Zelensky meets with Trump to call for a “just” peace as Russia manages to surround the symbolic fortress of Vuhledar

In fact, Trump dropped this Thursday that He had no intention of meeting Zelensky, a visit that had been closed for some time, while the speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson demanded that the Ukrainian president dismiss his ambassador to the United States for “electoral interference.” Oksana Markarova, a respected diplomat, had limited herself to organizing Zelensky’s visit to the North American country, something that Johnson described as “a partisan act aimed at helping the Democrats and interfering in the elections.”

This Republican offensive is by far the most violent since the start of the war between Ukraine and Russia. Johnson blocked an important aid package for months in Congress and the candidate for vice president, J.D. Vancehas expressed several times his willingness to let Russia keep all the occupied territory in order to stop financing Ukrainian defense. Nothing compared to Trump, who stated at a rally this week that Ukraine was “a dead and destroyed country.”

Yet, Zelensky swallowed his pride, accepted Trump’s change of heart and met him at his own home. At the exit, both politicians wanted to appear normal in the midst of obvious tension between them. Zelensky assured that the two had peace in Ukraine as their goal, and Trump made it clear that he intended this peace to be “fair on its terms for both sides.” Electoral polls place Harris and Trump in an almost total tie, so the diplomatic effort is more than justified, although at this point no one doubts that, if Trump wins, he will bow to Putin’s interests.

The symbolic fall of Vuhledar

Zelensky’s visit to the United States coincides with one of the worst moments for the Ukrainian army in recent months. After avoiding collapse on the eastern front when Russian troops began to approach Pokrovsk dangerously, Gerasimov’s almost suicidal insistence continues to take its toll on Donetsk province. Having trouble mobilizing and training new recruits and outgunned by the enemy, Ukrainian soldiers fight for every meter from Kupiansk in the north to Vuhledar in the south.

Although the frontal advance towards Pokrovsk was stopped at the height of Hrodivka, Russia continues to expand the occupied territory to the north and south of the main Ukrainian communications node in the south of Donetsk. After the conquest of Krasnohorivka and Ukrainsk in recent weeks and the siege of Selidove, the situation in the symbol city of Vuhledar worsens by the hour and the troops that still protect the enclave are in danger of being trapped, as Russia has almost The cauldron over the city has closed and the only escape route by road is continually being bombed.

Vuhledar’s defense had become a symbol of ukrainian resistance…and enemy failure. Wanted since 2014 by pro-Russian militias, Vuhledar had withstood a series of savage attacks from the south and east during two and a half years of open war. The city had become a kind of unattainable fortress for the Russians, who never tired of sending men and armored vehicles to the slaughterhouse. The presumed withdrawal in the next few hours represents an important moral blow for Ukraine and Russian propaganda will take advantage of it to magnify the achievement.

The price of the war of attrition

In fact, criticism of the general Oleksandr Syrskyi for defending the city at any price and not withdrawing their men have been constant in recent days. Syrskyi was already criticized for a similar maneuver in Bakhmut, when the United States was insistently asking him to withdraw his men towards Chasiv Yar. The vision of the general chief of the Ukrainian army is different: a very delicate balance of advantages and disadvantages in which you only stop fighting when it is clear that you are not going to continue harming the enemy.

It happened in Mariupol, it happened in Severodonetsk, it happened in Bakhmut, in Avdiivka and now in Vuhledar. Syrskyi does not surrender the positions as long as they serve to further weaken the Russian army and there is minimal opportunity for an organized retreat. In Vuhledar, that opportunity closes over time. The troops, some of them the most experienced on the Ukrainian side, are surrounded and under enemy fire. They could flee through the forest if the road becomes impassable, but it is difficult to organize such a retreat.

The conquest of Vuhledar comes just on the day that American sources estimated for The Economist in 100,000 the number of Russians killed in combat, with 430,000 wounded dand diverse consideration. Half a million young people who have seen their lives cut short on one side and who join the other half a million Ukrainians who would have suffered the same fate, according to Western estimates. The war of attrition is what it has: attacking day and night, in any context; day and night defending every inch of your territory. An absurd barbarism that is now heading towards Velyka Novosilka, Pokrovsk or Sloviansk. Terror never rests.