Our First Year
Freedom still requires sacrifice
(Zelenskyy and Trump in the Oval, February 28th, 2025 [Andrew Harnik/Getty Images])
Our first essay appeared the day Ukrainian president Zelenskyy upset Trump and Vance by speaking the truth in the Oval Office. Since February 28th, 2025, we have have published 122 essays, managing a pace of nearly one every three days — or between two and three per week, which had been our goal.
This note is to thank you all, our readers and subscribers: we are grateful.
The Diehard Optimist has covered a wide range of topics, with several recurring themes. Thirty essays have tackled Canadian subjects, including a ten-part series on foreign interference in our 2025 federal elections. Twenty focussed on Ukraine, twenty-two on Russia and thirteen on Trump’s United States. We have declared the Putin era over; found new meaning in George Grant’s Lament for a Nation 60 years’ later; pushed for the coalition of the willing to become a coalition for victory in Ukraine; and profiled the Kremlin’s Chekist masters.
A seven-part series on how the Cold War ended touched on Ukraine, the US, Canadian indigenous history and of course the demise of the Soviet Union. Unlike most histories, we concluded the Cold War was winding down over 1965-75 and had ended by the time Soviet military advisors were deploying en masse to Angola. Moscow has been engaged in large-scale, hot irregular warfare, massive influence operations and other active measures against NATO allies ever since. It is vital not to conflate the dissolution of the USSR and Warsaw Pact with the end of Russia’s active forever war, which they continue to wage at full tilt.
We have also tackled issues from Libya, Greenland and Moldova to Afghanistan and China’s balance of trade. Our objective is not to compete with headlines you read every day, but rather to take a step back from the news cycle — to provide deeper insights that put today’s conflicts, the fortunes of our democratic institutions and the policy choices that will make or break our futures into broader context.
Many platforms today are brimming with quality material. Our goal is to provide analysis and commentary you will not find anywhere else. Democracy, free speech and the peace we once took for granted are under concerted attack. This new wave of aggression started at least two decades ago, as yesterday’s essay pointed out. To restore hope for the future, to retake the initiative and re-open the door for more countries to become stable, free societies, we need to understand the sources of this aggression and the moves required to defeat it.
One year later, Ukraine has survived its most difficult winter since Russia’s full-scale onslaught began in 2022 — in fact, the worst of the twelve since Russia first invaded in 2014 on the very day Canada’s women won gold in hockey at Sochi.
It has been a brutal year for Ukraine and its allies. With a Russian asset in the White House, everything has gotten harder. Zelenskyy bounced back quickly from that awkward February 28th meeting, showing that bowing to bullies never pays and speaking the truth remains a powerful weapon. When we appease or coddle autocrats, as many have done in recent decades, or when we simply pretend they are something else, we only dehumanize, dishonour and weaken ourselves.
These lessons are eternal, but they must seemingly be re-learned in every generation. Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian people inspire us because they are the principal force and main voices reminding the world today that freedom and peace were won by the sacrifices of those who defied and defeated tyranny.
We are close to another one of those watersheds. The peace broken by Russia, Iran, Pakistan and others will not be restored without much greater effort and, yes, sacrifice by allies. We will advocate for these exceptional commitments, explain why they are needed, and aim to remain among the voices shaping and charting this difficult path forward. Thanks again for being part of this conversation.