As Trump Presses for Peace in Ukraine, All Eyes Turn to Rome, Where World Leaders Will Gather for the Funeral of Francis

When the plane of President Trump’s peace envoy Steve Witkoff flies into Moscow tomorrow morning, he is likely to see a vivid reminder of why he came: A towering column of black smoke still rising from what was once one of Russia’s biggest military arsenals. Satellite photos show the arsenal is smoldering today, two days after Ukrainian drones flew 400 miles to blast the depot 50 miles northeast of Moscow.Videos of an oily orange fireball rising over the arsenal bookend the videos of Russian and North Korean-made ballistic missiles plunging out of the night sky this morning to blow up Kyiv apartment buildings. With cell phones still ringing under the rubble, the latest toll is 12 dead and more than 90 injured.Whether by drone or ballistic missile, Russia and Ukraine seem entrenched in battle mode. President Trump is seen as the only politician on the planet capable of knocking heads and forging an armistice. Yet Russia’s terror bombings of apartment buildings in Kyiv and two other cities this month have swollen a chorus of critics who charge the American leader is failing to pressure Mr. Putin.President Macron of France said today: “U.S. anger should be directed at one person: Putin, who started this war against a neighboring country. He must finally stop lying to the world.”Mr. Trump this morning posted on his Truth Social platform: “I am not happy with the Russian strikes on KYIV. Not necessary, and very bad timing. Vladimir, STOP! 5000 soldiers a week are dying. Let’s get the Peace Deal DONE!”In response to critics, Mr. Trump told reporters today: “You have no idea what pressure I’m putting.” He continues: “We’re putting a lot of pressure on Russia, and Russia knows that.” Yet the concession that his envoy seeks to extract from Russia tomorrow — that Ukraine be allowed to keep its army and arms industry — seems to many to be inconsequential.Ukraine today fields the largest and most experienced army in Europe — 900,000 battle-hardened men and women. It is hard to imagine that they would docilely disarm to be replaced by a 50,000-man national guard.Ukraine’s arms industry now produces about 40 percent of its army’s needs, up from 10 percent in 2022, when Mr. Putin launched his full bore attack on Ukraine. Injections of billions of dollars by European arms makers has revived an industry which languished after the end of the Cold War.In a backhanded acknowledgement of Ukraine’s burgeoning defense industry, Russia’s Defense ministry said today that the “massive strike by air, land and sea-based long-range precision weapons and unmanned aerial vehicles” targeted “enterprises in Ukraine’s aviation, rocket and space, machine-building and armored-vehicle industries.” Reporters who visited the bomb sites in Kyiv reported that they only saw apartment buildings.In another red line for Kyiv, the peace proposal that Mr. Witkoff reportedly is forging includes American and, possibly, Ukrainian recognition that the Crimean peninsula is legally part of Russia.“This fully corresponds to our understanding and what we have been saying for a long time,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters today, Russian state news agency TASS reported. From London, veteran Ukraine analyst Timothy Ash wrote today: “Ukraine cannot agree to the legal loss of Crimea. Politically, that would be suicide” for President Zelensky “and risk a revolution at home.”Kyiv’s key demand is a rock solid Western guarantee against a renewed Russian attack. The Trump administration has said it will not follow the South Korean model and put American military boots on the edge of a demilitarized zone. Instead, France and Britain are working on forging a post-ceasefire “reassurance force” to monitor violations along what could be a 600-mile front line.However, the Russian Security Council secretary, Sergei Shoigu, told TASS today that any NATO peacekeepers on “historical Russian lands” would be seen as “invaders or occupants.” Mr. Shoigu, Russia’s former defense minister, said their presence would risk World War III.With positions far apart, Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, told Euronews today: “There has to be a compromise…this peace should, in my personal opinion, come down to the fact that neither side will be able to say that it won this war, because each side in some sense will have to step down.”NATO’s secretary general, Mark Rutte, reportedly will lobby Trump Administration officials at Washington this evening that Europe’s future security depends on finding a peace deal acceptable to Ukraine. In this deadlock, all eyes turn to the funeral of Pope Francis at Rome on Saturday. President Trump is not expected to schedule a meeting with President Zelensky. The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, will “seize” any chance to speak with Mr. Trump at the funeral, her spokesman said today.

As Trump Presses for Peace in Ukraine, All Eyes Turn to Rome, Where World Leaders Will Gather for the Funeral of Francis

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