Robert Serry has spent a lifetime at the centre of international crises. He was the first Dutch ambassador to independent Ukraine, served at NATO, and later became a United Nations envoy in the Middle East. His personal connection to Ukraine-from his first encounters with Soviet Kyiv in the 1980s and his years as ambassador in the newly independent country to his role as a UN envoy during the Maidan crisis of 2014- forms the core of a story about how Ukraine changed the course of European history.

In compelling scenes, Serry recounts how the Maidan crisis of 2014 became what he calls another "Sarajevo moment" in Europe's history, setting the continent on the path to its greatest war since the Second World War. With the pen of an engaged witness, Serry portrays the development of the war, which he sees not only as a struggle for his wife's native Ukraine, but as a litmus test for Europe itself. Along the way, he offers a critical analysis of the search for peace in a fractured international order, where Europe's security increasingly depends on Ukraine's survival.

This book is both a testimony and a warning, written by a diplomat who has experienced war in a way most of us have not.