Politics
Ukrainians contemplate the once unthinkable: Losing the war with Russia
Could Ukraine lose this war?
For more than two years, as this country of 44 million people has fought off an all-out invasion by neighboring Russia, a spirit of stubborn optimism prevailed even amid the most frightening moments. Any notion of defeat was unthinkable, an almost taboo topic.
But now the question hovers, flitting in and out of view: What if?
The stalling of crucial American aid, a distinct dimming of the world spotlight, and simple war weariness are all exacting a heavy cost. On the front lines, exhausted Ukrainian troops are rationing ammunition as they fend off the latest Russian advances, and anxiety is mounting along with the military and civilian toll.
“Every day, we’re dying,” said Marta Tomakhiv, 33, standing in a sharp-edged shadow in Kyiv’s main Independence Square, mourning a friend from her western Ukrainian hometown who was killed in battle days earlier in the east.
A Ukrainian serviceman with howitzer weaponry in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine on April 11, 2024.
(Alex Babenko / Associated Press)
By and large, Ukrainians still believe they can hold out against a resurgent and powerful foe — if for no other reason, as nearly everyone here points out, than that they are in a fight for their lives.
“There’s absolutely no choice — we know very well what they would do to us if they could,” Artem Morhun, a 30-year-old lawyer on his way to work in downtown Kyiv, said of the invading Russian forces.
Few Ukrainians have forgotten the brutal atrocities carried out by occupying Russian troops in Kyiv’s once-placid suburbs early in the war, or the wholesale destruction and mass death in still-captive cities such as Mariupol, in the country’s southeast.
After months of military setbacks, however, many here wonder whether the long front lines that arc across Ukraine’s south and east can hold, or even whether Russian troops could seize a major city.
Without a rapid infusion of aid, “it will be much harder for us to fight,” said Andriy Borovyk, 38, who was having a coffee outdoors with a friend in the city center. “I think we could lose some territories, definitely.”
Like many others here, he likened the attitude of some of Ukraine’s allies to that of European leaders before World War II, as Adolf Hitler was coming to power.
“I think that Westerners are in a warm bath, as we say in Ukraine — like in 1939, they think it will never affect them,” said Borovyk, who works for an anti-corruption nongovernmental organization. “But it will. History has a cycle.”
A metropolis the size of Chicago, Kyiv bears the earmarks of any sophisticated European capital: stately architecture, craft breweries, ubiquitous electric scooters, colorful springtime blooms in spacious, well-tended parks. But beneath the bustle runs an undercurrent of dread.
Although Kyiv lies hundreds of miles from the battle zone, war’s hallmarks are in plain view: a sea of fluttering blue-and-yellow flags commemorating fallen soldiers, QR codes plastered on posters for crowdfunding efforts to buy drones or other supplies for field units, men and women in camouflage uniforms kissing loved ones goodbye at train stations.
Even an open-air display of wrecked, rusting Russian military vehicles — installed early in the war as a morale booster in a square outside a landmark Kyiv monastery — is more likely these days to inspire a frisson of foreboding than a spurt of national pride.
People view captured Russian equipment, including tanks, in front of St. Michael’s monastery in Kyiv, Ukraine.
(Pete Kiehart / For The Times)
A sea of flags, each representing a fallen Ukrainian soldier, is displayed on Independence Square in Kyiv.
(Pete Kiehart / For The Times)
In the war’s heady early months, after Russian forces menaced Kyiv but then were forced to pull back, people flocked to the square to take selfies, and children played tag between the hulking wrecks. The display has been a frequent backdrop for visiting foreign dignitaries, including President Biden, who strolled the square last year.
For Marina Kozulina, a 50-something Kyiv woman walking her little black dog near a half-ruined tank, the military detritus in the square has become more a reminder of peril than triumph.
“Seeing this makes me nervous, to think about how close the Russians were to Kyiv, and if they could be again,” she said. “I want us to win, but it’s very difficult.”
Even President Volodymyr Zelensky, the former comedian who has tirelessly rallied compatriots since the invasion of Feb. 24, 2022, is taking an increasingly grim tone as cities across the country are pummeled nightly by relentless Russian drone and missile attacks.
“It is quite obvious that our existing air defense capabilities in Ukraine are not sufficient,” he said in a recent nightly address. “And it is obvious to our partners.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky inspects the fortification lines in the Kharkiv region on April 9, 2024.
(Ukrainian Presidential Press Office )
More gloomy news from the battle zone came Saturday, as the head of Ukraine’s military warned that conditions in the country’s east had “significantly worsened” in recent days.
Writing on the messaging app Telegram, the military chief, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, said warmer spring temperatures were drying up previously muddy terrain, allowing Russian forces to step up their assaults with tanks and other armored vehicles.
Until recently, explicit talk of potential military defeat was considered largely out of bounds for Ukrainian officials, because they did not want to appear to be seeking expensive Western backing to wage what could ultimately prove a fruitless struggle.
But Zelensky did not mince words in a video meeting last weekend with a Ukrainian aid group: “It is necessary to specifically tell Congress that if Congress does not help Ukraine, Ukraine will lose the war,” he said.
Many Ukrainians have an extremely detailed grasp of U.S. election-year politics, and any visiting American is asked again and again: When is more help coming?
“We’re grateful — more than grateful,” said Anastasia Shevchuk, 16, who was out shopping downtown with friends. “But everyone understands that if Russia wins here, it’s a big, big threat to all of Europe, and the rest of the world as well.”
Attention here is heavily focused on the $60-billion U.S. aid package that has been blocked for months by congressional Republicans. It may yet be put to a vote this month, but is still in danger of being derailed by internecine fighting in the GOP.
“Voting on this aid, it’s a matter of life and death — we depend on our partners, especially the U.S.,” said Bohdan Krylyvenko, 38, sitting in the sunshine outside a fast-food restaurant. “You might think, ‘Oh, McDonald’s is open, everything looks OK. But it’s totally not OK.”
Across the country, near-nightly Russian attacks exact a growing toll. The United Nations’ human rights monitoring mission in Ukraine said this week that at least 604 Ukrainian civilians were killed or injured in such strikes — hitting apartment blocks and shops, churches and cultural sites — in March.
“The situation in Ukraine is dire; there is not a moment to lose,” the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, wrote Thursday on the social media platform X. She noted the latest predawn air alert at 4:15 a.m., as missile barrages struck several parts of the country.
In a conflict marked by dramatic ups and downs over the last two years — initial fears that Ukraine would be swiftly subdued, an inspirational underdog narrative as the country successfully defended itself, stunning Ukrainian counteroffensives in the country’s south and east in 2022 — recent months, by contrast, have brought a drumbeat of bad news.
Last year’s much-vaunted summer counteroffensive foundered amid muted but pointed mutual recrimination between Ukrainian officials and American backers over battle tactics. The eastern town of Avdiivka fell to Russian forces in February, the first such Ukrainian loss in nine months, a defeat perhaps even more stinging symbolically than tactically.
An apartment in a nine-story building damaged by Russian shelling on April 9, 2024, in Selydove, in eastern Ukraine.
(Oleksandr Buriak / Getty Images)
Manpower shortages in the ranks of a professional army bolstered at the war’s outbreak by citizen soldiers — teachers, accountants and mechanics who rushed to volunteer — have forced an unpopular measure to lower the military mobilization age from 27 to 25. And in the battle zone, artillery stocks have dwindled alarmingly, the senior U.S. commander in Europe warned Congress on Wednesday.
Testifying before the House Armed Services Committee, Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli said that within weeks, Ukrainian forces will be vastly outgunned if more armaments are not rushed in.
“They are now being outshot by the Russian side 5-1,” Cavoli said of Ukrainian troops. “The Russians fire five times as many artillery shells at the Ukrainians than the Ukrainians are able to fire back. That will immediately go to 10-1 in a matter of weeks.”
The general added: “We’re not talking about months. We’re not talking hypothetically.”
The Ukrainian side can claim successes as well, some of which its leaders believe have gone unfairly unheralded. Those include stepped-up domestic production of much-needed drones, and securing a shipping lane for grain exports as Ukraine — a country without a formal navy — has sunk or disabled one-third of all Russian warships in the Black Sea with missile and drone attacks.
Ukraine has also harried Moscow with strikes aimed mainly at Russian energy installations — mirroring, though at a far smaller scale, the destructive Russian attacks aimed at Ukraine’s power grid. But some Ukrainian officials have grumbled that they are not allowed to use Western-supplied weaponry beyond the country’s borders.
Military analysts say the drop-off in aid not only contributes to battlefield hardship now, but also makes it difficult for Ukraine to make plans to try to recapture military momentum.
“It’s a dual challenge — to stabilize the current front line, and put in place significant defenses so the Russian advances this year are blunted,” said Matthew Savill, the director of military sciences at the Royal United Services Institute, a British defense and security think tank.
Because of the immediate and short-term difficulties, a major Ukrainian counteroffensive this year is a near-impossibility, he said.
In the meantime, European allies are seeking to break the U.S. congressional logjam. On Tuesday, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron met with Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, describing the blocked assistance as not only pivotal for Ukraine, but also “profoundly in your interest” — that of the United States.
In a telling bit of realpolitik, however, the British foreign secretary also made the trek to Florida for a meeting with former President Trump, who, as he seeks a second term, has played a key role in dissuading his congressional allies from endorsing the aid. After the meeting, Cameron made no claim of progress.
In every corner of Ukraine, the fallen return home daily.
In Kyiv this week, two wooden caskets bearing soldiers’ bodies were brought to Independence Square — the heart of Ukraine’s 2014 pro-democracy protests — in a solemn parade, with mourners kneeling at their passing.
People pay their respects to two Ukrainian servicemen killed in a battle with Russian troops during the funeral ceremony in Independence Square in Kyiv on April 9, 2024.
(Efrem Lukatsky / Associated Press)
Looking on was a 36-year-old lieutenant colonel named Bohdan, a friend of one of the dead soldiers. He described his feelings when his own 2-year-old son, no stranger to air alerts, asked him when the missiles would come again.
“When he grows up, I don’t want him to have to fight this kind of war, but without the world’s help, maybe he will have to,” said the officer, who, in keeping with military policy, did not want his full name used.
He watched bleakly as the coffins were carried to the foot of a towering monument to Ukraine’s 1991 independence.
“Many people, the best people of our nation, will die,” he continued. “But we will fight. We have no choice.”
new video loaded: Bill Clinton Says He ‘Did Nothing Wrong’ in House Epstein Inquiry
transcript
transcript
Bill Clinton Says He ‘Did Nothing Wrong’ in House Epstein Inquiry
Former President Bill Clinton told members of the House Oversight Committee in a closed-door deposition that he “saw nothing” and had done nothing wrong when he associated with Jeffrey Epstein decades ago.
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“Cause we don’t know when the video will be out. I don’t know when the transcript will be out. We’ve asked that they be out as quickly as possible.” “I don’t like seeing him deposed, but they certainly went after me a lot more than that.” “Republicans have now set a new precedent, which is to bring in presidents and former presidents to testify. So we’re once again going to make that call that we did yesterday. We are now asking and demanding that President Trump officially come in and testify in front of the Oversight Committee.” “Ranking Member Garcia asked President Clinton, quote, ‘Should President Trump be called to answer questions from this committee?’ And President Clinton said, that’s for you to decide. And the president went on to say that the President Trump has never said anything to me to make me think he was involved. “The way Chairman Comer described it, I don’t think is a complete, accurate description of what actually was said. So let’s release the full transcript.”
By Jackeline Luna
February 27, 2026
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) accused Everett, Washington, Mayor Cassie Franklin of escalating tensions with federal authorities after she issued a directive limiting immigration enforcement in the city.
Franklin issued a mayoral directive this week establishing citywide protocols for staff, including law enforcement, that restrict federal immigration agents from entering non-public areas of city buildings without a judicial warrant.
“We’ve heard directly from residents who are afraid to leave their houses because of the concerning immigration activity happening locally and across our country. It’s heartbreaking to see the impacts on Everett families and businesses,” Franklin said in a statement.
“With this directive, we are setting clear protocols, protecting access to services and reinforcing our commitment to serving the entire community.”
ICE blasted the directive Friday, writing on X it “escalates tension and directs city law enforcement to intervene with ICE operations at their own discretion,” thereby “putting everyone at greater risk.”
Mayor Cassie Franklin said her new citywide immigration enforcement protocols are intended to protect residents and ensure access to services, while ICE accused her of escalating tensions with federal authorities. (Google Maps)
ICE said Franklin was directing city workers to “impede ICE operations and expose the location of ICE officers and agents.”
“Working AGAINST ICE forces federal teams into the community searching for criminal illegal aliens released from local jails — INCREASING THE FEDERAL PRESENCE,” the agency said. “Working with ICE reduces the federal presence.”
“If Mayor Franklin wanted to protect the people she claims to serve, she’d empower the city police with an ICE 287g partnership — instead she serves criminal illegal aliens,” ICE added.
DHS, WHITE HOUSE MOCK CHICAGO’S LAWSUIT OVER ICE: ‘MIRACULOUSLY REDISCOVERED THE 10TH AMENDMENT’
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement blasted Everett’s mayor after she issued a directive restricting federal agents from accessing non-public areas of city facilities without a warrant. (Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
During a city council meeting where she announced the policy, Franklin said “federal immigration enforcement is causing real fear for Everett residents.”
“It’s been heartbreaking to see the racial profiling that’s having an impact on Everett families and businesses,” she said. “We know there are kids staying home from school, people not going to work or people not going about their day, dining out or shopping for essentials.”
The mayor’s directive covers four main areas, including restricting federal immigration agents from accessing non-public areas of city buildings without a warrant, requiring immediate reporting of enforcement activity on city property and mandating clear signage to enforce access limits.
BLOCKING ICE COOPERATION FUELED MINNESOTA UNREST, OFFICIALS WARN AS VIRGINIA REVERSES COURSE
Everett, Wash., Mayor Cassie Franklin said her new directive is aimed at protecting residents amid heightened immigration enforcement activity. (iStock)
It also calls for an internal policy review and staff training, including the creation of an Interdepartmental Response Team and updated immigration enforcement protocols to ensure compliance with state law.
Franklin directed city staff to expand partnerships with community leaders, advocacy groups and regional governments to coordinate responses to immigration enforcement, while promoting immigrant-owned businesses and providing workplace protections and “know your rights” resources.
The mayor also reaffirmed a commitment to “constitutional policing and best practices,” stating that the police department will comply with state law barring participation in civil immigration enforcement. The directive outlines protocols for documenting interactions with federal officials, reviewing records requests and strengthening privacy safeguards and technology audits.
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Everett, Wash., Mayor Cassie Franklin issued a directive limiting federal immigration enforcement in city facilities. (iStock)
“We want everyone in the city of Everett to feel safe calling 911 when they need help and to know that Everett Police will not ask about your immigration status,” Franklin said during the council meeting. ”I also expect our officers to intervene if it’s safe to do so to protect our residents when they witness federal officers using unnecessary force.”
Fox News Digital has reached out to Mayor Franklin’s office and ICE for comment.
Related Article
The morning after Netflix clinched its deal to buy Warner Bros., Paramount Skydance Chairman David Ellison assembled a war room of trusted advisors, including his billionaire father, Larry Ellison.
Furious at Warner Bros. Discovery Chief David Zaslav for ending the auction, the Ellisons and their team began plotting their comeback on that crisp December day.
To rattle Warner Bros. Discovery and its investors, they launched a three-front campaign: a lawsuit, a hostile takeover bid and direct lobbying of the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress.
“There was a master battle plan — and it was extremely disciplined,” said one auction insider who was not authorized to comment publicly.
Netflix stunned the industry late Thursday by pulling out of the bidding, clearing the way for Paramount to claim the company that owns HBO, HBO Max, CNN, TBS, Food Network and the Warner Bros. film and television studios in Burbank. The deal was valued at more than $111 billion.
The streaming giant’s reversal came just hours after co-Chief Executive Ted Sarandos met with Atty Gen. Pam Bondi and a deputy at the White House. It was a cordial session, but the Trump officials told Sarandos that his deal was facing significant hurdles in Washington, according to a person close to the administration who was not authorized to comment publicly.
Even before that meeting, the tide had turned for Paramount in a swell of power, politics and brinkmanship.
“Netflix played their cards well; however, Paramount played their cards perfectly,” said Jonathan Miller, chief executive of Integrated Media Co. “They did exactly what they had to do and when they had to do it — which was at the very last moment.”
Key to victory was Larry Ellison, his $200-billion fortune and his connections to President Trump and congressional Republicans.
Paramount also hired Trump’s former antitrust chief, attorney Makan Delrahim, to quarterback the firm’s legal and regulatory action.
Republicans during a Senate hearing this month piled onto Sarandos with complaints about potential monopolistic practices and “woke” programming.
David Ellison skipped that hearing. This week, however, he attended Trump’s State of the Union address in the Capitol chambers, a guest of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). The two men posed, grinning and giving a thumbs-up, for a photo that was posted to Graham’s X account.
David Ellison, the chairman and chief executive of Paramount Skydance Corp., walks through Statuary Hall to the State of the Union address at the U.S. Capitol on Feb. 24, 2026.
(Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images)
On Friday, Netflix said it had received a $2.8-billion payment — a termination fee Paramount agreed to pay to send Netflix on its way.
Long before David Ellison and his family acquired Paramount and CBS last summer, the 43-year-old tech scion and aircraft pilot already had his sights set on Warner Bros. Discovery.
Paramount’s assets, including MTV, Nickelodeon and the Melrose Avenue movie studio, have been fading. Ellison recognized he needed the more robust company — Warner Bros. Discovery — to achieve his ambitions.
“From the very beginning, our pursuit of Warner Bros. Discovery has been guided by a clear purpose: to honor the legacy of two iconic companies while accelerating our vision of building a next-generation media and entertainment company,” David Ellison said in a Friday statement. “We couldn’t be more excited for what’s ahead.”
Warner’s chief, Zaslav, who had initially opposed the Paramount bid, added: “We look forward to working with Paramount to complete this historic transaction.”
Netflix, in a separate statement, said it was unwilling to go beyond its $82.7-billion proposal that Warner board members accepted Dec. 4.
“We believe we would have been strong stewards of Warner Bros.’ iconic brands, and that our deal would have strengthened the entertainment industry and preserved and created more production jobs,” Sarandos and co-Chief Executive Greg Peters said in a statement.
“But this transaction was always a ‘nice to have’ at the right price, not a ‘must have’ at any price,” the Netflix chiefs said.
Netflix may have miscalculated the Ellison family’s determination when it agreed Feb. 16 to allow Paramount back into the bidding.
The Los Gatos, Calif.-based company already had prevailed in the auction, and had an agreement in hand. Its next step was a shareholder vote.
“They didn’t need to let Paramount back in, but there was a lot of pressure on them to make sure the process wouldn’t be challenged,” Miller said.
In addition, Netflix’s stock had also been pummeled — the company had lost a quarter of its value — since investors learned the company was making a Warner run.
Upon news that Netflix had withdrawn, its shares soared Friday nearly 14% to $96.24.
Netflix Chief Executive Ted Sarandos arrives at the White House on Feb. 26, 2026.
(Andrew Leyden / Getty Images)
Invited back into the auction room, Paramount unveiled a much stronger proposal than the one it submitted in December.
The elder Ellison had pledged to personally guarantee the deal, including $45.7 billion in equity required to close the transaction. And if bankers became worried that Paramount was too leveraged, the tech mogul agreed to put in more money in order to secure the bank financing.
That promise assuaged Warner Bros. Discovery board members who had fretted for weeks that they weren’t sure Ellison would sign on the dotted line, according to two people close to the auction who were not authorized to comment.
Paramount’s pressure campaign had been relentless, first winning over theater owners, who expressed alarm over Netflix’s business model that encourages consumers to watch movies in their homes.
During the last two weeks, Sarandos got dragged into two ugly controversies.
First, famed filmmaker James Cameron endorsed Paramount, saying a Netflix takeover would lead to massive job losses in the entertainment industry, which is already reeling from a production slowdown in Southern California that has disrupted the lives of thousands of film industry workers.
Then, a week ago, Trump took aim at Netflix board member Susan Rice, a former high-level Obama and Biden administration official. In a social media post, Trump called Rice a “no talent … political hack,” and said that Netflix must fire her or “pay the consequences.”
The threat underscored the dicey environment for Netflix.
Additionally, Paramount had sowed doubts about Netflix among lawmakers, regulators, Warner investors and ultimately the Warner board.
Paramount assured Warner board members that it had a clear path to win regulatory approval so the deal would quickly be finalized. In a show of confidence, Delrahim filed to win the Justice Department’s blessing in December — even though Paramount didn’t have a deal.
This month, a deadline for the Justice Department to raise issues with Paramount’s proposed Warner takeover passed without comment from the Trump regulators.
“Analysts believe the deal is likely to close,” TD Cowen analysts said in a Friday report. “While Paramount-WBD does present material antitrust risks (higher pay TV prices, lower pay for TV/movie workers), analysts also see a key pro-competitive effect: improved competition in streaming, with Paramount+ and HBO Max representing a materially stronger counterweight to #1 Netflix.”
Throughout the battle, David Ellison relied on support from his father, attorney Delrahim, and three key board members: Oracle Executive Vice Chair Safra A. Catz; RedBird Capital Partners founder Gerry Cardinale; and Justin Hamill, managing director of tech investment firm Silver Lake.
In the final days, David Ellison led an effort to flip Warner board members who had firmly supported Netflix. With Paramount’s improved offer, several began leaning toward the Paramount deal.
On Tuesday, Warner announced that Paramount’s deal was promising.
On Thursday, Warner’s board determined Paramount’s deal had topped Netflix. That’s when Netflix surrendered.
“Paramount had a fulsome, 360-degree approach,” Miller said. “They approached it financially. … They understood the regulatory environment here and abroad in the EU. And they had a game plan for every aspect.”
On Friday, Paramount shares rose 21% to $13.51.
It was a reversal of fortunes for David Ellison, who appeared on CNBC just three days after that war room meeting in December.
“We put the company in play,” David Ellison told the CNBC anchor that day. “We’re really here to finish what we started.”
Times staff writer Ana Cabellos and Business Editor Richard Verrier contributed to this report.
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