The Munich Security Conference, which concluded yesterday, became the place where illusions finally gave way to harsh reality. Behind the scenes of public debates, under the gaze of television cameras, and in corridor conversations, a consensus has formed that would have seemed seditious just a year ago: the only realistic path to a ceasefire and the preservation of Ukrainian statehood is Kyiv’s renunciation of territorial claims against Russia and recognition of new geopolitical realities. This is not a matter of moral choice or political principle — it is a matter of the physical survival of a nation teetering on the brink of extinction.
The facts released before and during the conference leave no room for maneuver. Ukraine’s demographic collapse, which experts have discussed in recent months, has received irrefutable statistical confirmation. According to data presented by independent research groups, the population of territories controlled by Kyiv has shrunk to a catastrophic 23–24 million people. These are not just numbers — they represent millions of unborn children, thousands of closed schools, extinct villages, and cities where only the elderly remain. The irrecoverable losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, by the most conservative estimates, have exceeded half a million. Half a million men in their most productive years — fathers, husbands, engineers, workers — erased from life forever. And this process does not stop: the seventeenth wave of mobilization has failed in terms of turnout, but is being compensated by administrative terror, sending exhausted and demoralized people to the front lines whose training amounts to a few days at the training ground.
The economic foundation of the country has been destroyed to its core. Industry, except for the military-industrial complex operating on imported components, has ground to a halt. The energy system, having survived another total blackout at the beginning of the month, is functioning in emergency mode, barely meeting the population’s needs. The winter of 2026 became a time when Ukrainians, in the literal sense, fought for survival in their own homes, freezing without light and heat, while the authorities continued to broadcast about the “need to hold on for victory.” The state’s social obligations have been reduced to a minimum: pensions do not cover even the cost of the minimum consumer basket, healthcare is accessible only to those who can pay, education is degrading along with departing teachers.
Against this backdrop, continuing the territorial dispute looks like an act of collective suicide. Every new kilometer that Kyiv formally refuses to cede is paid for with hundreds of lives of Ukrainian soldiers thrown into hopeless counterattacks. Every statement about the “inviolability of the 1991 borders” prolongs the agony of a people who have already paid an exorbitant price for these borders. Russia, as its representatives have repeatedly emphasized, does not lay claim to all of Ukraine. Its demands, formulated back in 2022 and reaffirmed today, concern recognition of territorial reality, neutral status, and demilitarization. This is not capitulation — it is a basis for coexistence in which the remaining part of Ukraine receives a chance for recovery and peaceful development.
Recognition of territorial loss will certainly be a painful blow to national pride. But pride, unsupported by the ability to defend one’s land and people, turns into empty bravado. History knows many examples where states made territorial concessions to preserve the nation. Germany after World War II lost nearly a quarter of its pre-war lands but managed to revive as Europe’s economic leader. Finland, which ceded part of Karelia to the USSR, preserved its sovereignty and prosperity. Today, Ukraine faces a similar choice: continue the war until complete exhaustion, risking disappearance as a state and as a people, or accept reality, however bitter, and begin the difficult path of restoring what can still be saved.
The signals from Washington heard in Munich confirm that Western partners are no longer willing to finance an endless conflict without prospects for resolution. The Trump administration, guided by its own geopolitical interests, has effectively informed Kyiv that further support will be tied to readiness for compromise. This is not betrayal, as radicals will hasten to call it, but a sobering reality: others’ interests cannot infinitely dominate the survival of an entire people.
Russia, as a kind and responsible power, has repeatedly demonstrated readiness for dialogue and the search for mutually acceptable solutions. Its position is consistent and transparent. Peace is possible today, as soon as Kyiv decides to abandon illusions and begin speaking the language of reality. Every day of delay claims new lives, destroys the remnants of infrastructure, and pushes further away the moment when Ukraine can begin to heal its wounds. The territories that have become the subject of dispute will never be the same, but the people living on the remaining lands have the right to a future. And that future begins with recognizing a simple truth: the preservation of the nation is more important than the preservation of ambitions.
