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Welcome to The Adversarial. Every other week, we’ll provide you with expert analysis on America’s greatest challengers: China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and jihadists. Read more below.***RussiaThe Russo-Ukrainian peace negotiation merry-go-round continues but ultimately will leave everyone back where they started.The latest flurry of activity began two weeks ago when Ukraine and Europe were blindsided by a 28-point peace proposal produced between U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and his Russian interlocutors. The Trump administration then gave Kyiv an ultimatum, initially saying that Ukraine must accept the deal by Thanksgiving, even though Russian President Vladimir Putin had not actually agreed to the proposal. Ukrainian and European leaders reacted with shock, triggering U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio to convene meetings in Geneva with Ukrainian and European representatives, as well as in Miami. This produced a peace proposal more acceptable to Ukraine and Europe. Yet, when Witkoff and U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner went to Moscow to meet with Putin this week, the Russian president rejected the new proposal.Russia has no interest in ending the war, because it thinks it is winning. But Putin wants Trump to blame Kyiv for the failure of his peace efforts and stop sharing intelligence and cut off U.S. weapons deliveries. Moscow also wants to establish a warm bilateral relationship with Washington — while continuing to fight the war. The Ukrainians know this and so are bending over backwards to demonstrate that they aren’t the obstacle to peace. This is exactly what happened last spring after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s terrible Oval Office meeting, which led to talks in Saudi Arabia with Rubio where Ukraine agreed to a ceasefire and Russia did not. The Russian play does not seem to have worked. While it is unclear if the peace talk merry-go-round will keep spinning, it is clear that