Pro-Russian forces have withdrawn from Slovyansk, a city in eastern Ukraine that has been the scene of some of the heaviest fighting. Heaviest is a relative term. The fighting in the east has been much less intense than the general impression given by media headlines. One measure of this is that the total withdrawal from the city, including weapons, was reported to fit on 20 trucks and buses. In urban fighting, this can be a painful group to subdue. But it does not threaten the regime.

What fighting has occurred has been confined to a relatively thin but populated strip along the Russian border. Russian special forces were undoubtedly supporting the rebels, but in the end the rebellion's consistent problem was that it did not spread. This is not to deny that there is a great deal of hostility among eastern Ukrainians toward the new regime in Kiev. But it does mean that that unhappiness did not extend to the staging of an uprising. So the forces that were actively resisting the regime remained operationally if not ideologically isolated. Tens of thousands of Ukrainians did not rise up against the new regime, which is what would have been needed.

It is not clear that the armed uprising is at an end, although this was the center of the most intense conflict. This matters a great deal however, because it is a setback and perhaps the closure of the Russian strategy of fomenting a rising in the east. The rising simply never happened. Nor did a Russian invasion of Ukraine with regular forces. Occupying an area as large as the eastern half of Ukraine is a complex and costly maneuver even without opposition. The Russian army has not been tested in such a large-scale maneuver in some time. Over time it could have done it, but not without the risk of facing insurgency. The Russians bluffed the invasion but ultimately declined.

The Russians have been urged by the Germans and French to take a hand in peacemaking in Ukraine. Having failed to foment a widespread uprising and unwilling to take military action, this course clearly recommended itself to the Russians. The decision to withdraw pro-Russian fighters from Slovyansk was, we suspect, orchestrated in Moscow. France and Germany do not want to humiliate Russia, as that makes Russia more insecure and less predictable. What they want is an end game that leaves Russia with some dignity, but leaves the pro-Western government in Kiev in place.

It would appear that the Russians are conceding defeat, however, it is premature to reach that conclusion. Their real levers in Ukraine are financial, political and covert. The center of gravity of this event is Kiev, and the ability of the new President Petro Poroshenko to hold orderly elections and create not only a government that is able to move into its ministries, but one in which those ministries actually have power in the country. This has been difficult for the Ukrainians to achieve. The Russians are likely betting that it will not be easy now.

On their own, the Ukrainians are fractious. With Russian pressure on the price of natural gas, Ukraine's indebtedness and the real hostility between the eastern and western regions, Moscow can increase pressure in Kiev beyond what would naturally be there. The Russians were patient after the Orange Revolution of 2004 and over time Ukraine backed away from its pro-Western stance. The Russians undoubtedly see this as the most viable strategy at this point.

We should be careful in declaring the end of conflict in the east. We do not think it will create a viable separatist movement with the force and organization necessary to split the country. They took their best shot and failed. But the east remains unhappy, and some degree of violence is likely to continue. It is a place where the Russians have levers, although not the levers they hoped to have. But one should never dismiss Russia's potential power in Ukraine. It has been shown over and over historically that the Russians will neither allow Ukraine full freedom of maneuver nor do they lack the means of influencing events there. But in this round, in Slovyansk, Russia seems to have lost.