May 19—Why would the Vatican, even after Zelenskyy’s apparent rejection of any rational peace plan whatsoever, send a simultaneous mission to Kiev and Moscow “in pursuit of a cease-fire?” Perhaps there are those in the Vatican who have not only an appreciation, but even a mastery of the principle of tragedy, a principle that the comedian Volodymyr “Pagliacci” Zelenskyy will probably only come to recognize in the form of Nemesis. With yesterday’s announcement by Russian Security Council head Nikolay Patrushev that the Russian military’s destruction of stockpiles of Ukrainian depleted uranium munitions had caused a radioactive cloud to begin to drift westward towards Europe, the world was reminded—including G7 members assembled in Hiroshima for their summit—how unpredictable the winds of war can be.