On February 1, the European Commission published analytical reports on Georgia’s, Ukraine’s and Moldova’s respective alignment with the European Union’s acquis. The reports complement the opinions adopted by the European Commission on the three countries’ applications for EU accession in June 2022. In its report,... MORE

The agendas of the Belarusian official and opposition-minded media outlets create the impression of two parallel worlds. While some common themes exist, such as the creation of new government entities, the treatment of such subjects could not be more contrasting. According to Belta, Belarus’s official... MORE

If at the end of 2022 it was assumed that Ukraine would be the first to attack to gain the initiative on the battlefield, more recent calculations have posited that the Russians will strike first and appear to be gearing up for their next massive... MORE

Morale is a critical resource during wartime, and the role of Russia’s state-organized Cossack movement in shoring up the home front has been significant (see EDM, May 10, 2022). In truth, making President Vladimir Putin’s case for his war to the Russian people may ultimately... MORE

*Read Part One Here. Ukraine’s leadership and public opinion are adamant in ruling out land-for-peace tradeoffs with Russia. Leadership statements and public opinion surveys testify to this attitude. Such tradeoffs have, nevertheless, been proposed in a recent RAND Corporation report (Rand.org, January 2023). Ukrainian territorial... MORE

The boldest prescription yet for a United States–abetted defeat of Ukraine by Russia—and, ipso facto, a Western defeat—has come out of one unit of the RAND Corporation in Washington, DC. It envisages large territorial concessions by Ukraine to Russia—in effect, more and even more land... MORE

The year 2023 began with a series of alarming signs for the already troubled relationship between Hungary and Ukraine. Speaking to conservative-minded international journalists on January 26, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán reportedly compared Ukraine to Afghanistan, characterizing the war-torn country as a “no man’s... MORE

On January 22, Belarusians identifying as pro-Western (as opposed to those who identify as Russo-centric) celebrated the 160th anniversary of the so-called Kastus Kalinowski uprising on Belarusian soil. Thus, Belarusian émigrés organized a performance in front of the Russian embassy in Warsaw in commemoration. The... MORE

On February 24, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his “special military operation” against Ukraine, a brutal conflict that has highlighted the Russian military’s shortcomings in excruciating detail. The Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF), jointly based with the Ukrainian navy until 2014 at Crimea’s Port... MORE

Sweden’s security dilemma has worsened in recent years due to Moscow’s increasingly aggressive behavior as demonstrated by Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2018, its invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014, and its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The consequences of potential Russian... MORE