Macron's state visit to Beijing a waste of time

Emmanauel Macron went to Beijing thinking he could persuade Xi Zinping to push Moscow to end the war in Ukraine. All he got was a handshake, the briefest of smiles and a load of platitudes. No surprise there. The Chinese president isn't interested in trying to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine and even if he was whatever he came up with wouldn't be agreed by President Zelensky because the Ukrainian leader won't want any deal that involves giving up land to Moscow. Xi likes to think of himself as a global player but in fact all he is is a communist boss who wants everyone to be communists like him. He is not interested in being an altruistic peacemaker. He has tied himself to Putin, so he is the last person in the world who should be asked to broker peace between Moscow and Kyiv. I don't know what Macron was thinking. Certainly Zelensky doesn't want Macron or any other European leader to act on his behalf. As far as he is concerned his soldiers will do what's necessary to end the war and he doesn't need Macron to plead with Xi to make Putin see sense, as the French president put it. Putin will never see sense. He didn't invade Ukraine for a bit of extra territory in the east. He wants the lot. So whatever Macron or any other leader puts forward, Zelensky will pursue the war until Russia has no troops left in Ukraine capable of fighting. It's as brutal as that. A Pentagon official said the other day that the Russian loss of life in Ukraine was now "devastating". There will come a point when the slaughter is so overwhelming that Putin will have no one else to turn to. More mobilisations will be senseless. There will never be a peace deal in Ukraine. It's just not possible. Death and exhaustion will bring this war to an end but there will be no peace. And no victory.