Robert Sherman is a White House correspondent for NewsNation. He is reporting from Ukraine. Subscribe to his newsletter: Frontlines with Robert Sherman here.
(NewsNation) — Three-and-a-half years.
Three-and-a-half years of war.
Three-and-a-half years of bombs falling.
Three-and-a-half years of sleeping underground for the sake of safety.
That is the so-called “new normal” for people in Ukraine as the war with Russia continues on.
The precautions are hardly excessive. Just Thursday, over 30 people were killed in a major attack on Kyiv, including 5 children. That’s the single largest attack we have seen since 2024.
Other cities like Kramatorsk, Odesa and Mykolaiv are coming under fire in recent days as well.
Multiple sources of pressure are currently colliding, on the one hand from Russia, the other from Washington as President Trump reups his threat to institute new economic sanctions on the Russians if they don’t move towards peace.
Those sanctions include secondary tariffs on major trade partners. Today, the president wrote on Truth Social, “India is not only buying massive amounts of Russian Oil, they are then, for much of the Oil purchased, selling it on the Open Market for big profits. They don’t care how many people in Ukraine are being killed by the Russian War Machine. Because of this, I will be substantially raising the Tariff paid by India to the USA.”
Will the pressure lead to anything tangible? The overwhelming sentiment we are hearing from Ukrainians is no. They’ve been down this road before, seen economic sanctions hurled at Russia, and it hasn’t made much of a difference in their lives. Russia has pressed on through all of them.
I asked one first responder at a missile impact site exactly how often this happens where civilians get caught in the line of fire. His response was rather blunt: “Ordinary civilians are suffering every day.”
All this week, I will be reporting from Ukraine for NewsNation ahead of the president’s deadline. We intend to give you an inside look at the war and show you what is happening on the ground here.
Tonight, the focus will be on the people and the lives they lead while under siege.
One programming note: Wednesday, I’ll be taking you to the frontlines where we’ll go inside one of the Ukrainians’ drone workshops. This is where modern warfare is reinventing itself at a rapid pace, and unconventional fighting reigns supreme. I asked the Ukrainians point-blank if they think the United States is ready for the new era. Their response?
“No.”
You can watch my report from The Hill Sunday for a sneak peek here.
Catch my reports every night this week on “Elizabeth Vargas Reports” at 7 p.m. ET.
And as an aside, thank you for all of your support surrounding my book, “Lessons from the Front.” It’s been a blessing to see a renewed interest in my reporting from Ukraine this week. As I’ve said before, the day Russia invaded Ukraine and I was on a plane to Europe, my life changed forever. For those stories and more, you can preorder my book through Amazon, Barnes and Noble or Bloomsbury.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily of NewsNation.
