“THE DARKEST moment of this war is now,” says a Ukrainian intelligence officer. Along roads in the east tank transporters lumber towards the front line while ambulances speed away from it. In the past few weeks the Russians have ramped up drone and missile attacks on Ukrainian cities, their soldiers are mounting a renewed offensive aimed at creating a breakthrough in the east and Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, is coming under intense American pressure to sign up to a peace plan that looks much more favourable to Russia than to Ukraine. On April 25th Donald Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, met Vladimir Putin in Moscow for talks that Mr Trump later described as having reached agreement on “most of the major points”. The president called for a meeting between Ukraine and Russia “at very high levels, to ‘finish it off.’” But there is no indication that Ukraine is ready to approve the American proposals.