After three failed diplomatic meetings between the U.S. and Russia last week, leaders and analysts across Europe are worried that the first full-blown military clash on the Continent in three decades may soon erupt as Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to amass fighters and weapons on the periphery of Ukraine.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg met with the German Chancellor in Berlin on Monday to discuss the current situation with Russia and warned that it was a defining moment for European security.
There was a parade in Moscow last May. Dimitar Dilkoff is a photographer.
NATO and the U.S. are being painted by Putin as the invaders in the current confrontation, demanding that they permanently block Ukraine from joining the alliance. Those demands were shot down last week during diplomatic meetings between Russia and the US, NATO and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
70 Ukrainian government sites were hit by a massive cyberattack on Friday after the Kremlin said talks were useless. Microsoft warned that the malicious software was in the government computers that were attacked.
The Secretary of State is going to Berlin to discuss the sanctions the EU countries will impose if Russia goes ahead with an invasion with a warning of an imminent attack by the U.S. He will meet with the Russian Foreign Minister in Switzerland.
The U.K. has flown weapons to the Ukrainian government in case of an attack, while the families of Russian Embassy staff in Kyiv have already left. The mood in the Ukrainian capital is not panicked.
When Alex Danylyuk, the country's former finance minister, led reporters on a tour, he was shocked by the responses they received. He told Yahoo News that it was not a real threat for the majority. It is absurd when our international partners are more concerned than we are.
The investigative reporter from Ukranian concurs. She told Yahoo News that most citizens don't believe Russia would invade.
Few are listening to the advice that Kozyreva has given to her friends in Kyiv to carry their passports and cash wherever they go. She said nobody was going to the store to stock up on supplies. People are tired of being afraid of war.
She thinks that the government of President Zelensky is downplaying the likelihood of war because the military is prepared. She said that the movie "Don't Look Up" was similar to the government in the movie "Don't look North, South or East" in Ukraine.
Ukrainian servicemen are participating in military exercises with the United States and other NATO countries. Yuriy Dyachyshyn is a photographer.
The editor in chief of the independent newspaper Kyiv Post attributes the current reaction to battle fatigue. He told Yahoo News that since at least the year of 2014, Russia has been attacking Ukraine. He said that the government takes the threat at the border very seriously. There is an attempt to downplay it so that there is no mass panic.
Lesia Donets, a public relations consultant, said that most of us don't believe that an attack by Russia is going to happen. She saw a rise in concern last month after the Ministry of Defense ordered women of certain professions to register for the draft. The map of bomb shelters published by the Kyiv City Council caused her to discuss her contingency plans with her friends.
Many of the bomb shelters that were used during World War II have been converted into hair salons and restaurants.
The US and European officials are alarmed by Russia's military increase. Few now believe that the build up is a ruse to get NATO concessions.
The International Institute for Strategic Studies' senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia said that the threat looked very serious. He said that it would be irresponsible to assume that the troops will not be used to fight. The use of military power by Putin has surprised the West before. This would be on a much larger scale.
Russian President Putin is standing. The Host Photo Agency is headed by Sergey Guneev.
Even though Putin knew his demands would be rejected, the inability of the Kremlin to get concessions in last week's talks increased the likelihood that Russia will strike. Now that the diplomatic route didn't work, they'll want to show that they have other options, including military and cyberattacks.
The question will be how Moscow will be seen by the world and the Russian people.
David Stulk, an expert on Russia at the European Values Center for Security Policy, has observed how the Kremlin is portraying the conflict as being caused by the U.S. and NATO. Stulk told Yahoo News that one of his friends was present at the NATO and Russia meeting. Russian citizens were asked a number of times how Ukraine was threatening their national security. The Russians couldn't provide a rational response to that. He has seen on Russian state media that Russia is being threatened by NATO, which would start an aggression against Russia from Ukraine.
Russian operatives in Ukraine could threaten ethnic Russians living there, giving Moscow a reason to invade to protect them, or even release chemical weapons to justify an invasion. John Herbst, director of the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center and former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, told Yahoo News that it was possible for Putin to order Russian special forces to launch a chemical attack on Ukraine.
There is equal concern about Putin's end game if he attacks.
The members of the Kyiv Territorial Defense Unit are training. Brendan Hoffman is a photographer.
Herbst said that Putin's foreign policy is focused on Ukraine, but his ambitions are much greater. He is trying to change what was established after the Cold War ended. Russian control of the post-Soviet space is something that that means.
The director of Middle East Studies at a Georgian think tank said that Ukraine's neighbors are jittery. Russia has occupied or annexed more territories than any other country. Its gas resources are constantly manipulated to get more influence over the West. It is clear that Russia is a threat to other countries.
Legucka said that NATO's Eastern flank is on high alert since the beginning.
Evelyn Farkas is a former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia. She told Yahoo News that Putin was trying to change the world order.
She told Yahoo News that if Putin gets away with what he's doing in Ukraine, he'll turn his attention to other states that were in the Soviet sphere of influence, such as the Baltics. He will start threatening their sovereignty. The U.S. will have an obligation to protect those countries. NATO will fall apart if we don't. If NATO falls apart, Putin will do everything he can to keep Europe together, and the Europeans will have to fight for themselves.
Evelyn Farkas is the U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense. Alex Wong is the photographer.
The vice president of GLOBSEC Brussels believes that Putin is gambling heavily on Russia's skills in hybrid war and on his new military, and that he may have boxed himself into a corner. If the world reacts negatively and Russians react negatively, a military incursion into Ukraine could blow up in Putin's face. Putin wanted NATO to stop adding members so that they wouldn't allow Finland and Sweden to join.
Last week, it was a hot topic again, with both Sweden and Finland saying that they weren't applying for NATO membership now, but they totally rejected Russia's demand that they declared they would never join NATO.
According to Freudenstein and others, Putin may be trying to drive Sweden and Finland into NATO's arms, just one bit of blowback from Russia's renewed aggression. He said that the end of Putin may be closer than he thought. He may be about to dig his own grave here.
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