When the velvet glove comes off

When will it end?: A firefighter working at the site of an apartment building hit by a Russian air strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine. The suggestion that the Russo-Ukrainian war should be brought to a precipitous close is bound to further unsettle governments already wary of the Trump administration. — Reuters

THE Prussian field marshal, Helmuth von Moltke the Elder, renowned for having laid the groundwork for modern warfare, is said to have observed that no plan survives first contact with the enemy.

His reputation as a military strategist par excellence notwithstanding, it is the sort of aphorism generals admire because it flatters their sense of realism, a reminder that strategy, however artfully conceived, must eventually contend with facts on the ground.