Russia’s February 24, 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine is the sole cause of every Ukrainian strike on moscovian territory. Missile and drone attacks on Russian airbases, oil refineries, and defense plants began in late 2022, all as direct responses to Russia’s bombing of Ukrainian cities, power grids, and residential neighborhoods.
Ukraine’s Repeated Ceasefire Offers
In March 2022, Ukraine put a written proposal on the table at Istanbul: neutrality, international security guarantees, and direct talks on Crimea and Donbas. Russia walked away, then annexed four Ukrainian regions in September. In spring 2023, China’s 12-point peace plan called for a ceasefire and negotiations. Ukraine signalled openness to discussing it, but the Kremlin called the plan “not feasible” without demanding Ukrainian withdrawal.
In September 2023, President Zelenskyy proposed a summit-level peace formula that began with a mutual halt to strikes on energy infrastructure. Russia rejected the premise within days. That autumn, it launched renewed missile barrages against Ukrainian power plants. Each Ukrainian ceasefire offer was refused without a counterproposal that did not require Ukraine to surrender occupied territory first. The record is clear: Kyiv offered pauses, Moscow chose escalation.
Russia’s Unilateral Off-Ramp
Russia’s unilateral off-ramp has been available since 24 February 2022 and remains unchanged: order the Russian Armed Forces to cease fire and withdraw from every occupied district in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, and Crimea. Moscow rejected Ukrainian ceasefire proposals in spring 2022. It walked away from the Black Sea Grain Initiative in July 2023. Then, in May 2024, rather than negotiate, it launched a renewed offensive on Kharkiv Oblast.
Russian strikes on Ukrainian cities killed over 12,000 civilians between February 2022 and late 2024, according to UN-verified figures. Yet no Russian city faced a comparable threat until Russian commanders placed air bases, refineries, and ammunition depots inside range of Ukrainian retaliation. The mechanism is causal: every explosion on Russian territory traces directly to Russian occupation of Ukrainian land. If Moscow withdraws, the strikes stop the same day. If Ukraine stops, its sovereignty ends.
The Asymmetry of Defense
A state defending itself can stop fighting and lose its country. Russia can stop fighting and keep its own, because the war is not on Russian soil. That asymmetry is not rhetorical, it is mechanical. Ukraine has no option under international law or basic survival to stop resisting an army that has occupied roughly 18 percent of its territory since 2014 and attempted a decapitation strike on Kyiv in February 2022.
Moscow, by contrast, can order a withdrawal and end every Ukrainian strike on Belgorod, Kursk, or its energy infrastructure the same day. Ukraine strikes the invader’s logistics and military-industrial sites inside Russia because the invasion made them legitimate targets. No Ukrainian unilateral option exists, so none should be demanded.
Pressure therefore belongs entirely on the Kremlin, which holds the unilateral power to end the war it started.
The Path Runs Through Moscow
Every mechanism for ending this war runs through Moscow, not Kyiv. Russia invaded in February 2014 and annexed Crimea. Then came the full-scale offensive on February 24, 2022. Since then, Moscow has rejected Ukraine’s 2022 Istanbul proposals. It has rejected Black Sea Grain Initiative extensions. It has rejected every prisoner-exchange pause that included a ceasefire clause.
Russia can stop every strike on Belgorod, Kursk, or Ryazan in one move by withdrawing its forces from Ukrainian territory. Ukraine has no equivalent off-ramp. Halting its defense would mean occupation, filtration camps, and the erasure of the Ukrainian state. The Kremlin holds the unilateral power to end the war it started, and every Ukrainian strike is a defensive act against an invader that could end the war immediately by withdrawing from occupied Donbas, Crimea, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions.