupyansk, Novopavlivka, Kurakhove, and Velyka Novosilka.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-june-7-2025

Russia's economy can't afford to win or lose the war in Ukraine, one economist says - Jennifer Sor (Business Insider)

A dependência viciosa da economia russa da guerra na Ucrânia: ela não pode vencer, nem perder, no sentido em que ela não pode largar a guerra, pois toda a sua economia está agora dominada pela guerra. (PRA) 

Russia's economy can't afford to win or lose the war in Ukraine, one economist says

Jennifer Sor

Business Insider, Feb 23, 2024

https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-economy-ukraine-war-moscow-military-spending-inflation-worker-shortage-2024-2

• That's because Russia can't afford the cost of rebuilding and securing Ukraine.
• The cost of repairing its own nation is already "massive," Renaud Foucart says.

• 
  
• - Russia's economy can't afford to win or lose the war in Ukraine, one economist says.
• - That's because Russia can't afford the cost of rebuilding and securing Ukraine.
• - The cost of repairing its own nation is already "massive," Renaud Foucart says.

Russia's economy is completely dominated by its war in Ukraine, so much that Moscow cannot afford either to win or lose the war, according to one European economist.

Renaud Foucart, a senior economics lecturer at Lancaster University, pointed to the dire economic situation facing Russia as the war in Ukraine wraps up its second year. 

Russia's GDP grew 5.5% year-over-year over the third quarter of 2023, according to data from the Russian government. But most of that growth is being fueled by the nation's monster military spending, Foucart said, with plans for the Kremlin to spend a record 36.6 trillion rubles, or $386 billion on defense this year.

"Military pay, ammunition, tanks, planes, and compensation for dead and wounded soldiers, all contribute to the GDP figures. Put simply, the war against Ukraine is now the main driver of Russia's economic growth" Foucart said in an op-ed for The Conversation this week.

Other areas of Russia's economy are hurting as the war drags on. Moscow is slammed with a severe labor shortage, thanks to young professionals fleeing the country or being pulled into the conflict. The nation is now short around 5 million workers, according to one estimate, which is causing wages to soar.

Inflation is high at 7.4% — nearly double the 4% target of its central bank. Meanwhile, direct investment in the country has collapsed, falling around $8.7 billion in the first three quarters of 2023, per data from Russia's central bank.

That all puts the Kremlin in a tough position, no matter the outcome of the war in Ukraine. Even if Russia wins, the nation can't afford to rebuild and secure Ukraine, due to the financial costs as well as the impact of remaining isolated from the rest of the global market. 

Western nations have shunned trade with Russia since it invaded Ukraine in 2022, which economists have said could severely crimp Russia's long-term economic growth.

As long as it remains isolated, Russia's "best hope" is to become "entirely dependent" on China, one of its few remaining strategic allies, Foucart said.

Meanwhile, the costs of rebuilding its own nation are already "massive," he added, pointing to problems like broken infrastructure and social unrest in Russia.

"A protracted stalemate might be the only solution for Russia to avoid total economic collapse," Foucart wrote. "The Russian regime has no incentive to end the war and deal with that kind of economic reality. So it cannot afford to win the war, nor can it afford to lose it. Its economy is now entirely geared towards continuing a long and ever deadlier conflict."

Other economists have warned of trouble coming for Russia amid the toll of its war in Ukraine. Russia's economy will see significantly more degradation ahead, one London-based think tank recently warned, despite talk of Russia's resilience in the face of Western sanctions.

GZero on Russia and its war of aggression against Ukraine

 Excelent GZero!

Tomorrow, Feb. 24, marks the second anniversary of Russia’s brutal war against Ukraine — a perfect time to reflect on the most pivotal moments of the past 24 months. Check out our timeline here.

https://gzeromedia.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=7404e6dcdc8018f49c82e941d&id=57e38ee215&e=96ffb72608

Russia’s last independent pollster tells me how Putin does it

   

By Alex Kliment, Senior Writer

How does Vladimir Putin manage to keep this up? For all the destruction he’s visited on Ukraine, his invasion has also inflicted so much damage on Russia.

There are the financial and economic costs. There’s the diplomatic isolation. There’s the exodus of hundreds of thousands of Russians who’d rather bet on a future abroad than support Putin’s war for the past at home. 

But above all, there are the dead. The Kremlin doesn’t announce casualty figures, but a running tally by the BBC and the independent Russian outlet Mediazona estimates that at least 45,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in Ukraine. 

To put that in perspective, it’s triple the number of Soviets killed in the USSR’s decade-long invasion of Afghanistan, often described as the “Kremlin’s Vietnam.” 

In fact, it surpasses the number of Soviet and Russian troops killed in the entire period between 1945 and 2022, a period that also includes the Kremlin’s ham-fisted and initially disastrous bid to suppress Chechen separatists and jihadists in the 1990s. To put it in American terms, those 45,000 dead would amount to 100,000 flag-draped caskets in the United States. 

And yet, there’s hardly been a peep from Russian society. 

To find out why, I sent a note to Lev Gudkov in Moscow. Gudkov is the academic director of the Levada Center, Russia’s last remaining independent pollster. I last saw him in person in 2018, at his messy office on Nikolskaya Street — a ritzy pedestrian boulevard — that’s just a five-minute walk from the Kremlin, which has long considered Levada a “foreign agent.” 

At 77, Lev has the weary, knowing demeanor of a man who has spent his life asking questions in a society that is increasingly wary of answering them.

The Kremlin has pressured Levada over the years but always seemed to allow it to continue its work. Even autocrats, after all, need to know what their people are comfortable saying to strangers. 

“The people don’t know how many are dead and wounded,” he told me. More than 60% of Russians get their news primarily from state-controlled TV, which will shout at you about neo-Nazis in Kyiv, perverts who run Europe, or cats thrown from Russian trains — but will not tell you about the bodybags coming home from Ukraine. 

People who do speak out about casualties are arrested, harassed or, on occasion, driven to suicide, which is what happened this week to a hawkish military blogger who suggested Russia had lost 16,000 troops in its recent campaign for a single Ukrainian town.

Another problem, to adapt a Vietnam-era protest line, is that the Russians dying in Ukraine “ain’t no Gazprom executive’s son.” 

“The funerals are held by individual families,” says Gudkov, “and its overwhelmingly conscripts from marginalized social groups who don’t have the power to mobilize.” 

A look at the casualty map bears this out. Young men in remote and relatively poor Russian provinces like Tuva or Buryatia, for example, are up to 45 times as likely to die as their counterparts in Moscow or St. Petersburg. 

All of this makes perfect sense. Russians don’t know about the casualties, face huge consequences for trying to find out, and are victim to the propaganda mill that keeps support for Putin above 80% and approval of his war not far behind. 

But blaming this sort of collective delusion simply on a Very Bad Autocrat™ is too easy. The reality is that it can happen in democracies too, and it does. 

On the eve of the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, for example, I looked at a poll that showed 72% of the population approving of their government’s decision to launch a disastrous, unprovoked war. 

But it wasn’t from Russia. It was from the US, and it was taken in 2003 to gauge popular support for the invasion of Iraq. 

Say what you will about the failure of mainstream media to question the WMD narrative — and there is lots to say — but the US was, and is, a pluralistic paradise compared to today’s Russia. 

But even so, it took four whole years of debacle in Iraq for a majority of Americans to finally decidethat the invasion was a “bad decision.”

The emergence of social media in the years since has hardly helped. Nearly 20% of Americans today say pop star Taylor Swift was engaged in a Deep State psyop to sway the next election, while a third of Americans still think the last one was “stolen.” And as many as half of Hillary Clinton’svoters once believed Trump’s victory was the result of Russian tampering with vote tallies. None of the above is true. 

The point is that you don’t actually have to live under the sway of a late-stage autocrat who controls the airwaves to believe bad, stupid, or crazy things. 

A badly contaminated news environment can in some ways be as bad as a tightly controlled one. 

 

 

Russia is winning? Winning what?

   

Western press coverage of Ukraine’s war has shifted. Today, there are few stories about determined, resourceful Ukrainian fighters pushing back Russian invaders and regaining lost ground. Most current coverage focuses on Ukraine’s exhaustion, its wavering Western backers, and Vladimir Putin's recent swagger.

Yes, as my friend Alex Kliment noted yesterday, Ukraine’s future is genuinely uncertain. Its material losses are far heavier than Russia’s, mainly because the war has been fought almost entirely on Ukrainian land. Damage to its trade and infrastructure shrank Ukraine’s economy by 29.1% in 2022 before the return home of some of the country’s millions of refugees brought a modest rebound last year. EU membership remains a distant dream.

Russia’s economy has notably strengthened. This country of 140 million people (Ukraine now has fewer than 40 million) has far more young men to push to the front, more industrial capacity, and far more natural resources to sell to finance the carnage. Its troops are deeply dug in to defend the 18% of Ukrainian territory they still hold.

Since invading Crimea 10 years ago on Feb. 27, 2014, and destabilizing the Donbas region a few weeks later, the Russian government has wisely kept foreign debt low, reducing the country’s vulnerability to Western sanctions. The war has boosted Russia’s economy by sending weapons production into overdrive, and despite Europe’s bold move to halt the import of Russian energy, Russia now sells more oil to energy-thirsty customers in China and India.

Finally, critics of aid for Ukraine in America and Europe are growing more politically aggressive. Fears that Donald Trump will again become president, abandon Kyiv, and perhaps yank the US from the transatlantic alliance encourage bravado from Putin and weigh heavily on European minds. 

So … is Russia winning? Let’s look at the bigger picture here.

https://gzeromedia.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=7404e6dcdc8018f49c82e941d&id=3c98d38c9b&e=96ffb72608 

A Igreja Ortodoxa Russa declara que o pacifismo é uma heresia e apoia o morticínio entre cristãos - Center for Defense Studies

 International and relevant Russia’s news 

CDS, June 11, 2023

In a politically motivated case, the Russian Orthodox Church's Court declared pacifism a heresy, alien to the Church. The reason for such a verdict was an anti-war statement made by Priest Ioann Burdin, "we Christians do not dare to stand aside when a brother kills a brother; a Christian kills a Christian. We cannot bashfully close our eyes and call black on white, evil on good, say that Abel was probably wrong when he provoked his older brother." 

"His pacifism is imaginary, one-sidedly oriented, his anti-Russian political position is clearly visible behind him, perceived in our country as unacceptable, and, it is important to emphasize, radically at odds with the position of the Russian Orthodox Church," the verdict reads. 

Meanwhile, Ukraine's Orthodox Church held a liturgy for the first time in more than three centuries, praying for the repose of Hetman (military ruler) Ivan Mazepa in the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. Hetman Ivan Mazepa was a close ally of Moscow's Tsar Peter I but turned to Swedish King Charles XII when the Muscovite refused to honor an agreement and help to defend Ukraine. "Ukraine's Hetman, calm and bold" inspired Lord Byron to write a poem in his name (Mazeppa). By order of Tsar Peter I, the Moscow Church imposed an anathema to the Hetman Ivan Mazepa. In September 2018, the Ecumenical Patriarch and the Synod of the Patriarchate of Constantinople stated that they never recognized the validity of the anathema of Ivan Mazepa because it was imposed purely for political reasons. 

Both cases prove that the Russian Orthodox Church has been a political tool of Russian rulers throughout the centuries.

"In Russia's wars, the very senselessness seems to be the sense," Peter Pomerantsev argued about the Russian death cult in the Guardian. "In a culture such as Russia's, where avoiding facing up to the dark past with all its complex webs of guilt and responsibility is commonplace, such oblivion can be especially seductive." 

"Putin's war has become the war of all Russians. His legacy will remain part of their legacy, and it will continue to weigh heavily on their domestic affairs and the country's relationship with the rest of the world," wrote Eugene Rumer of the Carnegie Endowment for Foreign Affairs. 

Source: Center For Defense Studies (Ukraine)

Daily Brief CDS <cds.dailybrief@gmail.com>

At U.S. behest, Ukraine held off anniversary attacks on Russia - Shane Harris and Isabelle Khurshudyan (The Washington Post)

THE DISCORD LEAKS

At U.S. behest, Ukraine held off anniversary attacks 

on Russia

Kyiv’s head of military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, planned bold strikes deep behind enemy lines that unnerved officials in Washington

By Shane Harris

 and 

Isabelle Khurshudyan

The Washington Post, April 24, 2023 at 5:00 a.m. EDT

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/04/24/discord-leaks-moscow-strikes-ukraine/

In February, with the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine days away, officials in Kyiv were busy making plans to attack Moscow.

Maj. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the country’s military intelligence directorate, the HUR, instructed one of his officers “to get ready for mass strikes on 24 February … with everything the HUR had,” according to a classified report from the U.S. National Security Agency. Officials even mused about a sea-based strike using TNT in the Black Sea port city of Novorossiysk, a largely symbolic operation that would nevertheless demonstrate Ukraine’s ability to hit deep inside enemy territory.

Back in Washington, officials were secretly monitoring the Ukrainians’ plans. The White House had long worried that attacks inside Russia could provoke an aggressive response from the Kremlin.

On Feb. 22, two days before the anniversary, the CIA circulated a new classified report: The HUR “had agreed, at Washington’s request, to postpone strikes” on Moscow. The documents, part of a trove of classified information allegedly leaked on a gaming server by a 21-year-old member of the National Guard, don’t explain precisely who interceded and why the Ukrainians agreed to stand down.

But they offer a specific example of a broader tension that has characterized much of the war: Ukraine, eager to bring the fight to Russia’s home turf, is sometimes restrained by the United States, which has consistently tried to avoid escalating the conflict into a direct fight between U.S. and Russian forces. Some U.S. officials see attacks on Russia, particularly if they involve U.S.-supplied weapons, as highly risky operations that Russian President Vladimir Putin could find so threatening that he resorts to using tactical nuclear weapons.

And yet mysterious explosions and drone strikes continue to happen in Russia. Ukrainian officials are often coy about the incidents, hinting that they’re responsible without directly taking credit.

“The Earth is round — discovery made by Galileo,” presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak wrote on Twitter in December after an attack on the Engels-2 air force base, deep inside Russia. “If something is launched into other countries’ airspace, sooner or later unknown flying objects will return to departure point.”

Operations on foreign soil fall under the HUR’s purview. Budanov, an ambitious 37-year-old general and rising star in the Ukrainian military, doesn’t acknowledge that his agency is behind the attacks. But he has warned they will continue.

“This shattered their illusions of safety,” Budanov told The Washington Post in January. “There are people who plant explosives. There are drones. Until the territorial integrity of Ukraine is restored, there will be problems inside Russia.”

Budanov did not comment for this article. U.S. officials did not comment on the leaked documents about anniversary strikes.

Privately, U.S. and European officials express their admiration for Budanov. But they also say his audacity sometimes makes them nervous.

On Feb. 13, the day that the NSA document said Budanov had instructed one of his officers to be ready for an operation presumably aimed at Novorossiysk, the United States repeated its public advisory for citizens in Russia to leave the country immediately. It’s not clear that the warning anticipated an aggressive Ukrainian strike, but it appears to reflect a level of concern in Washington about attacks around the anniversary.

Budanov is known for bold claims and pronouncements, which many Western officials regard skeptically. He has said that Putin is terminally ill, an assertion that U.S. intelligence officials have rejected, and that he uses multiple body doubles. Budanov exudes confidence that Ukraine will prevail over Russia — and soon. He has said that Crimea, the highly fortified peninsula Russia illegally annexed in 2014, must be returned to Kyiv this summer. The leaked documents show the U.S. intelligence community views that scenario as unlikely.

The documents also make clear that the U.S. intelligence community is monitoring Budanov’s communications, which seems not to be news to the general. In past interviews with The Post, Budanov, perhaps aware that he was being spied on, has played music or static noise in his office at HUR headquarters. 

Washington’s intercession ahead of the war’s anniversary appears to have been only partially successful. “There is no indication” that Ukraine’s security service, the SBU, “agreed to postpone its own plans to attack Moscow around the same date,” the CIA report said. The SBU, which is responsible for state security and reports directly to the president, also conducts special operations.

Ukraine appears not to have held its fire for long. A week after the anniversary, Moscow publicly accused Kyiv of attempting drone strikes on infrastructure in Russia, including near the capital.

Ukraine continues to have ambitions to expand the battlefield beyond its home territory, the classified documents show. Budanov’s agency made plans to attack members of the notorious Russian military contractor Wagner Group in Mali, where personnel provide security assistance to the Malian government and training for its military, the documents state. Wagner has played a pivotal role in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and provides essential front-line support to Russian military forces.

“It is unknown what stage the operations [in Mali] were currently in and whether the HUR has received approval to execute its plans,” the NSA document says.

The HUR also developed plans to conduct covert attacks on Russian forces in Syria using secret Kurdish help. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky halted the offensive, but one of the intelligence documents details how Budanov’s agency could still launch deniable attacks that would avoid implicating the Ukrainian government itself.

Officials in Washington and Europe have admonished Ukraine for attacks outside its territory that they felt went too far. After a car bomb near Moscow in August killed Daria Dugina, in an attack that appeared intended for her father — a Russian nationalist whose writing had helped to shape a Kremlin narrative about Ukraine — Western officials said they made clear to Zelensky that they held operatives in his government responsible. The attack was seen as provocative and risked a severe Russian response, officials said.

U.S. officials are also concerned that Beijing is likely to view attacks by Ukraine inside Russia as “an opportunity to cast NATO as the aggressor,” and that China could increase its support to Russia if it felt the attacks were “significant,” according to other classified documents contained in the trove.

So far, officials have said there is no indication that China has granted Russia’s request for lethal military aid. However, a Ukrainian attack on Moscow using weapons provided by the United States or NATO would probably indicate to Beijing that “Washington was directly responsible for escalating the conflict” and provide possible justification for China to arm Russia, the analysis concludes.

The United States prohibits Ukraine from using American weaponry to strike Russia. One Ukrainian official, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, pointed to an attack in December on a Russian strategic bomber base using Ukrainian-made drones as evidence that Kyiv was adhering to the rules Washington has imposed.

Ukrainian officials have long privately said that the United States has de facto control over some military operations. For example, Kyiv typically won’t fire its advanced U.S.-provided rocket systems without coordinates confirmed or provided by U.S. military personnel from a base in Europe, to ensure the strikes’ accuracy and conserve artillery.

A senior Ukrainian official said that Kyiv’s willingness not to fire on certain targets and to coordinate with the Americans should encourage the United States to provide more modern and longer-range weapons, such as the Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, a munition that can travel up to 185 miles. Biden administration officials have declined to provide the weapon, which is in limited supply and might be seen by Russia as an escalation by the United States, officials have said.

The strikes in Russia have been a morale booster for Ukrainian citizens, who have taken to calling the billowing smoke from the mysterious explosions “bavovna,” or “cotton.” Stores sell T-shirts with cotton flowers blooming on the Kremlin’s walls, and cotton bouquets are popular gifts.

The attacks may be getting to Putin, too. Citing security concerns, he recently opted to cancel some regional Victory Day parades celebrating the upcoming anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany. May 9 is considered one of Russia’s most important holidays and an opportunity for the Kremlin to flex its military muscle with a display of tanks and other weaponry in central Moscow.

Khurshudyan reported from Kyiv.