From Washington: In a development that will reverberate across the Pacific, Ukraine on Tuesday marked four years since Russia's full-scale invasion began, with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declaring that Vladimir Putin had failed in his central ambition to break the Ukrainian people.
Zelenskyy issued the defiant assessment in a video address that drew on footage of Ukrainian civilians resisting Russian soldiers in the chaotic opening days of the conflict. The message was clear: despite the staggering human cost, Ukraine has not been crushed.
"Putin has not achieved his goals. He did not break the Ukrainians. He did not win this war. We have preserved Ukraine, and we will do everything to achieve peace — and to ensure there is justice," Zelenskyy said.
Russia launched its invasion on 24 February, 2022, expecting Kyiv to fall within days. Instead, the conflict has dragged into its fifth year, claiming hundreds of thousands of lives, displacing millions, and reducing much of eastern Ukraine to rubble. Peace talks brokered under American pressure remain deadlocked, primarily over the question of territorial concessions.
The Kremlin, for its part, offered a candid if carefully worded admission. Putin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters that "the goals haven't been fully achieved yet, which is why the military operation continues." Speaking to agents of his FSB security service in Moscow, Putin himself claimed Ukraine had "not managed to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia on the battlefield," while accusing Kyiv of escalating behind-the-lines sabotage operations.
Several European leaders, including Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, travelled to Kyiv to mark the anniversary in a show of solidarity. In Brussels, Zelenskyy addressed the European Parliament alongside EU chiefs Ursula von der Leyen and António Costa, urging Belgium to accelerate Ukraine's admission to the bloc. Without faster progress, he warned, Russia would spend "decades" trying to disrupt the process.
Zelenskyy's language on peace was carefully calibrated. Ukraine, he said, was ready to do "everything" to secure a settlement, but that settlement must be "strong, dignified, and lasting" and must be "accepted by Ukrainians." Any deal that abandoned hard-won ground or glossed over Russian atrocities would, in his framing, betray the price already paid.
That framing reflects a genuine and difficult tension at the heart of current diplomacy. Western governments, including those in Washington, have signalled that some form of territorial compromise may be unavoidable if talks are to produce results. Critics of that position, including many in Eastern Europe, argue that rewarding territorial aggression sets a dangerous precedent for international law and future conflicts. The United Nations has repeatedly called for adherence to its charter principles, which prohibit the acquisition of territory by force.
For Australia, the war's trajectory carries strategic weight that goes beyond the immediate humanitarian crisis. Canberra has provided military and financial assistance to Ukraine, and the conflict has shaped global conversations about deterrence, sovereignty, and the reliability of security guarantees. Those conversations bear directly on Australia's own strategic environment, particularly within the AUKUS partnership and the broader question of how liberal democracies respond when the rules-based international order is tested by force.
The economic ripple effects for Australian exporters are also real. The war has continued to distort global grain and energy markets, contributing to inflationary pressures that Australian households have felt at the checkout. A durable ceasefire, if it could be achieved, would ease some of those pressures, though the path to one remains contested and unclear.
As reported by SBS News, citing AFP, the anniversary comes at a moment when US-led talks remain in an uneasy holding pattern, with both sides publicly committed to their core positions. Whether diplomacy can bridge that gap, and at what cost to Ukraine's territorial integrity and long-term security, is the defining question of the months ahead.
What the fourth anniversary makes plain is that the conflict has confounded the predictions of almost everyone who made them. Russia did not win quickly; Ukraine did not collapse; Western resolve, though tested, has not entirely dissolved. Reasonable observers disagree sharply on what a just and workable peace would look like. But the weight of the evidence suggests that any agreement imposed without Ukrainian consent would be fragile at best, and would likely sow the seeds of future instability rather than resolve the one already underway.