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As the world watches the Russian invasion of Ukraine unfold, UkraineAlert delivers the best Atlantic Council expert insight and analysis on Ukraine twice a week directly to your inbox.

editor’s picks

What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert May 13, 2025

Drone superpower: Ukrainian wartime innovation offers lessons for NATO

By David Kirichenko

Today’s Ukraine is now a drone superpower with an innovative domestic defense industry that can provide its NATO allies with important lessons in the realities of twenty-first century warfare, writes David Kirichenko.
Conflict Defense Industry
What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert May 6, 2025

The shadow of 1930s appeasement hangs over US-led peace talks

By Oleksandr Merezhko

As the world prepares to mark the eightieth anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany, the shadow of events leading up to World War II hangs over efforts to end Russia’s current invasion of Ukraine, writes Oleksandr Merezhko.
Conflict European Union
What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert Apr 17, 2025

The Ukrainian army is now Europe’s most credible security guarantee

By Pavlo Verkhniatskyi

As Europe confronts the new geopolitical realities of an expansionist Russia and an isolationist United States, the continent’s most credible security guarantee is now the Ukrainian Armed Forces, writes Pavlo Verkhniatskyi.
Conflict Defense Industry

Latest analysis

UkraineAlert

Jun 5, 2025

Russian hybrid warfare: Ukraine’s success offers lessons for Europe

By Maksym Beznosiuk

As the Kremlin continues to escalate its hybrid war against Europe, Ukraine’s unique experience since 2014 of combating Russian hybrid warfare offers important lessons, writes Maksym Beznosiuk.

Conflict Defense Policy

UkraineAlert

Jun 5, 2025

Trump’s Russia policy must be rooted in realism

By Agnia Grigas

The Trump administration favors a realist approach to international relations, but a pragmatic assessment of Russia’s capabilities and objectives is needed to achieve the stated goal of bringing the war in Ukraine to an end, writes Agnia Grigas.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Jun 3, 2025

Putin’s punitive peace terms are a call for Ukraine’s complete capitulation

By Peter Dickinson

Vladimir Putin’s punitive peace terms for Ukraine would leave the country at the mercy of the Kremlin and confirm his unwavering determination to erase Ukrainian statehood, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Jun 3, 2025

After Ukraine’s innovative airbase attacks, nowhere in Russia is safe

By David Kirichenko

Ukraine carried out one of the most audacious operations in modern military history on June 1, using swarms of smuggled drones to strike four Russian airbases simultaneously and destroy a significant portion of Putin’s bomber fleet, writes David Kirichenko.

Artificial Intelligence Conflict

UkraineAlert

May 29, 2025

UN probe: Russia’s ‘human safari’ in Ukraine is a crime against humanity

By Peter Dickinson

UN investigators have concluded that a coordinated Russian campaign of deadly drone strikes targeting civilians in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region is a crime against humanity, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict Drones

UkraineAlert

May 29, 2025

Judicial reform must be at the heart of Ukraine’s postwar recovery

By Oleksandr Vasiuk

Amid the horror and the trauma of Russia’s ongoing invasion, Ukrainians now have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to achieve transformational change in the country’s justice system. We must not miss this chance, writes Ukrainian MP Oleksandr Vasiuk.

Civil Society Conflict

UkraineAlert

May 29, 2025

Fiber optic drones could play decisive role in Russia’s summer offensive

By David Kirichenko

Russia’s emphasis on fiber optic drones is giving it a battlefield edge over Ukraine and may help Putin achieve a long hoped for breakthrough in his coming summer offensive, writes David Kirichenko.

Conflict Defense Industry

UkraineAlert

May 27, 2025

Russia is extinguishing all traces of Ukrainian identity in occupied Ukraine

By Kateryna Odarchenko

Throughout occupied Ukraine, the Russian authorities are seeking to consolidate their control by eradicating all traces of Ukrainian statehood and national identity while imposing a reign of terror on the civilian population, writes Kateryna Odarchenko.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

May 27, 2025

Russia’s summer offensive could spark a new humanitarian crisis in Ukraine

By Viktor Liakh, Melinda Haring

As the Russian army gears up for a major summer offensive, Ukraine could soon be facing its most serious humanitarian crisis since the initial phase of the full-scale invasion more than three years ago, write Viktor Liakh and Melinda Haring.

Civil Society Conflict

UkraineAlert

May 21, 2025

Putin aims to destroy Ukraine and has zero interest in a compromise peace

By Peter Dickinson

Russia’s ongoing campaign to destroy Ukraine as a state and as a nation is taking place in front of the watching world and makes a complete mockery of US-led efforts to broker some kind of compromise peace, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict Disinformation
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spotlight

Resilience in the face of adversity

Ukraine’s transformation

Ukraine has moved tentatively toward an open society and market economy since independence. The country has held several democratic elections and made halting progress in addressing corruption and state control in its economy. Since the 2014 Maidan Revolution, Ukraine has undertaken significant governance and economic reform and moved decisively toward a Europe-Atlantic foreign policy. Since 2022, Ukraine has resiliently continued to advance some reforms despite fighting for its very existence against the full-scale Russian invasion.

Learn more about Ukraine
What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert Dec 5, 2024

Ukraine’s entrepreneurial class can drive the country’s economic recovery

The Ukrainian SME sector has demonstrated remarkable wartime resilience and is poised to be at the forefront of efforts to create a modern, innovative, postwar economy, writes Anton Waschuk.

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What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert Oct 1, 2024

Ukraine needs international investors to maintain defense tech momentum

By Mykhailo Fedorov

Ukraine’s rapidly expanding defense tech sector can play a game-changing role in the war against Russia but Ukrainian companies need international investment, writes Ukraine’s Minister for Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov.
Artificial Intelligence Conflict
What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

UkraineAlert Jun 13, 2024

Ukraine officially embraces English as historic westward pivot continues

By Oleksiy Goncharenko

By officially embracing English, Ukrainians aim to support their country’s historic pivot away from Moscow and return to the European community of nations, writes Oleksiy Goncharenko.
Civil Society Conflict

The views expressed in UkraineAlert are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Atlantic Council, its staff, or its supporters.

The Eurasia Center’s mission is to enhance transatlantic cooperation in promoting stability, democratic values and prosperity in Eurasia, from Eastern Europe and Turkey in the West to the Caucasus, Russia and Central Asia in the East.

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Content

UkraineAlert

Jun 17, 2019

What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

By Diane Francis

Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union broke up the empire and its people have paid a monstrous price for generations. It’s time that Europe finally recognized its responsibility to this worthy nation, yearning to be free from Russian tyranny.

Energy Markets & Governance Eurozone

UkraineAlert

Jun 17, 2019

Why are donors afraid of the prosecutor’s office?

By Yuri Polakiwsky

It’s no secret that the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine has failed to be transformed in the post-Maidan period. But who is to blame? A high-level diplomat representing a G-7 country recently lamented that Ukraine’s major western partners deserve a large share of the blame for not providing direct assistance to the office. “You don’t […]

Corruption Elections

UkraineAlert

Jun 13, 2019

One Ukraine? Think again.

By Roman Solchanyk

Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s recent landslide victory in Ukraine’s presidential election over incumbent Petro Poroshenko has spawned intense speculation. The most intriguing is the assertion that we are witnessing the long-awaited emergence of a “new” Ukraine that is no longer divided along overlapping regional, ethnic, and linguistic fault lines because Zelenskyy won in all of the country’s […]

Elections Nationalism

UkraineAlert

Jun 9, 2019

Zelensky, Zelenskiy, Zelenskyy: spelling confusion doesn’t help Ukraine  

By Peter Dickinson

It would be unfair to expect Ukraine’s novice president to take over the reins of Europe’s largest country seamlessly. However, knowing how to spell his own name in English would seem a more realistic expectation. This did not appear to be the case during the first days of his administration, or at least that was […]

Disinformation Media

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

How Kolomoisky does business in the United States

By Anders Åslund

The PrivatBank case shows that dirty money is not necessarily concentrated in the big cities and in real estate but can penetrate the real economy.

Corruption Financial Regulation

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

Seven dangers of engaging with the occupied Donbas—and opportunities for the new Ukrainian president

By Petro Burkovskyi

Ukraine’s new president says he wants to end the Russian-backed war in the country’s east. However, it won’t be easy. There are at least seven dangers of engaging with the occupied territories of the Donbas. The first danger is that a class of highly educated and trained leaders is completely absent. All key positions, whether […]

Conflict Corruption

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

Cheap gas is too costly

By Oleh Havrylyshyn

On May 20, Volodymyr Zelenskiy was inaugurated Ukraine’s seventh president. In his inaugural address, he demonstrated a resoluteness that should put an end to the annoying journalistic cliché of a “comedian-president.” Taking such firm actions as dissolving parliament and requesting the resignations of key officials within minutes of taking office in front of the very […]

Central Europe Energy Markets & Governance

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

Zelenskyy’s golden opportunity to challenge the oligarchs and bring real news to Ukraine’s airwaves

By Janek Lasocki

Over the past five years, the foundations have been laid for a quality public service broadcaster. If successful, it could make a profound difference to public debate in Ukraine.

Democratic Transitions Elections

UkraineAlert

Jun 3, 2019

The right man for the right time  

By Andy Hunder

“God probably has a great sense of humor,” reckons Borys Gudziak, president of the Ukrainian Catholic University (UCU) in Lviv. The US-born archbishop transformed what was designed to be the Soviet communist party’s atheist ideology center in western Ukraine into a thriving catholic university. The irony of this transformation is not lost on him. Only […]

Civil Society Nationalism

UkraineAlert

May 31, 2019

What Ukraine’s new president cannot afford to overlook

By Bohdan Nahaylo

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s resounding victory in April underscored Ukrainians’ desire for change. Proclaiming his commitment to overhauling the entire system, the new president has announced five short-term priorities: change the electoral law, restore criminal liability for unlawful enrichment, and remove the parliamentary immunity of deputies, as well as reform the legal system and eradicate corruption. […]

Conflict Human Rights
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