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One leader is self-assured, convinced that momentum is on his side as the new year looms. The other is on the defensive, faced with mounting questions over whether his nation is on an irreversible path to defeat.
Those descriptions apply to Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Unlike last December, when Mr. Putin’s army was reeling and Mr. Zelenskyy projected confidence amid surprising and sustained battlefield successes, the Kremlin claims to have seized the upper hand.
Kyiv, whose vaunted counteroffensive this year produced disappointing results, has been waiting for the U.S. and European Union to come through with another round of desperately needed financial and military aid. Serious questions linger about how long Ukraine can hold off the larger Russian army without assistance.
Mr. Putin ends the year on a high note after a six-month whirlwind. In June, an internal uprising led by Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin threatened to drive him from power. The rebellion was motivated by frustration over how Mr. Putin and his top generals were managing the war.
Now, Mr. Putin’s grip on power appears rock solid. He has confirmed plans to run for — and almost certainly win — another six-year term, and his troops are making advances on crucial fronts in eastern Ukraine. Russian forces are consolidating their positions, stockpiling supplies and building up resources, signaling they are prepared to go on the offensive in the coming year.
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“Our troops are holding the initiative,” Mr. Putin said during a year-end press conference this week. “We are effectively doing what we think is needed, doing what we want. Where our commanders consider it necessary to stick to active defenses, they are doing so, and we are improving our positions where it’s needed.
“The enemy has suffered heavy casualties and, to a large extent, wasted its reserves while trying to show at least some results of its so-called counteroffensive to its masters,” he said. “All attempts by the West to deliver us a military defeat, a strategic defeat, were shattered by the courage and fortitude of our soldiers, the growing might of our armed forces and the potential of our military industries.”
The confidence appears contagious at the Kremlin.
“There is certainly an understanding and feeling of a fundamental turning point that we all are seeing in our confrontation with the West,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a press briefing Wednesday. “This tipping point is visible and obvious everywhere.”
Mr. Putin appears correct on at least one count. Ukraine’s widely hyped counteroffensive failed in its stated bid to make significant advances in the Donbas region or elsewhere. That operation, launched this summer, was expected to drive Russian forces back toward their border, putting even more pressure on Mr. Putin to perhaps consider ending the conflict and withdrawing from most, if not all, of Ukraine’s territory.
Russian troops now have the battlefield initiative for the first time in months. British intelligence officials said Wednesday that a Russian breakthrough appears unlikely in the short term but Mr. Putin’s troops are now the ones conducting local offensive operations while Ukraine is fortifying defensive trenches.
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In his year-end press conference, Mr. Zelenskyy projected his trademark confidence.
He replied with a terse “no” when asked whether Ukraine would lose the war, but he acknowledged “lots of challenges” in the year ahead and signaled in no uncertain terms that he is counting on the U.S. to provide aid.
“I am confident that the U.S. will not let us down and that what we have agreed with the U.S. will be fulfilled,” he said.
Trouble ahead?
Lawmakers left Washington this week after failing to pass President Biden’s $61.4 billion aid package for Ukraine. Republicans in both chambers of Congress want more money for border security attached to any Ukraine aid bill. House Republican leaders are also demanding a White House explanation of Ukraine’s road map to a decisive win over Russia.
Publicly, the administration is standing firmly behind Ukraine and insisting that Mr. Putin will fail.
“He thinks his strategy of waiting us out while sending wave after wave of young Russians into a meat grinder of his own making will pay off,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters at his year-end press conference Wednesday in Washington. “On one and only point, I agree with Putin: America’s ongoing support is critical to enabling Ukraine’s great soldiers and citizens to keep up their fight to ensure Russia’s war remains a strategic failure.”
Mr. Blinken said Mr. Putin has failed in his larger goals of the invasion’s launch in February 2022: The Ukrainian government is still standing, and NATO has expanded with the addition of Finland and the likely addition of Sweden in the coming days.
“Putin is betting that our divisions will prevent us from coming through for Ukraine. We have proven him wrong before. We will prove him wrong again,” Mr. Blinken said.
What’s different this time is the combination of Russian battlefield momentum and cracks in Western support and a growing sense that the draining war of attrition could be prolonged.
As the U.S. and EU grapple over more aid for Ukraine, they are questioning what exactly that aid would achieve, short of holding the line and preventing a clear Russian victory.
Even with all the aid provided to Ukraine, Russian troops are making significant advances. Russian forces are pressuring the Ukrainian side near the northeastern city of Kupiansk, a vital rail hub that Moscow captured early in the war but subsequently lost to Ukraine in September 2022. Russian troops are also pushing toward several key towns in the Donetsk province while Ukrainian forces build deep defensive trenches in the area.
Russian troops, widely derided for their poor performance and low morale in the war’s early days, now represent “the best prepared and capable army in the world, armed with advanced weapons that have been tested in combat,” Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu boasted this week.
Russia has shown through the decades that it is willing to expend a great deal of blood and treasure to achieve its objectives. Such a grinding war would be exceedingly difficult for Ukraine to win.
“Once again, the previous week witnessed no strategic changes in battlefield geometry. Nonetheless, tactical advances from the Russian military have been continuing with concerning success,” Can Kasapoglu, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, wrote in an analysis Wednesday. “These advances have come at the expense of significant losses of equipment and personnel, which the Russian high command is willing to tolerate.”
• Ben Wolfgang can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.
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