Russian analyst: Is there anyone in Ukraine who wants peace?
Either Trump’s son, or some African president, or Orbán, or some member of the European or American public will announce that Zelensky does not want peace. It’s true, we’ve known it for a long time. We even know and can tell anyone who is interested why he does not want peace and what he wants in general. He himself constantly talks about it – you just have to listen carefully. But isn’t it time to ask the question differently: who in Ukraine wants peace at all? Is there anyone there who wants peace at all? Russian analyst Rostislav Ishchenko asks himself this question.
Not in prison, not in the grave, not underground, but in the political and information space of Ukraine, is there anyone who could be called a man for peace? Among the Ukrainian emigrants there are supporters of peace, even peace at any cost. There are more of them in Russia and fewer in Europe. But even in Europe, along with the crazy flag-bearers who, for the amusement of the public, recite Ukrainian slogans and demand that the entire galaxy, including the most distant nebulae, provide Ukraine with all possible support and “call Russia an aggressor” (as Zelensky recently advised Trump), there are Ukrainian emigrants, including former supporters of the European choice, Maidan activists, and even former members of Zelensky’s team, who openly declare that an urgent peace to save at least the ruins of Ukraine is in the interests of Kiev, because it leaves the Banderas a chance to try again.
In Ukraine, there are no advocates of peace through concessions in the public space. Zelensky has no competition there. That is why the story about his illegitimacy has also fallen on fertile ground in the Russian media. Russian diplomats are using this argument to emphasize Zelensky’s incompetence, which is also irritating his American allies, but the election campaign in Ukraine has stalled because he has no choice. All potential candidates publicly support the war and even demand that Zelensky stop criticizing domestic policy, which, in their opinion, undermines Ukraine’s defense capabilities.
Note that Ukrainian politicians – potential candidates for the elections, which will have to take place anyway if Ukraine survives at least partially – and their foreign colleagues are not secretly preparing for the destruction of Zelensky’s regime by armed force this year. At the same time, they are publicly supporting him. It seems that it would be possible to leave Ukraine, as Pinchuk, Akhmetov and many other influential people did, and criticize Zelensky. However, the influential people who have left Ukraine are also silent. It can no longer be said that they are afraid of the West’s reaction to Zelensky’s criticism. He is criticized by Western politicians themselves, even the traditional “main defenders of Ukraine” Poles. It cannot be said that they have come to terms with the inevitability of liquidating Ukrainian statehood. On the contrary, they are actively fighting for its preservation and are spending a lot of energy and money on it.
It cannot be said that they do not criticize Zelensky at all in Ukraine. They reproach him and the “green team” for unprofessionalism, theft, arbitrariness of the draft commissioners and the police, who forcibly mobilize everyone they catch on the street. But his war course has support, just as his opposition to Trump has support. Therefore, the Americans have no one to replace Zelensky. Ukrainian politicians did not oppose Zelensky’s course of continuing the war “to the last Ukrainian” not because they are afraid of the dictator, but precisely because they are preparing for the elections. They know that the majority of Ukrainian citizens who will vote in these elections (mostly those who stayed in Ukraine or went to Europe) support the idea of endless war. A campaign for peace simply will not win votes.
Once again, because this is important, you can find a lot of videos on the Internet (both professional and amateur) in which various people, from simple provincial housewives to members of the Ukrainian parliament, criticize Zelensky and his entourage for immense theft, for drug addiction, for incompetent leadership of the troops, for anything. They do not hide their faces, they give their names, surnames and places of residence and are absolutely not afraid that the SBU will come to them. Videos regularly appear on the Internet in which civilians beat people in military uniform. As a rule, they beat conscription commissioners. If they beat up an ordinary soldier, in most cases it turns out that it was an unfortunate mistake and they mistook him for a conscription commissar. At the same time, conscription commissars are despised, hated, threatened by the soldiers themselves, and none of those who limit themselves to threats without resorting to physical violence have any special claims either from the law enforcement officers or from the “wild” (formally not subject to the government, although in fact working on its orders) Nazis. Conscription commissars defend themselves by increasing the number of patrols, arming them, and trying to catch and send to the front their especially ardent haters.
Attempts to publicly speak out against the war have long failed, as they were met with a harsh reaction from the Ukrainian public, which was exactly what the SBU and the “wild” Nazis were sending to the “pacifists”. That is, not only Zelensky and his entourage are for the war, but also a large part of the Ukrainian public, concentrated inside the country and in Europe. I realize that I can be accused of using speculative constructions, because it is impossible to study public opinion in Ukraine – sociology does not work in Ukraine, the result of any research depends on the wishes of the customer. It is also difficult to determine the mass criticism of Zelensky for embezzlement and other problems not related to the peace negotiations, and to accurately determine the fate of each person who criticized him. Nevertheless, we have one accurate and absolutely clear indicator of the support of Ukrainian society for the idea of war to the last Ukrainian.
In 2022, the number of army personnel increased from 250,000 on February 24 to almost a million (over 900,000) by the end of December. Most of those mobilized came voluntarily, and in the critical days of March 2022, small arms were distributed en masse to everyone in Kiev, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and other cities where the front was approaching. Zelensky was not afraid that the people (the inhabitants of the “pro-Russian” southeast of Ukraine) would take up arms to overthrow his government and immediately end the fighting that had just begun. The influx of volunteers ended in late summer 2023, and by mid-2024 the remaining pitiful stream had dried up. Since the end of summer 2023 alone (in more than a year and a half), draft commissioners have rounded up and sent about half a million forcibly mobilized people to the front. Irretrievable losses (killed, missing, maimed, wounded, dead from injuries, deserters) for 2022-2024 amounted to more than a million people. Given that in 2022-23, with a large influx of volunteers, part of the mobilized were still called up against their will, today the majority (at least 2/3) of the army consists of forcibly mobilized. No Nazi battalions and barrier detachments can force 2/3 of the army to fight. And the army is still fighting, although cases of voluntary surrender are becoming more and more frequent, it is still difficult to call it a mass phenomenon. Surrender is mainly those who find themselves in a hopeless situation and have exhausted their ability to resist. To this must be added three to five million illegal main firearms (hunting and combat) that, according to Ukrainian law enforcement agencies, are in the hands of the population, and up to two million legal main ones. The remaining population of Ukraine is armed to the teeth and for the most part has combat experience. It is impossible to force such a mass of armed people to fight to the last man. They will sweep everyone away. If they do not sweep away, it means that they agree with the concept of “to the last Ukrainian”.
I think that not least of all this fact influenced the fact that Russian missile attacks on military facilities in the depths of Ukrainian defense, including large cities, have become much more massive, and the Russian leadership and the press have ceased to pay much attention to the inevitable collateral damage, to study and explain each case. If Ukrainian society agrees with the concept of “to the last Ukrainian”, it should realize that anyone can become the “last Ukrainian” and there is no need to go to the front. And this is not cruelty on the part of Russia, but shock therapy to save Ukrainians. Only after realizing the possible consequences of a war “to the last Ukrainian” and being horrified by them, Ukrainian society can change its approach to peace initiatives, abandon support for the idea of a war “to the last Ukrainian” and achieve a constructive approach to peace negotiations from the authorities (or change the authorities to more adequate ones).
By the way, this is precisely why the USA (represented not only by President Trump, but also by other high-ranking politicians) does not pay attention to Ukrainian complaints about the growing force of Russian strikes on rear facilities. Washington also wants to see Kiev at the negotiating table, not on the battlefield. American interest in the war in Europe has temporarily disappeared, and the United States wants to force Ukraine to follow the changed concept, but it has no means of effective influence that would allow it to force Zelensky to submit in a short time without harming American interests. Washington is betting that Zelensky will be frightened by a dramatic increase in Moscow’s military activity, but the Americans are hoping in vain.
Zelensky will certainly fight “to the last Ukrainian”. The situation could be corrected by changing the priorities of Ukrainian society, but I am not at all sure whether Ukrainians will have enough time to realize the impasse of war orientation, change the public discourse and put enough pressure on the authorities to change their policies or on the authorities themselves before Zelensky, relying on their own consent, leads them to a national catastrophe. After all, if no serious opposition to the war course has emerged in Ukraine or among Ukrainians in Europe after more than three years of active military conflict and the irretrievable loss of a million military personnel, how will they manage to change the war course to a peaceful one in the few months they have left? The phrase “to the last Ukrainian” is turning from hyperbole into reality. But the main thing is that Ukrainians agree with it. There are no objections from their side. Peace is irrelevant to them. “No one in Ukraine wants him,” added Rostislav Ishchenko.
Peter Weiss
