Russia says Ukraine wants to drag the West deeper into conflict

According to RT on November 1, Russian President's press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said that all the so-called "peace plans" and "victory plans" of the Kiev government are aimed at quickly drawing Western countries deeper into the conflict in Ukraine.

“It is clear that all the “peace plans”, “victory plans”, and even secret clauses are aimed at drawing Western countries into the conflict as soon as possible and legitimizing it. In fact, all plans have this ultimate goal. This is how we assess it,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

Earlier, the New York Times quoted US officials as saying that a secret clause in President Zelensky’s “victory plan” for a “non-nuclear deterrent” package involved a request to transfer long-range Tomahawk missiles to Kiev. However, the New York Times noted that this request was completely impossible. The range of the Tomahawk missile is seven times greater than the range of the ATACMS that Kiev has received. The publication stressed that Ukraine “has not yet made convincing arguments for how it will use long-range weapons.”

Ukrainian President Zelensky later confirmed that the secret part of his “victory plan” did indeed include a provision for the supply of US Tomahawk cruise missiles.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Mr. Zelensky's request for Tomahawk missiles "surprised Washington." The Russian diplomat also expressed confidence that, to ensure US security, the Washington administration would "pat Mr. Zelensky on the hand" when the Ukrainian leader continued to try to drag the United States into the conflict against Russia.

In a conversation with reporters, Kremlin spokesman Peskov also noted that Kiev is "quite worried" about the situation on the current front.

Earlier, Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Alexander Syrsky, rushed to the Zaporozhye region, where the Ukrainian army controlled, to try to calm panic and discontent in the ranks of the Ukrainian armed forces, amid increasing losses and increasingly progressive tactical successes of the Russian army.

In mid-October 2024, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky presented to the Parliament a "victory plan", in which 5 points were made public, and 3 additional points were kept secret.

In public, Mr. Zelensky's plan mentions inviting Ukraine to join NATO, liftingrestrictions on Western long-range strikes deep into Russian territory and proposed a "comprehensive denuclearization package" for Russia.

Oleg Nemensky, a leading expert at the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, told RT that for Western countries to get deeper involved in the Ukrainian conflict, a unified decision by the entire West is needed, but such a consensus is not easy to find. Moreover, Kiev's "victory" and "peace" plans are "rather strange" documents. According to Nemensky, they do not contain an action plan for Ukraine, but a list of demands for Western allies. Not to mention the fact that all the points of the "victory plan" start from the first point - inviting Ukraine to join NATO, which is unrealistic, Nemensky assessed.

According to him, thanks to these initiatives, Kiev also shifts responsibility for Ukraine's failures on the front to its Western allies.

Observers believe that, in the context of the difficulties of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Kiev is conducting “vigorous activities” in the international arena, including those related to the so-called peace summit, because Ukraine does not want to lose on the diplomatic front. Moreover, because it simply seems to have no other choice. If Ukraine manages to gather several dozen countries at the upcoming peace summit, the conference will be considered a success for Kiev.

However, observers also believe that no "peace summit" can help Ukraine receive more military support from Western partners.