The Kremlin is continuing its multi-pronged hybrid war, aimed at influencing US politicians in favor of Russia in response to the latest US sanctions.
The CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund and a key Kremlin negotiator, Kirill Dmitriev, announced on October 24 that he was leaving for the US to meet with representatives of the Trump administration.
This is according to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).
The analysis states that there is a well-demonstrated pattern of Russia escalating the war in Ukraine immediately after developing new weapons systems and tactics that Russia believes will help its military efforts. ISW estimates that Russia will continue to escalate the war at any time in the future, regardless of whether the West provides military assistance to Ukraine.
The Kremlin has not given any guarantees that Russia will refrain from escalating the war in Ukraine, even if the US refrains from supplying "Tomahawk" missiles to Ukraine.
The Kremlin's threat of a military response to the supplies of "Tomahawk" missiles is the latest step in its long-running rhetorical effort to convince the West that a Russian victory in Ukraine is inevitable because of Russia's supposed military might and advantages over Ukraine and the West as a whole.
Russia's ongoing efforts in hybrid warfare to portray a Russian victory as inevitable ignore the reality that Russian forces continue to achieve only minimal, painful successes at disproportionately high casualties, and that Russia is unlikely to achieve its strategic goals in Ukraine by force in the short or medium term.
Russia often uses threats, including nuclear threats, to cover up its own military weaknesses and false claims that the West and Ukraine are escalating the war to justify Russian escalations.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently acknowledged that the West views Russia's negotiating position as "maximalist" and stated that "Russia has not changed its positions" and that the Kremlin expects the "root causes" of the war to be addressed.
Lavrov continues to identify the root causes of Russia's war in Ukraine as NATO's eastward expansion and Ukraine's alleged discrimination against Russian speakers - reasons similar to those that Russian President Vladimir Putin highlighted on February 24, 2022, when the full-scale invasion began.
Russian officials have repeatedly stated that Ukraine's neutrality, a change in NATO's integral open-door policy, and the establishment of a pro-Russian government are the only conditions under which Ukraine and the West can address the alleged "root causes" for the war.
In stark contrast to Russia, Zelensky has consistently demonstrated Ukraine's readiness to engage substantially in the peace initiative, including most recently by expressing his agreement with US President Donald Trump for an immediate ceasefire.
The Kremlin is trying to use the renewed US interest in bilateral cooperation with Russia and participation in initiatives to return Ukrainian children to put pressure on the US administration.
On October 24, Russian Foreign Ministry (MFA) spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that Ukraine and its allies were promoting an "anti-Russian smear campaign on the issue of children" and that the US Senate is considering several "anti-Russian bills", including a bill that would designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism for "abductions of Ukrainian children".
The Kremlin-appointed Russian Commissioner for Children's Rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, recently implicated herself in the forced deportation and re-education of a Ukrainian teenager, and admitted that she "stole" and re-educated the teenager in a pro-Russian ideology.
The Yale Humanities Research Lab estimates that Russia has likely deported over 35,000 Ukrainian children, and ISW continues to monitor reports that Russia maintains numerous "re-education" camps and militarization in occupied Ukraine and Russia.
ISW continues to assess that the Kremlin remains engaged in attempts to engage the US on issues unrelated to Russia's war in Ukraine, in an attempt to delay or circumvent progress in negotiations and extract additional economic and political concessions.