CIA Director John Ratcliffe used a secretive trip to Moscow this week to deliver a bleak assessment of Russia’s war against Ukraine, warning that Moscow’s military and economic position would deteriorate further if the Kremlin refused to pursue serious peace negotiations, The New York Times reported Thursday. Ratcliffe delivered the warning directly to Aleksandr Bortnikov, head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), according to current and former US officials cited by the newspaper.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. The unusual intelligence mission sought to deliver the assessment through a channel that could carry particular weight with Russian President Vladimir Putin. CIA analysts have long questioned whether Putin’s advisers are giving him an honest picture of the war’s trajectory and the scale of Russia’s battlefield losses. US officials reportedly hoped Putin, himself a former Soviet intelligence officer, would take a message from the CIA director more seriously than one delivered through traditional diplomatic channels. Stalled advances and massive losses Ratcliffe’s assessment emphasized the enormous price Russia has paid for limited territorial gains in Ukraine. The warning echoed public comments by the CIA director last month, when he said the life expectancy of a Russian soldier on the front line was “less than 35 minutes” and that Moscow had captured only about 1% of Ukraine’s total territory during the previous 18 months.