Ukrainians Pull Stricken Russian Tank From River
Ukrainians Pull Stricken Russian Tank From RiverReuters/General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger warned this week that talks to end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine must begin soon in order to avoid escalating the conflict into "a war against Russia itself,” Fox News reported.

"In my view, a movement towards negotiations on peace needs to begin in the next two months or so. The outcome of the war should be outlined by them before it creates upheavals and tensions that will be even harder to overcome, particularly between the eventual relationship of Russia towards Europe and of Ukraine towards Europe," Kissinger said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Kissinger cautioned that if the war continued unabated, it could change from a war about freeing Ukraine from Russian troops to a wider war against Russia, with uncertain outcome.

"Ideally, the dividing line should return to the status quo ante. I believe pursuing the war beyond that point could turn it into a war not about the freedom of Ukraine, which has been undertaken with great cohesion by NATO, but into a war against Russia itself, and so this seems to me to be the dividing line, that it is just impossible to define... It will be difficult."

Kissinger, 98, continued: "European relations are not the only key element of this long-term [evolution]. Russia and China and the United States will over the next years have to come to some definition of how to conduct the long-term relationship of countries. That depends on their strategic capacities but also on their interpretations of these capacities."

Since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24, the U.S. has provided billions of dollars to help Ukraine, both in humanitarian and military aid, although it has not provided any direct military intervention.