Putin had four plans to defeat Ukraine. He only has two left.

Detailed summary

The Kremlin’s hopes for military victory or Trump-brokered deal have dimmed. Putin is now betting on Ukraine’s economic collapse, weakening European support | World News

Russian President Vladimir Putin has four bets on how to win the war in Ukraine. Two of them—that Ukraine’s army will break, or that the Trump administration will force Kyiv to submit to Moscow’s terms—are going badly.

But Putin’s other two bets have a better chance of succeeding by next year: paralyzing Ukraine’s economy with relentless missile and drone strikes, and waiting for European support to falter as political parties that oppose aid for Kyiv gain popularity.

This week’s U.S.-mediated talks in Abu Dhabi showed that the Kremlin remains committed to its original war aims: dismembering and subjugating Ukraine while rewriting Europe’s post-Cold War order. “All the objectives we have set ourselves will be achieved,” Moscow’s lead negotiator Vladimir Medinsky told Russian state TV on Wednesday.

Putin will likely wait to see how his stratagems play out in early 2027, most observers say, before deciding whether to stay the course or adjust it.

“The spring is what the Russians will be waiting for. They want to see what this missile campaign delivers,” as well as who wins France’s coming presidential election, said Hanna Notte, Eurasia director at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, Calif. “And then they’ll take stock.”

Even then, Russia is more likely to review its strategy than give up its goals, Notte says.

After President Trump returned to the White House last year promising to end the war in a day, the Kremlin hoped he would force Ukraine into territorial and other concessions. Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky: “You don’t have the cards right now.”

But despite U.S. pressure, Kyiv rejected Putin’s demands to hand over territory that Russian forces had failed to conquer. Trump’s early move to end nearly all U.S. military and financial aid for Ukraine also reduced the White House’s leverage.

The U.S. can still pressure Ukraine. Zelensky said on Thursday that Ukrainian forces are experiencing disruptions to their…

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