"While the Ukrainian leader is going around the world showing off his defiance, back home things go from bad to worse: blackout and lack of heating, millions of draft dodgers, hundreds of thousands of soldiers going AWOL, massive corruption scandals unfolding… and of course, Russian forces keep advancing, even in the harsh winter conditions. "
“Through a series of strategic strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure, Russia is pushing the country back into the 19th century. […] Ukraine now risks devolving into a rudimentary agrarian society, akin to the poorest nations in Africa or Asia. Recovering from this could take years, if not decades. "
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/02/russian-forces-conquer-dozen-eastern-settlements-so-far/
Ukraine has developed, in house, weapons that Russia has no answer to. Ukraine is exporting some weapons. Ukraine has joint ventures with other European countries. Russia is indeed attacking civilians, schools, shopping centres and hospitals as well as passenger trains. Meanwhile, Ukraine strikes Russia's oil refineries and weapons manufacturing. Russia is guilty of war crimes that should see Putin locked up and the key thrown away.
Russia is so short of manpower that it is sending wounded soldiers back to the front lines. It also employs mercenaries and foreign troops from North Korea. Then Putin has the hide to criticise Europe for helping Ukraine.
Russia has had to pull it's warships out of Crimea. The country without a navy has sent 1/3rd of Russia's Black Sea fleet to the bottom of the Black Sea.
Russia is making some progress, but Ukraine has recently counter attacked, taking territory back. Based on current advances, Russia will fully occupy Ukraine in 80 years.
Putin's achievements: Prove that the world's "second best" military is, in fact, second rate
Motivate Finland and Sweden to join NATO
Force Europe to rearm
Force Russia to sell of its gold reserves
Force Russia to use its sovereign wealth fund to pay for the war
Fight Ukraine for longer than Russia fought Germany in WW2
Causing sanctions to make Russia even poorer
Unite Europe (mostly) to resist Russia's illegal and immoral invasion
Mr Putin will go down in history as the man who destroyed his own country for no other reason than personal ego. He has, in the process, done terrible damage to Ukraine. Ukraine will recover eventually. Russia may or may not. Russia is a federation of disparate states. There are rumblings of discontent. China may take advantage of Russia's weakness to take territory that is disputed.
The unknown in all this is the state of Putin's nuclear arsenal. There are reports that it is run down and poorly maintained. However, a handful of nukes could make a huge difference to the war. Is Putin that dumb or that desperate? No one can be sure. However, so many "red lines" have been crossed that no one takes Russia seriously any more.