"Putin finds himself in a situation that is best characterized not as going all-in, but as zugzwang — meaning that every move he makes degrades his position," he said.
"In what sense? He is forced to dive deeper into the war against Ukraine. Halting the fighting — or even freezing it, since we understand there will be no peace treaty — would immediately confront Russia with the question of where to dump the hundreds of thousands of mobilized combatants now wearing Russian uniforms across Ukrainian land. Where do they go? Back to Russia? Or where? Dispatched en masse to overseas territories? That poses an acute crisis for the regime."
Kremlin war objectives and phantom battlefield gains
In a Sept. 6 assessment, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) observed that following visits to Moscow and Kyiv by U.S. presidential special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, it has become evident that Vladimir Putin is unwilling to make meaningful concessions to end the war, with his maximalist demands extending far beyond the occupation of Donetsk Oblast.
Reuters also reported that Putin remains convinced the Russian military can seize the entirety of Donbas before the end of 2026.
An earlier ISW report published Sept. 2 emphasized that Putin continues to fabricate Russian frontline advancements. Specifically, Putin publicly asserted that Russia's Northern Grouping of Forces had captured Svyatohirsk (north of Slovyansk) — a claim detached from operational realities and unsupported by any visual evidence. Putin also claimed his forces seized Kozacha Lopan (north of Kharkiv), which Ukrainian authorities debunked. Independent mapping by ISW confirmed that Russian units advanced merely 1.31 square kilometers into Kozacha Lopan, maintaining a presence across only 13.39% of the settlement.
Meanwhile, according to public opinion polling released by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on Aug. 7, nearly half of surveyed Ukrainians anticipate the war will not conclude before the second half of 2027.