. One of the clues is a confidential conversation between the NZZ and two influential foreign politicians, one from the governing coalition, the other from the opposition. Both insist on anonymity because what they say independently is explosive. In mid-January, US President Joe Biden instructed CIA chief William Burns to assess whether Kyiv and Moscow were willing to negotiate.

The offer to Kyiv read: peace for land, the offer to Moscow: land for peace. The "land" is said to have been about 20 percent of Ukrainian territory. That's about the size of the Donbass. Both sides, the two politicians report, refused. The Ukrainians because they are not willing to have their territory divided, the Russians because they assume they will win the war in the long run anyway.

On the one hand, these statements are explosive because they give an indirect insight into the views in the White House at the time of Burns' trip. According to the two German foreign politicians, Biden wanted to avoid a protracted war in Ukraine and was prepared to give up parts of the country. If this account is correct, Biden would not be alone in his stance in Washington. A new study by the Rand Corporation ("Avoiding a long war"), a renowned American think tank, concludes that "avoiding a long war is a higher priority for the United States" than for Ukraine "control of their entire territory».