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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

Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

UkraineAlert Jul 1, 2025

Putin’s escalating air offensive is overwhelming Ukraine’s defenses

By Mykola Bielieskov

Russian aerial attacks on Ukrainian cities are expanding rapidly and killing growing numbers of civilians. Kyiv must urgently find technological solutions to defend against Putin’s escalating air offensive, writes Mykola Bielieskov.
Conflict Defense Industry
Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

UkraineAlert Jun 23, 2025

‘All of Ukraine is ours’: Putin’s Russian imperialism is now on full display

By Peter Dickinson

Putin declared last week that “all of Ukraine is ours.” The Kremlin dictator’s revealing comments highlight the resurgent Russian imperialism driving Europe’s largest invasion since WWII, writes Peter Dickinson.
Conflict Disinformation
Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

UkraineAlert Jun 12, 2025

Putin’s peace plan is a blueprint for the end of Ukrainian statehood

By Tetiana Kotelnykova

Russia’s peace plan sends a clear signal that Moscow wants to erase Ukraine as a state and as a nation. If Western leaders wish to avoid this catastrophic outcome, they must convince Putin that the alternative to a negotiated peace is a Russian defeat, writes Tetiana Kotelnykova.
Conflict Freedom and Prosperity

Latest analysis

UkraineAlert

Apr 29, 2025

Kyiv accuses China of deepening involvement in Russia’s Ukraine war

By Katherine Spencer

As US-led efforts continue to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, Kyiv has recently accused China of deepening its involvement in Moscow’s invasion, writes Katherine Spencer.

China Conflict

UkraineAlert

Apr 24, 2025

Ukraine’s innovative army can help Europe defend itself against Russia

By David Kirichenko

Faced with an isolationist US and an expansionist Russia, Ukrainians and their European partners are increasingly acknowledging that their collective future security depends on closer cooperation, writes David Kirichenko.

Conflict Defense Industry

UkraineAlert

Apr 24, 2025

A pro-Putin peace deal in Ukraine would destabilize the entire world

By Elena Davlikanova, Lesia Ogryzko

Handing Russia victory in Ukraine may temporarily create the illusion of peace, but in reality it would set the stage for a dangerous new era of international insecurity marked by militarization, nuclear proliferation, and wars of aggression, write Elena Davlikanova and Lesia Ogryzko.

Conflict International Norms

UkraineAlert

Apr 22, 2025

Putin’s cynical Easter ceasefire stunt backfires as Zelenskyy calls his bluff

By Peter Dickinson

Vladimir Putin’s surprise Easter ceasefire announcement was clearly a cynical stunt, but it did inadvertently serve an important purpose by underlining the simple fact that Russia can end the war whenever it chooses, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Apr 22, 2025

US-led peace talks hampered by Trump’s reluctance to pressure Putin

By Olivia Yanchik

US-led efforts to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine are being hampered by Donald Trump’s reluctance to put pressure on Vladimir Putin and force the Kremlin leader to accept a compromise peace, writes Olivia Yanchik.

Conflict Economic Sanctions

UkraineAlert

Apr 17, 2025

Putin is attempting to intimidate Merz with yet more Russian red lines

By Peter Dickinson

As Germany’s next chancellor Friedrich Merz prepares to boost support for Ukraine, the Kremlin is already seeking to deter him with intimidation tactics, writes Peter Dickinson. Merz’s response will help define whether he is capable of leading Europe.

Conflict Defense Industry

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

UkraineAlert

Apr 15, 2025

US funding cuts create openings for Russian disinformation in Ukraine

By Muhammad Tahir

Drastic recent cuts to US funding for Ukraine’s independent media will create unprecedented opportunities for Russian disinformation, writes Muhammad Tahir.

Civil Society Conflict

UkraineAlert

Apr 15, 2025

Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian civilians cast shadow over peace talks

By Mercedes Sapuppo

Russia’s Palm Sunday ballistic missile strike on Sumy was the latest in a series of attacks on Ukrainian cities that have killed dozens of civilians and cast a long shadow over Donald Trump’s efforts to initiate peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv, writes Mercedes Sapuppo.

Conflict Missile Defense

UkraineAlert

Apr 10, 2025

A pragmatic peace plan for Ukraine

By Mykola Bielieskov

A pragmatic and sustainable peace is possible in Ukraine if Kyiv’s European partners dramatically increase their own defense spending while significantly strengthening the Ukrainian military, writes Mykola Bielieskov.

European Union NATO
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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
Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

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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Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

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
Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

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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UkraineAlert

Jan 14, 2022

Western weakness has emboldened Putin and invited Russian aggression

By Tinatin Khidasheli

The West's weak response to repeated instances of Russian aggression in the ex-USSR has emboldened Vladimir Putin and created today's European security crisis, says former Georgian defense minister Tinatin Khidasheli.

Conflict European Union

UkraineAlert

Jan 13, 2022

Russia Crisis: War fears mount as West rejects Putin’s ultimatum

By Peter Dickinson

A week of high-stakes meetings between Kremlin officials and their US, NATO and OSCE counterparts has failed to defuse tensions in Eastern Europe or reduce the threat of a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Conflict NATO

UkraineAlert

Jan 12, 2022

Cutting off Russia from SWIFT will really sting

By Harley Balzer

While Russia has attempted to reduce its dependence on the SWIFT payment system, it remains vulnerable to a sanctions cut-off in the event of a new Kremlin offensive in Putin's eight-year undeclared war against Ukraine.

China Conflict

UkraineAlert

Jan 11, 2022

Ukrainians call on US Senate to sanction Putin’s pipeline weapon

By Ukrainian civil society representatives

US senators are set to vote in the coming days on a bill for new sanctions against Russia’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Ukrainian civil society representatives have issued an appeal calling on senators to back sanctions.

Conflict Economic Sanctions

UkraineAlert

Jan 10, 2022

The US and NATO must attack Vladimir Putin’s intimidation strategy

By Harlan Ullman

The current US approach to the crisis with Russia is predictable and conventional. The principle author of the "shock and awe" doctrine, Harlan Ullman, believes it is time to turn Putin's intimidation tactics against him.

Conflict Defense Policy

UkraineAlert

Jan 9, 2022

How to make a Russian invasion of Ukraine prohibitively expensive

By Andriy Zagorodnyuk

Bolstering Ukraine's ability to wage an effective asymmetric campaign on home soil may be the most effective way to deter Russian President Vladimir Putin from launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Conflict Defense Technologies

UkraineAlert

Jan 6, 2022

Can diplomacy deter Vladimir Putin and avert a major war in Ukraine?

By Peter Dickinson

Senior Russian and Western officials will hold a series of meetings next week in a bid to defuse mounting tensions and avert the possibility of a major escalation in Vladimir Putin’s eight-year war against Ukraine.

Conflict NATO

UkraineAlert

Jan 5, 2022

Appeasing Putin in Ukraine would be disastrous for European security

By Stephen Blank

Any attempt to appease Moscow and Beijing over Ukraine and Taiwan would be a dangerous betrayal of Western values that would invite bolder acts of aggression against a much more enfeebled West.

China Conflict

UkraineAlert

Dec 30, 2021

How to deal with the Kremlin-created crisis in Europe

By Eurasia Center

The Kremlin appears to be setting the stage for a major conventional assault on Ukraine. Twenty-five distinguished experts and former senior officials urge the Biden administration to take decisive action.

Conflict Politics & Diplomacy

UkraineAlert

Dec 29, 2021

Debunking the myth of a divided Ukraine

By Peter Dickinson

Russia's attempts to promote the false narrative of an artificial and divided Ukraine are a central element of the Kremlin's ongoing campaign of imperial aggression against the country.

Conflict Democratic Transitions
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