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Children killed in Russian missile strike on Ukrainian apartment

An apartment bombing in Odesa is the second mass civilian casualty missile strike on Ukraine this week.

Cody Godwin, USA TODAY

The cost of rebuilding battered Ukraine after the war is estimated at a staggering $750 billion, but some of those funds could come from the source of the damage.

Just as he has appealed to the international community for help in his country's attempt to fend off the Russian invasion, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy toldthe Ukraine Recovery Conference in Switzerland a global effort will be needed for restoration.

The reconstruction of Ukraine is not a local project, is not a project of one nation, but a common task of the entire democratic world all countries, all countries who can say they are civilized, Zelenskyy said in a video message. Restoring Ukraine means restoring the principles of life, restoring the space of life, restoring everything that makes humans humans.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, who attended the conference in Luganoin person, provided the $750 billion figure andpresented a recovery plan forimmediate and long-term needs.

Shmyhalalso said a large source offunding should be the confiscated assets of Russia and Russian oligarchs, which he said may currently amount to between $300 billion and $500 billion.

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Latest developments

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has thanked the International Olympic Committeefor supporting a ban on Russian athletes in most Olympics sports.Russia has an appeal hearing Tuesday challenging its ban from international soccer at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Pope Francis, who has condemned the "ferocity'' and "cruelty''of Russian troops in Ukraine, said he hopes to visit Moscow and Kyiv after his trip toCanada July 24-30.

Russian President Vladimir Putin declared victory in the battle for Ukraine's Luhansk province Monday and ordered rest for his troops before pushing on in the Kremlin's quest to take control of the entire Donbas industrial region.

"Military units that took part in active hostilities and achieved success and victory should rest, increase their combat capabilities, Putin said on state TV.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu reported that Russian forces had taken control of Lysychansk, the last disputed major city in Luhansk. Earlier, Ukraine's military said it wasforced to withdraw in the face of Russia'sadvantage in artillery, aviation, ammunition and personnel. Continuing to hold out would lead to "fatal consequences" for its troops, the military said in a Facebook post.

"We just gotta keep on fighting," the post said. "Unfortunately, steel will and patriotism are not enough for success. Material and technical resources are needed."

Despite Russia's claims to the contrary, its invasion is still having "a devastating impact on Ukraine's agricultural sector,'' the British Defense Ministry saidin its latest intelligence assessment.

The ministry saidthe Russian blockade of the key port of Odesa in the Black Sea is severely limiting Ukraine's ability to export grain while harvest has begun.In addition, the war hasdisrupted the supply chain of seeds and fertilizer farmers use.

That combination will most likely shrink Ukraine's agricultural exports this year to 35% or less of what they were in 2021, the ministry said, pointing out that drastic reduction from a major wheat producer is contributing to the global food crisis.

Russia's increasing use of outdated weaponry in a number of deadly attacks may beevidence its military lacks more precise modern weapons, military analysts say.

Russian bombers have been using 1960s-era KH-class missiles, which were primarily designed to target aircraft carriers using a nuclear warhead and are not able to accurately strike ground targets, officials say. The weapons were used in twoattacks on a shopping center and apartment building last week, resulting in dozens of civilian casualties.

Russia continues to employ air-launched anti-ship missiles in a secondary land-attack role, likely because of dwindling stockpiles of more accurate modern weapons, the British defense ministry said on Twitter.

Both Russia and Ukraine have expended large amounts of weaponry ina grinding war of attritionfor the easternDonbas region.President JoeBidensaid last month the U.S. would provide Ukrainelonger-range precision rockets, but it's not clear yet how much difference they'll make.

Contributing: The Associated Press

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Ukraine live updates: Reconstruction cost estimated at $750 billion - USA TODAY

Kyiv, Ukraine It wasnt a knock, it was loud banging at about 7:30 on a recent Saturday morning.

Taras opened the door of his two-bedroom apartment in Kreminna, a town in Ukraines southeastern Luhansk region that was taken over by Russia in late April, to see three gun-toting soldiers in camouflage.

Do you have a garage on the corner? the oldest of them, a redhead in his late 20s, asked Taras imperatively.

Without waiting for his answer, the soldier continued: Open it up.

He was talking about a group of three dozen garages built in the early 1980s, an area which had become an informal club, where men could have a drink, crack a joke and play backgammon or chess.

But to the Russian occupiers, the garages were a source of danger, a younger, less strict soldier told 53-year-old Taras on the way, and they needed to check each for arms and explosives.

They looked inside, checked the basement and left without saying a word, Taras, who requested his last name be withheld because he doesnt want to be shot, told Al Jazeera.

They only thing of interest they saw and took away was a three-litre jar with cucumbers that Tarass wife had pickled in vinegar and tomato juice.

Taras got lucky.

His neighbour had his sky-blue Lada Priora confiscated and was beaten and left bruised after he hesitated to hand over the car key for a split second.

On Monday, after the capture of the Luhansk region, media outlets in Russia aired interviews with residents of Lysychansk who thanked Moscow for liberating them and claimed Kyivs forces were inhumane.

But people Al Jazeera spoke to had rather different views.

They said Moscow appoints new officials from among Ukrainian turncoats or pro-Moscow separatists. Tens of thousands are deported to Russia, and those who remain are subjected to humiliation, torture, robbery or arbitrary, extrajudicial killing. And it is only in the areas that Moscow plans to rule directly that occupying forces and officials are instructed to treat locals with at least a shred of respect.

They dont treat us like humans. They say they came to liberate us from what? From our property? From our lives? Taras told Al Jazeera via a messaging app.

Liberation is the key word the Kremlin uses when describing what it calls the special operation in Ukraine.

In Kremlin-speak, Ukraine had to be liberated from its neo-Nazi regime, and the eastern and southern Ukrainian regions where the majority of the population speaks Russian needed a liberation from Ukrainian nationalists.

In reality, in the occupied areas of Ukraine, Russia pursues three different policies.

The first one is being implemented in places such as Kreminna in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, known collectively as the Donbas, that had already been partially controlled by separatists since 2014, says Kyiv-based political analyst Aleksey Kushch.

They use the scorched earth tactic here, a big population is seen as an unnecessary social burden, he told Al Jazeera.

Moscow prefers to send younger residents of the Donbas to Russia to repopulate its regions with low birthrates, bad local economies, and excessive alcoholism and crime.

More than a million Ukrainians have been deported to Russia from the Donbas, including the city of Mariupol, Ukrainian officials said.

The restoration of plants and factories in occupied Donbas, Ukraines former industrial pillar, is of no interest to Moscow. Russia simply needs to declare the liberation of areas that would later become part of the separatist statelets the so-called peoples republics of Donetsk and Luhansk known as DPR and LNR that are fully dependent on Russia economically and politically, Kushch said.

A stark example of this strategy is the way Russia operates in Mariupol, a former industrial hub on the Sea of Azov that had a population of more than 400,000 before the war.

After merciless, incessant pummelling between late February and April, it is now home to tens of thousands, mostly the elderly who live without electricity, running water and healthcare.

They cook, look for firewood, collect water and live outdoors because their shelling-damaged apartment buildings may collapse any minute and bury them alive, said Petro Andryushchenko, an adviser to Mariupols mayor Vadym Boychenko, who left the city before Russias takeover.

The worst thing is that people are getting used to it. They compare [their living conditions] not to what was before the war but to [what happened] in February April. With their lives in the cold basements under fire, Andryushchenko said in a Telegram post in mid-June.

The second strategy is used in the areas Russia plans to hold on to directly namely, the southern regions of Kherson and Zaporizhia, and in parts of the northeastern Kharkiv region adjacent to the Russian border.

There are attempts to create loyalty they plan fictional referendums to declare their residents determination to join Russia, analyst Kushch said.

In Kherson, despite hundreds of alleged abductions of pro-Ukrainian activists, most in the area are being cajoled into submission with food handouts and the promises of tax breaks, higher pensions and other perks.

Even critics of their policies admit that their efforts are aimed at appeasing the masses.

They quietly, calmly help people. One can take as much flour, grain, sugar, all in sacks. If it wasnt for them, there would have been famine, Halyna, a pro-Kyiv resident of Kherson, told Al Jazeera.

Last Wednesday, Kremlin-appointed officials in Kherson said they were preparing a referendum to join Russia.

Meanwhile, a third strategy is being used in areas where Russia did not try to create loyalists and relied on terror and mass crimes towards civilians, Kushch said.

Ukrainian officials say that more than 1,000 people have been killed in the towns and villages northwest, north and northeast of Kyiv between late February and early April, after Moscow retreated from the area after realising it would not risk street fights to seize the capital.

Many civilians were reportedly tortured, raped and shot dead in the back of their heads.

Some were killed just for fun, said a survivor who was beaten and doused with diesel fuel in late March.

They said: Lets set him on fire and send [him] back to his people, Viktor, a resident of Bucha, where most of the killings had taken place, told Al Jazeera in early April.

He survived only because shelling from the Ukrainian side forced his tormentors into a bomb shelter while he managed to escape.

Another reason why atrocities were so widespread, cruel and arbitrary is because of the narrative on Kremlin-controlled television networks that has for years portrayed Ukrainians as neo-Nazis who approve of the alleged genocide of Russian-speaking residents of the Donbas.

Another survivor described the look on the faces of three Russian soldiers who stormed into her house in the village of Myrotske 40 kilometres (25 miles) northwest of Kyiv.

They seemed full of hatred to Ukraine since they had been born, child psychologist Rivil Kofman told Al Jazeera in mid-March.

Kofman and her son David managed to leave the village after hiding for days in their ice-cold basement, observing the duels between Russian tanks and Ukrainian artillery and witnessing the killing of their escaping neighbours in their cars.

Unsurprisingly, residents of Russia-occupied areas meet Ukrainian servicemen as their true liberators.

They cried, they hugged us, saying, Oh, my dearest ones, thank you, said Maksim Butkevych, a Ukrainian human rights advocate who volunteered to join the Ukrainian army, and took part in the battles to retake Kyiv suburbs.

One old-timer even offered me moonshine, and I had to tell him, Daddy, I am on duty! Butkevych, who was taken prisoner in the Donbas last week, told Al Jazeera in mid-May.

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What is life like in Russia-occupied areas of Ukraine? - Al Jazeera English

A British citizen who has been sentenced to death by a Russian proxy court in eastern Ukraine has launched an appeal against the verdict. Aiden Aslin, 28, a British-Ukrainian former care worker from Nottinghamshire who was a Ukrainian marine, was captured by Russian forces in the besieged city of Mariupol in April.

The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, has said alternative routes to retrieve grain stuck in Ukraine would need to be looked at, including through Europes Danube River, if it cannot be moved via the Bosphorus strait in Turkey. The Turks are absolutely indispensable to solving this. Theyre doing their very best We will increasingly have to look at alternative means of moving that grain from Ukraine if we cannot use the sea route, if you cant use the Bosphorus, he told parliament on Monday.

Turkey has halted a Russian-flagged cargo ship off its Black Sea coast and is investigating a Ukrainian claim that it was carrying stolen grain, a senior Turkish official said on Monday.

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Russia-Ukraine war: what we know on day 132 of the invasion - The Guardian

Ukraine needs $750 billion for its recovery plan, prime minister says

Ukraine will need a massive $750 billion for its recovery following Russia's invasion, the county's Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said while speaking to international leaders in Switzerland gathered for the Ukraine Recovery Conference.

Shmyhal also said that Russia's invasion has so far resulted in more than $100 billion in damage to Ukrainian infrastructure.

Country leaders, private sector and NGO representatives attended the conference to discuss a sort of "Marshall Plan" to rebuild Ukraine.

President Zelenskyy, who spoke to the conference attendees via video call, warned that there was "really colossal" work needed to reconstruct the areas that have already been taken back from Russian troops. In addition to that, "we will have to free over 2,000 villages and towns in the east and south of Ukraine," he said.

The eastern Ukrainian city of Sloviansk in Donetsk is readying for a major battle after Russian forces captured neighboring Luhansk province.

"Everyone knows that there will be a huge battle in Sloviansk," one Ukrainian soldier told the Associated Press. Soldiers defending the city told the AP that they are severely outgunned by the Russians.

The city, home to roughly 100,000 people before the war, was captured by pro-Russian fighters in 2014 and held for three months before being retaken by Ukrainian forces. For many in the city, the war has been going on since then. Roughly three-quarters of Sloviansk's population has fled since late February, and city officials are urging remaining civilians to evacuate.

Natasha Turak

Moscow will respond in kind to Bulgaria's expulsion of 70 of its diplomats, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said following the largest-ever expulsion of Russians from the EU country. The Russian embassy staff were ordered to leave Bulgaria by Monday.

While the two have historically close ties, Bulgaria is a member of NATO and its government took a strong stance backing sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. Moscow responded by cutting gas supplies to the country in April.

"Anyone who works against the interests of Bulgaria will be called to go back to the country from which they came," BulgarianPrime Minister Kiril Petkov said. Petkov has accused Moscow of launching a "hybrid warfare" campaign against his government.

Natasha Turak

Plumes of smoke rising to the sky during heavy fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces in Lysychansk, Ukraine, on July 1, 2022. Russia claimed it had captured Lysychansk on Sunday, a development later confirmed by Ukraine.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

President Vladimir Putin congratulated Russian troops on "liberating" Ukraine's eastern Luhansk province after several weeks of brutal fighting. A huge proportion of the area's infrastructure, including residential buildings, has been destroyed.

Speaking on television with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Putin said that the troops who fought in Luhansk should rest but that other troops should keep fighting, according to a Reuters translation.

Ukrainian forces have withdrawn from the majority of the area, although President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has pledged to win back the lost territory. Russian forces are now expected to turn their focus to neighboring Donetsk, which together with Luhansk makes up the Donbas region, Moscow's top territorial priority.

Natasha Turak

Washington's ambassador to China spoke out against Russia during a forum and criticized China's foreign ministry for repeating Russian "propaganda."

Ambassador Nicholas Burns called Russia's war in Ukraine "the greatest threat to global world order," and said he hoped China's government would stop spreading Russian rhetoric that blamed NATO for the crisis.

"I hope foreign ministry spokespersons would also stop telling lies about American bioweapons labs, which do not exist in Ukraine," Burns said during the event entitled the "World Peace Forum," hosted by Tsinghua University.

Burns was speaking among top French, British, Chinese and Russian diplomats to an audience of Chinese and other foreign diplomats, students and professors. The event was organized as a talk among representatives of the five permanent U.N. Security Council member states.

Also speaking at the forum, U.K. ambassador Caroline Wilson said, "If Russia has its way, we would have global anarchy." Russia refutes the West's criticisms. The ambassadors' comments were rare for China, a country that broadly stifles dissent.

China has refrained from condemning Russia for its invasion of Ukraine both in world politics and in media. Much of its media takes a narrative that places blame on the West and criticizes sanctions imposed on Russia.

Natasha Turak

Residents pump water from a public well on June 09, 2022 in Sloviansk, Ukraine.

Scott Olson | Getty Images

Russia has captured Ukraine's eastern Luhansk region and will now turn its focus to neighboring Donetsk, Luhansk's regional governor Serhiy Haidai said.

The governor expects Russian forces to concentrate their attacks on Sloviansk, a city with a pre-war population of roughly 100,000 that was the first to be seized by Russian-backed forces in 2014. It was then retaken by Ukrainian troops.

Haidai also named the town of Bakhmut as a key target for Russia.

Luhansk and Donetsk, known collectively as the Donbas, has been the site of sporadic fighting between Ukrainian and pro-Russian troops for many years. Moscow has called capturing the Donbas an "unconditional priority."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has vowed that Ukraine will take back its land seized by Russia.

Natasha Turak

Britain's Ministry of Defense has said that Russian forces, having seized the Luhansk province in the Donbas after weeks of intense shelling, are likely to employ the same tactics to seize Donetsk

Scott Olson | Getty Images

Britain's Ministry of Defense has said that Russian forces, having seized the Luhansk province in the Donbas after weeks of intense shelling, are likely to employ the same tactics to seize Donetsk, which makes up the rest of the eastern region of Ukraine.

"The fight for the Donbas has been grinding and attritional and this is highly unlikely to change in the coming weeks," the ministry said in its latest intelligence update on Twitter on Monday.

"Russia's Ministry of Defence had earlier claimed to have completed the encirclement of Lysychansk and secured full control of the city," the U.K. said of the weekend's developments in the Luhansk. It added that "Russia's focus will now almost certainly switch to capturing Donetsk Oblast, a large portion of which remain under the control of Ukrainian forces."

The U.K. noted that the invasion is continuing to have a devastating impact on Ukraine's agricultural sector, causing major disruption to the supply chains of seed and fertilizer which Ukrainian farmers rely on.

"Russia's blockade of Odesa continues to severely constrain Ukraine's grain exports. Because of this, Ukraine's agricultural exports in 2022 are unlikely to be more than 35% of the 2021 total."

"Following its retreat from the Black Sea outpost of Snake Island, Russia misleadingly claimed that 'the ball is now in Ukraine's court' in relation to improving grain exports. In reality, it is Russia's disruption of Ukraine's agricultural sector which continues to exacerbate the global food crisis," the ministry concluded.

Holly Ellyatt

President Zelenskyy described how the country's sportsmen and women and have been affected by the war, with thousands of Ukrainian athletes unable to train, hundreds of sports facilities destroyed, and a large number killed in the fighting.

Issei Kato | Reuters

As many as 89 Ukrainian athletes and coaches have been killed since Russia invaded Ukraine, the country's president told Thomas Bach, the president of the International Olympic Committee, on Sunday.

President Zelenskyy described how the country's sportsmen and women and have been affected by the war, with thousands of Ukrainian athletes unable to train, hundreds of sports facilities destroyed, and a large number killed in the fighting.

"Many Ukrainian athletes joined the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces to defend our country, to defend it on the battlefield. Some 89 athletes and coaches have been killed in hostilities. Thirteen were captured and are in Russian captivity," he told Bach.

The IOC has offered a new support package for Ukrainian Olympians. The IOC's Bach said his position was unchanged when it comes to Russian and Belarusian athletes being barred from participating in some international competitions held under the auspices of the IOC.

"The time has not yet come to lift such a ban," Bach said.

Holly Ellyatt

Destruction from a missile attack in Bakhmut City, in the southeast of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk in the Donetsk region of the Donbas on July 3, 2022.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

Russian forces have turned their attention to capturing more parts of the Donetsk region of the Donbas, with the province coming under heavy shelling on Sunday, according to the head of the province.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of the Donetsk oblast (or province), said it was a "difficult Sunday in Donetsk region [with] rocket strikes and shelling throughout the region."

He said the area's largest cities Kramatorsk and Sloviansk were the most affected. Six people, including one child, were killed in Sloviansk after what Kyrylenko described as "massive shelling during the day." Nineteen people were injured and multiple residential buildings were damaged.

Kramatorsk, meanwhile, was shelled by a Russian "Smerch" multiple launch rocketsystem, he said. "During the day they damaged a hotel and residential complex, in the evening they destroyed a road, targeted a school and the territory of a kindergarten and a clinic," Kyrylenko said on Telegram in a post accompanied by images of heavily damaged and destroyed residential buildings.

The shelling in Kramatorsk left one person injured while in a residential area another person was killed.

"In just one day, the Russians killed at least 7 civilians and wounded at least 20 in Donetsk region," Kyrylenko said. CNBC was not able to immediately verify the information.

Holly Ellyatt

Plumes of smoke rising to the sky during heavy fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces in Lysychansk, Ukraine, on July 1, 2022. Russia claimed it had captured Lysychansk on Sunday, a development later confirmed by Ukraine.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

Ukraine's President Zelenskyy conceded on Sunday that his forces have had to retreat from the city of Lysychansk in the Luhansk province in the eastern Donbas region, but vowed to return to the area.

"If the commanders of our army withdraw people from certain points at the front, where the enemy has the greatest advantage in fire power, and this also applies to Lysychansk, it means only one thing," he said in his nightly video address.

"That we will return thanks to our tactics, thanks to the increase in the supply of modern weapons."

Zelenskyy said Russia had enough multiple rocket launch systems to destroy "city after city in Ukraine" and that the reality is that "they have gathered most of their firepower in Donbas."

The president defended the decision to prioritize lives over land, noting: "The fact that we protect the lives of our soldiers, our people, plays an equally important role. We will rebuild the walls, we will win back the land, and people must be protected above all else."

Russia claimed it had captured Lysychansk on Sunday, a development that was later confirmed by Ukraine. Russian forces now control the Luhansk region and are expected to now focus on capturing more territory in Donetsk. Russia has said its main aim in the war is to "liberate" the Donbas region in east Ukraine where two breakaway pro-Russian, self-styled "republics" are located.

Holly Ellyatt

Excerpt from:
Russian forces turn firepower on Donetsk after capturing Luhansk; Zelenskyy vows Ukraine will win back its land - CNBC

One of the pure joys of being a college professor in my D.C. dotage is having former students and their friends now mostly in government reach out for advice. As I have been in the intelligence game for four decades, most of them these days ask about Ukraine and what we intelligence guys did in the old days that helped win the Cold War.

So, I tell them. Some things worked. Some things didnt. It took a long time. And victory was not achieved by intelligence alone. Its often not the response they want to hear but it is the truth. Intelligence has its fine uses and its distinct limits. Ukraine is no exception.

James Bond had good writers

I am often asked about why we dont have better human intelligence? Isnt it a waste of time? Well, let me say: We always have had good human intelligence and excellent collectors. What we dont have are people willing to roll over like a Bond movie henchman and spill the beans.

The term used to describe Russia is hard target. And by a hard target I mean the SVR/FSB/GRU spying mechanism is huge, worldwide, and ubiquitous, especially in Russia. They keep an eye on their people and home turf. You cant meet Vesper Lynn in a bar and get the goods on the evil mastermind Ernst Blofeld. It takes years of determining what sources are good and who are not and meeting clandestinely with the opposition on your tail.

Add to that another factor: Dictators like Vladimir Putin dont sit around like Dr. Evil (if I may throw another movie in) planning aloud his next move. Few know whats in his head and perhaps, he himself may not be sure. Either way, getting to the leadership is nearly impossible, and the information you do get is likely filtered through different levels of direct access and the always-present biases. Not easy, but gold when you get it.

There are no crystal balls

My former students are also quick to judge intelligence analysis. Why did we overestimate the strength of the Russian army? Why cant we tell how sick Putin is? When will he be overthrown? Why dont we use more open-source information cyber space is filled with information like this dont you guys read it?

Of course there are enormous amounts of information available on Ukraine. More in this war than perhaps any other in my lifetime. TikTok, Tweets, and Instagram directly from the front lines. And analysts, like judges, do read the paper. But and this comes from a guy who ran private sector analysis companies more information does not necessarily mean better.

And there is a fundamental misunderstanding of what an analyst does. Analysts estimate. They approximate. They speak in levels of confidence. They sort through vast caverns of information. They are not sooth seers who predict the future. And no one in my 40 years has ever come across a single report of any kind that says John Doe will be standing on the corner of 16th and L, and at 15:30 hours he will detonate a belt bomb filled with nails. You are most likely to get a dozen separate and slightly contradictory reports from several sources vaguely describing each aspect of the event. A puzzle wrapped in a fog.

Rambo did not win Afghanistan

And then there is covert action, a subject everyone likes to bring up but few really understand.Rambo III. Charlie Wilsons War. Hollywood shapes the subject. Sadly, reality does not have good scriptwriters.

Simply put: A covert action is an order issued by the president and briefed to the Congress addressing a particular international political issue and outlining U.S. Government actions short of the use of direct military force.

In warfare, covert action is not full-scale warfare. The brave French resistance did not win the war: Allied troops invading France did. Americas covert actions in Afghanistan gave the Mujahadeen a fighting chance. Ultimately, a number of factors that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union caused Russia to quit the war in Afghanistan.

Covert action is about training and financing partisans. It is about arming them, showing them how to use the arms and hoping you can keep the weapons under control and find the unused ones after the war. Theres a big, lucrative black market out there for weapons.

But, covert action is also about coordinating actions within the U.S. Government and our Allies to support the effort. Economic and political sanctions, effectively countering propaganda these too are part of a success program.

And none of this happens immediately. The first Afghanistan conflict lasted over a decade; some of our efforts were made successful because we had been pressing on the USSR for four decades. Ukraine will be the same.

The spice in the soup

In the final analysis as I tell my now disillusioned, but I hope wiser students intelligence is the spice in the policy soup: necessary and important, but not the soup itself. It can gather excellent sources, but it cannot be expected to reach into the minds of dictators like Putin. Intelligence analysis is predictive and estimative; it succeeds sometime and fails others. And covert action is meant to inflict pain and influence the outcome, but not win the war.

So, my ultimate lesson for my former students is this: With all our foreign policy tools, including intelligence, it will take time, persistence, diligence, and stamina to win in Ukraine. Weve done it before. It can be done again.

RonaldA. Marksis a former CIA officer who served as Senate liaison for five CIA Directors and intelligence counsel to two Senate Majority Leaders. He currently is president of ZPN Cyber and National Security Strategies, a non-resident senior fellow at the Scowcroft Center at The Atlantic Council and visiting professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University.

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What good is intelligence in Ukraine? - The Hill