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As Ukraine Retakes Kherson, U.S. Looks to Diplomacy Before Winter Slows Momentum
American arms are flowing, but officials in Washington question how much territory either side can win

https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-ukra...um-11668345883

Senior U.S. officials have begun nudging Kyiv to start thinking about peace talks in the event winter stalls its momentum, following Ukraine’s recapture of Kherson in one of its most stunning triumphs of the war.

The imminent onset of winter—coupled with fears of inflation spurred by mounting energy and food prices, the billions of dollars of weaponry already pumped into Ukraine, and the tens of thousands of casualties on both sides—has prompted talk in Washington of a potential inflection point in the war, now in its ninth month.

Ukrainian troops were cheered by residents of Kherson as they entered the strategic city after Moscow withdrew its forces. WSJ looks at how Russia went from capturing to losing the regional capital, in one of its largest symbolic defeats in the war. Illustration: Adele Morgan
The U.S. and its allies are pledging to continue supporting Ukraine, but top officials in Washington are beginning to wonder aloud how much more territory can be won by either side, and at what cost. Some European officials, meanwhile, are more bullish on Ukraine’s chances.

“There has to be a mutual recognition that military victory, in the true sense of the word, is maybe not achievable through military means, so therefore you need to turn to other means,” Army Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the top U.S. military officer, told the Economic Club of New York on Wednesday. “There’s also an opportunity here, a window of opportunity, for negotiation.”

The prospect that Ukraine won’t make major battlefield gains in the weeks ahead has led the U.S. and some European officials to ask when public pressure will emerge to demand a settlement.

“We are saying to the Ukrainians that it is up to them to decide when to do it,” said a Western European official, referring to the potential for talks. “But it might be a good idea to do it sooner.”

U.S. officials, for their part, don’t think now is the right time, but more of them believe the coming weeks and months provide an opportunity to talk about talks.

The U.S. and some of its allies are concerned that their stockpiles of weaponry, including some ammunition, are being depleted at an unsustainable rate. U.S. military support for Ukraine this year, now nearing $19 billion, has far outstripped European assistance.

“We are seeing real, practical problems of making military progress, we are seeing shortages of munitions,” said another Western official.

The same day that Gen. Milley spoke of an opportunity for talks, President Biden too suggested the time could soon be right.

“It remains to be seen whether or not there’ll be a judgment made as to whether or not Ukraine is prepared to compromise with Russia,” Mr. Biden said at the White House. He added: “They’re going to both lick their wounds, decide…what they’re going to do over the winter, and decide whether or not they’re going to compromise.”

Washington has signaled to Ukraine that at a minimum Kyiv needs to appear open to a negotiated solution. Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, conveyed that message to President Volodymyr Zelensky and his lieutenants in Kyiv on Nov. 4, suggesting that Kyiv would gain leverage by showing openness to negotiations, according to people familiar with the discussions.

Two European diplomats briefed on the discussions said Mr. Sullivan recommended that Mr. Zelensky’s team start thinking about its realistic demands and priorities for negotiations, including a reconsideration of its stated aim for Ukraine to regain Crimea, which was annexed in 2014.

Administration officials, including Mr. Sullivan, continue to state in public that Washington won’t press Kyiv on a diplomatic course, a practice that is perplexing the U.S.’s North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies. State Department officials briefed some European partners in Washington last week to allay concerns about a shift in approach, according to two senior European officials.

“It is our job to put them in the best position on the battlefield so that when and if there is an opportunity for diplomacy, they’re in the best position at the bargaining table,” Mr. Sullivan said Thursday. “The United States is not pressuring Ukraine. We’re not insisting on things with Ukraine.”

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen meanwhile said some sanctions on Russia could remain in place even after any eventual peace agreement with Ukraine, raising the prospect of a long-term U.S. effort to squeeze Russia’s economy. Ms. Yellen said in an interview in Indonesia, where she is attending a gathering of G-20 leaders, that any eventual peace agreement would involve a review of the penalties the U.S. and its allies have imposed on Russia’s economy.

“We would probably feel, given what’s happened, that probably some sanctions should stay in place,” she said.

On Friday, Ukraine’s forces swept into the southern city of Kherson after Russian troops completed their withdrawal from the regional capital, in one of the largest strategic and symbolic defeats for the Kremlin since launching its invasion. Over the weekend, Ukrainian authorities set about restoring essential services after blaming Russian forces for sabotaging power grid facilities and stripping cell towers and other infrastructure as they departed. Roman Holovnya, an adviser to Kherson’s mayor, told Ukrainian television that there is a critical lack of water in the city, as aid convoys set out from other parts of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian advance is the second sudden shift in the war in less than three months. Ukraine’s forces recaptured a swath of territory in the northeastern part of the country in September. The recent advance likely ends Russia’s prospects of advancing toward Odessa, Ukraine’s largest coastal city and port.

With Ukrainian troops winning on the ground, Mr. Zelensky and his top aides have warned publicly that pursuing peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin now would amount to a needless surrender. Some of the U.S.’s European allies have said Ukraine’s advances leave Kyiv with little reason to submit to Mr. Putin’s demands.

They believe Ukraine can retake more territory if Western arms keep flowing, strengthening its position in eventual negotiations. Washington’s new pledge of another $400 million in security assistance reinforced the Europeans’ confidence in U.S. support for Ukraine’s military.

“We as the West, we must be extremely careful not to press Ukraine on anything because we know that this war was started by Russia and this war can be ended in a minute if Russia simply decides to end it,” said Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks.

Officials in some European countries, particularly in the east and north, have said that publicly pressing for talks could hurt Ukraine’s efforts and play to Russia’s aims of dividing the alliance.

“We need to talk about the cost of peace,” one northern European official said. If the war ends now, “The message the Ukrainians would get is that their fight was meaningless. The message Russia would get is that this is time to refit and to rebuild economically. No one believes [Russia] will stop until they achieve their strategic objective.”

Mr. Putin has said that Russia is open to peace talks and argued that if Washington ordered Mr. Zelensky to sit down for negotiations, Kyiv would do so. With the latest setbacks in the battlefield, Western officials have said the Kremlin appears to have backed away from its previous preconditions for talks, such as accepting Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory.

Yet European and U.S. officials have said they see little sign that the Kremlin is interested in serious talks. At a Group of Seven meeting earlier this month, foreign ministers agreed that it was up to Ukraine to decide when the military and political conditions were right to seek a cease-fire and pursue negotiations, said participants at the meeting. The ministers said in a statement afterward that the Kremlin’s call for peace talks wasn’t credible as Mr. Putin continues to escalate the war.

On Monday, Mr. Zelensky said Ukrainian conditions for talks included returning Ukrainian control over its territories, compensating Kyiv for Moscow’s invasion and bringing to justice perpetrators of war crimes.

Critical to the differences between allies over how urgently diplomacy should be pursued are varying assessments of the prospect of Ukraine gaining more ground in the winter months ahead.

Some NATO allies believe that Ukraine will struggle to make major breakthroughs, as it attacks areas that are more urbanized and closer to Russia, and where Russian forces have been present longer and have had time to fortify their defenses. Meanwhile, Russia has been pounding Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure in recent weeks, imposing blackouts and power and water shortages on millions of Ukrainians.

Others, more confident of Ukraine’s chances, don’t believe the fighting will stall. The country’s growing arsenal of air defense systems has become more efficient at intercepting missiles and drones.

A Western diplomat said there was concern among some European partners that Washington was coaxing Ukraine toward talks before its troops could make further gains.

—Max Colchester in London and Andrew Duehren in Nusa Dua, Indonesia, contributed to this article.

Write to Gordon Lubold at gordon.lubold@wsj.com, Nancy A. Youssef at nancy.youssef@wsj.com, Laurence Norman at laurence.norman@wsj.com and Drew Hinshaw at drew.hinshaw@wsj.com