Ukraine now has the ‘cards,’ the US must force Putin to make concessions

Ukraine is proving it holds more “cards” than some assumed, thwarting Russia’s battlefield advances while pounding its infrastructure.

Vladimir Putin is visibly under stress to end the war. Yet Moscow is still demanding peace terms far exceeding its military leverage.

That mismatch sank previous US-brokered peace talks, currently paused amid the Iran conflict.

When negotiations resume, they’ll fail again unless Washington can convince Putin to align his demands with reality.

Ukraine has cause for optimism, as one of us observed first-hand this month. Ukrainians survived their hardest winter yet despite a shortage of air defenses to protect energy infrastructure, and people remain resilient.

Although Ukraine remains unlikely to recapture much of its territory, Russian gains have become ever slower and costlier to achieve. And Ukraine’s tactical and technological innovation advantages make long-term Russian success unlikely.

We’ll likely see Russian offensives gain limited ground this month — but these will be quickly blunted by Ukraine’s ability to make ground maneuvers fatal.

Ukraine has significantly improved the depth of its close-range drone fires, allowing them to consistently impose costs 30 or 50 kilometers behind Russian lines. That leaves Russian troops with virtually no chance of achieving a major breakthrough.

The Ukrainian army has stopped bleeding manpower, while the quality of Russian forces continues to decline.

Ukraine also ramped up strikes on mid-range Russian targets like logistics and air defense systems — making Russian maneuver operations, already challenged, extremely risky to initiate and resupply. And long-range bombardments of oil infrastructure and defense-industrial plants, making it more difficult for Putin to fund the Russian war machine.

Relentless barrages forced Moscow to scale down its annual May 9 military parade on Red Square — a spectacle usually meant as a show of strength. It became a tacit admission of powerlessness.

And Russia’s worse-than-expected economic slowdown has left Putin demanding answers from top officials.

Public weariness with the conflict, which has now dragged on longer than the Soviet “Great Patriotic War” against Nazi Germany, has grown. Restrictions on mobile internet access and popular social media apps have inflamed dissatisfaction among ordinary Russians and elites alike.

This doesn’t put Putin at serious risk of a coup or uprising, but he does seem to be feeling pressure to wrap up the war. Yet he still insists on doing so on his terms.

The Kremlin declared this month that further peace talks would be a “waste of time” unless Kyiv surrenders the Ukrainian-controlled portion of the country’s eastern Donetsk region.

To Kyiv, that’s a non-starter: The territory includes a “fortress belt” of cities and towns that Russia, at its current rate of advancement, would need years to conquer.

This same impasse frustrated US peacemaking efforts since last year.

In those negotiations, the White House pushed for territorial concessions by Ukraine, seen as the weaker party. But while the Ukrainians can live with leaving already occupied land under de facto Russian control, Kyiv won’t cede territory Russia cannot capture.

As a compromise, US negotiators suggested turning the Ukrainian-held part of Donetsk into a demilitarized “free economic zone.” But it foundered when Moscow insisted on obtaining administrative control and deploying Russian national guard troops in the territory — which Kyiv rightly refused.

Russia, moreover, made clear that its demands don’t end with Donetsk. In the Kremlin’s own words, a Ukrainian capitulation on that issue would merely unlock a cease-fire and negotiations on a final settlement.

Putin would likely insist on further constraints on Ukrainian sovereignty.

Rather than predicating a deal on further Ukrainian concessions, President Trump should focus on exploiting Russia’s weaknesses — and convincing Putin to accept terms commensurate with reality.

For example, Washington could reprise its proposal for a demilitarized zone but insist it remain under Ukrainian sovereignty.

Achieving this will require bursting the bubble of rose-tinted information Russian generals are likely feeding to Putin.

Moscow’s penchant for exaggerating its battlefield progress likely reflects not just propaganda, but bogus reporting up the chain.

Trump should hammer home to Putin that Russia has no path to victory. He should pair that message with continued supplies of European-financed weapons and US intelligence to Ukraine.

In concert, the United States should work to exacerbate Russia’s economic woes.

Proper enforcement of oil sanctions, although currently impracticable given the Hormuz oil crisis, should commence posthaste.

Wearing Putin down will take time. It may prove impossible.

But the alternative has been tried and failed.

To achieve peace, Putin must be made to understand the limits of his “cards” — and adjust accordingly.

Mark Montgomery is a retired US Navy rear admiral who is now a senior director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where John Hardie is deputy director of the Russia program.