NATO

VIENNA — Russian officials signaled that they could abandon diplomatic efforts to resolve the security crisis surrounding Ukraine, bringing a whirlwind week of European diplomacy to an ominous end and deflating hopes that negotiators could forge a path toward easing tensions in Eastern Europe.

One senior Russian diplomat said that talks with the West were approaching a “dead end,” while another said the Kremlin would wait until it receives written responses next week to its demands from Washington and from NATO before deciding how to proceed.

It was clear that Russia’s next move would be up to President Vladimir V. Putin, who, his spokesman said on Thursday, was being briefed regularly this week on negotiations with the West.

Russia has threatened war if the United States and its NATO allies fail to comply — unconditionally — with sweeping demands for a new security arrangement in Europe.

The demands, issued by the Russian Foreign Ministry, require the United States to remove its nuclear umbrella from Europe and allow Russia to reestablish its Soviet-era sphere of influence over Eastern Europe.

The Russian demands, which effectively require NATO to commit suicide, are so obviously outrageous and unmeetable that Western analysts are split over interpreting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s motives. Some say he is using the impossible list of demands as a pretext to invade Ukraine. Others think he is playing a weak hand to try to divide the West and reorder Europe’s security architecture in Russia’s favor.

For Misha Novitskyi, the question of whether Russia will invade Ukraine is not theoretical. The enemy is just 50 metres away behind a concrete slab. From time to time Russian voices float eerily across a wintry no man’s land of ragged trees and scrub.

“When they light their stoves you can see the smoke,” Novitskyi – a senior lieutenant in the Ukrainian army – said, speaking from what is in effect Europe’s eastern front with Russia. He added: “Every day they shoot at us.”

The conflict between Kyiv and pro-Russian separatists has gone on for nearly eight long years. There are first world war echoes. Both sides face off along a fixed 250-mile “border” or line of contact which snakes across Ukraine’s Donbas region.

Also… How a Russian invasion of Ukraine could spill over into Europe

A senior Western intelligence official has warned that if Russia decides to invade Ukraine, a conflict could spill over further into Europe.

Speaking to journalists, including the BBC, the senior intelligence official, who asked not to be named, said: “Let’s not be blind. If Russia initiates a scenario of any kind it will also initiate action against Nato members”.

“To think war could be contained to one nation would be foolish,” they added.

Those concerns have been echoed by Britain’s most senior military officer.

A massive build-up of Russian troops along the Ukrainian border is fueling speculation of an imminent invasion. Western leaders have warned Russian President Vladimir Putin against military action, but, especially after the catastrophic American withdrawal from Afghanistan, they appear divided and weak and may be unable to stop him.

A Russian invasion of Ukraine, if successful, would expand Moscow’s sphere of influence along its western border and pave the way for Eastern Europe and the Baltics to come under Russian domination once again.

Will Russia invade? I have my doubts. Maybe the intent is to widen the growing schisms within NATO by warlike posturing. I doubt the majority of NATO members would go to war over Ukraine and that will at the least herald the beginning of the end of the alliance. That may be Putin’s immediate goal, neatly accomplished without need of an invasion.