Ukraine–Russia
Conflict overview
Current situation
This war is no longer decided on the line of contact. On the ground Russia pushes at the Donetsk "fortress belt" — Kostiantynivka, Pokrovsk, towards Sloviansk — at a tactical pace and without operational manoeuvre: in August 2026 it consolidated some 90 km² and has not taken Kostiantynivka, where ISW credits it with a presence, advancing or infiltrating, across 72% of the built-up area. Ukraine answers with local counterattacks at Lyman and Oleksandrivka and, in that same month, retook more ground than Russia kept. That is the background. What moves the political map is the air: Russia hits cities, the railway and, where it can, energy, with jet-powered drones that are harder to intercept; Ukraine hits refineries, depots and ports inside Russia. Two war economies, not two armies breaking a front.
Diplomacy is frozen on a single object: Donetsk. Moscow will not trade a ceasefire for an economic zone in the Donbas administered by a third party — it rejected that as "Russian territory" — and demands cession. Kyiv does not give it. The American channel, Witkoff and Kushner, has not set foot in Moscow since January 2026; there are calls, not a table. Europe arms, intercepts spillover and attributes sabotage, without Article 5. Short of a discontinuity — an agreement that concedes or withdraws that condition, or a strike that forces the NATO threshold — this is the regime: attrition from the air, a jammed front, a closed peace.
Actors and objectives
Russia
It wants the Donbas, starting with the whole of Donetsk, and Ukraine to accept the "realities on the ground". It will not trade that condition for a pause. Its instrument now is the air, not a ground breakthrough.
Ukraine
It wants a ceasefire without handing over Donetsk, interceptors that cover ballistic missiles, and to keep hitting Russian refining. It will not sign the cession Moscow sets as the price of sitting down.
United States
It wants a mediation that ends the war without fighting it. It will not treat a drone over Poland or Estonia as Article 5, and its attention is split with Iran.
Europe and NATO’s eastern flank
It wants Ukraine to hold and the hybrid campaign not to cross into an allied war. It will not invoke Article 5 over drone spillover or over Leipzig. Romania, the Baltics and the other hosts do not direct this war: they absorb the blows.
Key issues
Interceptors against ballistic missiles and jet drones
Ukraine stopped publishing missile intercept counts in mid-August; officials speak of Patriot stocks at a minimum. Ihnat, of the Ukrainian Air Force, on 1 September: piston drones come down at 90–95%, jet-powered ones at around 60%. That is a Ukrainian claim. The fact is the change of mix, not the decimal.
Russian refining against the Ukrainian grid
Bloomberg, via Meduza, on 28 August: Russian refining at a roughly 20-year low after the drone campaign. The Russian defence ministry announces preparation of massive strikes on Ukrainian energy; on the ground what is verified remains mostly urban and railway. Do not flatten the two: a threat is not a winter campaign already under way.
Donetsk as the object of any peace
Without total cession, which Moscow demands, or a third-party zone, which Kyiv, Washington and Brussels floated, there is no table. The fortress belt is the map of that sentence.
The American channel
Open or closed is measured in flights to Moscow and Kyiv, not in statements. January 2026 was the last one in Moscow; Ratcliffe went to warn, not to negotiate, and Putin cancelled seeing him.
The NATO threshold
Drones, jamming, Leipzig, fires at Polish plants. Germany has already attributed. None of that is Article 5. Whoever absorbs a blow is not a co-belligerent.
What to watch
Refineries and Ust-Luga
A statement from a Russian governor or from a company admitting a shutdown or a fire at a refinery or at Ust-Luga — the Drozdenko model — not a Telegram clip.
Ukrainian intercept counts
Whether the Air Force publishes ballistic intercepts again, and how many drones it declares jet-powered rather than piston.
Interceptor deliveries
An announcement by a government of the "coalition of the willing" of Patriot or other interceptors delivered — the shipment, not Sybiha's request.
The ISW map
Geolocated confirmation of the capture of Kostiantynivka or Pokrovsk, or of a breakthrough west of the belt. Flags in Russian video do not count when ISW marks them altered.
The Donetsk condition
Peskov or Putin: whether they withdraw the demand for the whole of Donetsk or repeat the pause. A sentence, not a summit rumour.
The American envoys
Witkoff or Kushner landing in Kyiv or in Moscow. The call of 31 August is not that.
Zaporizhzhia
The IAEA: external power restored at Zaporizhzhia, or a new report on diesel and convoys. It has been off the grid since 20 August.
Attribution on NATO soil
Official attribution of a drone or an act of sabotage on NATO territory, in the manner of Leipzig on 1 September. Estonia scrambling jets is not attribution.
How we got here
24 Feb 2022
The full-scale invasion. The theater stops being the Donbas war of 2014 and becomes a war between states.
2023 – 2024
The Ukrainian counteroffensive does not break through; Avdiivka falls and the ground prize anchors to the fortress belt. From then on the front is attrition, not manoeuvre — a reading ISW repeated on 1 September 2026 about the 2026 spring–summer offensive, which also achieved no operational manoeuvre.
Jan 2026
The last visit by Witkoff and Kushner to Moscow. Reuters, on 25 August, gives it as the cut: Ukraine cedes no more land, Washington turns to Iran, and the channel stays on the telephone.
Jun 2026 – Aug 2026
The deciding domain moves to the long-range exchange: refineries, depots, cities. ISW, on 1 July and again on 1 September, treats it as the centre of gravity rather than the infantry map.
27 Aug 2026 – 28 Aug 2026
A double break of regime: Russia sustains daytime waves over Kyiv, not only night ones, and Peskov declares the negotiations in a "deep pause". Putin, on 2 September, calls the process frozen.