"I wouldn’t say that the Russians are uninterested in bringing this thing to a resolution,” Vice President J.D. Vance said at the Munich Security Conference Leaders Meeting in Washington, DC, in a conversation with Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, President of the Foundation Council of the Munich Security Conference. “What I would say is, right now, the Russians are asking for a certain set of requirements, a certain set of concessions in order to end the conflict. We think they’re asking for too much.” 

Pressed further, he reiterated that, if there was no progress on the peace process, the White House would just walk away. This wasn’t a new signal. President Donald Trump said the same, as did Secretary Marco Rubio a month back.

The 48 hours following those remarks tested U.S. diplomacy and will be possibly considered historic for years to come. 

This magazine reported how Vance deliberated on the Indo-Pakistani conflict, which has no direct strategic interest for the United States, except for a fear of an all-out nuclear war. Within a day that fear came close to reality. By Friday midnight, the pace and scale of Indian bombardment increased to the point that a new nuclear counterattack doctrine was being written in real time; a nuclear power was bombing the nuclear command facilities of a neighboring nuclear power. Never before had decapitation strikes against a nuclear command been not only considered but carried out, even as Trump and Rubio pursued peace efforts elsewhere.