Russia says no chance of peace after Zelensky's trip to U.S.

Officials within the Kremlin have stated that there can be no peace with Ukraine after President Volodymyr Zelensky’s in-person trip to Washington D.C. 

In a call with reporters, Kremlin spokesperson Dimitri Peskov said that nothing good could come of Zelensky’s visit to the United States and that continued arms sales to Ukraine would result in a “deepening” of the crises on the European continent. 

"The supply of weapons continues and the range of supplied weapons is expanding,” Peskov told reporters. 

“All of this,” Peskov added,” leads to an aggravation of the conflict. This does not bode well for Ukraine."

Zelensky met with President Joe Biden and key Congressional leaders on December 21st in the first foreign trip the Ukrainian leader has taken since the start of the war with Russia began in late February. 

The trip was a tightly held secret and wasn’t revealed until hours before Zelensky’s arrival in Washington, it also came one day after the Ukrainian president visited the embattled frontline city of Bakhmut. 

While in Bakhmut, Zelensky met with Ukrainian soldiers and handed out awards, some of which were then taken to the United States and gifted to Joe Biden and the people of the United States as a thank you for their support against Russia. 

When asked if Moscow expected to see anything positive coming from Zelensky’s meeting with Biden, Dimitri Peskov simply replied, “No.”

It is assumed that during Zelensky’s visit to Washington, he will seek to secure even more funding and advanced weapons that can be used to win the war against Russia. 

“He needs longer-range weapons to enable him to preempt an expected Russian offensive,” former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Bill Taylor told Politico reporters.

“He needs immediate financial support to keep his government running, and he knows that Congress will make decisions on these items this week,” Taylor added. 

It is assumed that Zelensky and his team will make another round of pleas for long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) as well as Gray Eagle and Reaper drones—requests that the U.S. has been reluctant to grant to their Ukranian allies. 

It is these exact weapons systems that Dimitri Peskov and other Kremlin officals are so wary about. Without such weapons, the battlefield in Ukraine is likely to freeze and momentum in the war could swing back to Russia with rumors of a renewed offensive from Moscow. 

In response to the news that Zelensky would be visiting Washinton, Russian President Vladimir Putin removed all financial limits on support for the country's military forces, but he has yet to comment publically on Zelensky’s trip. 

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu also proposed that the country’s standing military would be increased to 1.5 million servicemen during a defense meeting on December 21st. 

"It is necessary to increase the number of armed troops to 1.5 million servicemen, including 695,000 contract soldiers," Shoigu told Putin, who "agreed" with the proposals at a defense meeting in the wake of Zelensky’s visit to the United States according to the French news outlet, France24.

Regardless of what happened in Washington, it does seem that Russia is preparing for a serious escalation in Ukraine and we shouldn’t expect an end to the madness anytime soon.