Western media buzz with speculation about potential Trump-Putin meetings in Alaska. Moscow sees another bargaining chip. But in Kyiv, military planners work from a different timeline — one measured not in months of negotiations, but years of grinding conflict that Russia still believes it can win through sheer persistence. The daily bombardment of Ukrainian cities and battlefield dynamics tells a starker story than diplomatic calendars suggest.
Russia doubles down on military solution
On 30 July, as President Trump threatened new tariffs against Moscow, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov delivered a telling response: Russia has developed “certain immunity” to sanctions and no longer fears additional economic restrictions.
However, the real indicator of Russian intentions sits buried in draft legislation submitted to the State Duma. The proposal would replace traditional spring and autumn conscription cycles with year-round conscription — a move opposition Russian media trace directly to a confidential order from Vladimir Putin. This gives the proposal a strong chance of passing as early as this autumn.
The timing exposes Moscow’s calculation.
With Russian battlefield losses surpassing one million soldiers killed, wounded, and missing, the Kremlin needs constant replenishment without formally declaring mobilization.
The apparent goal of the draft law is to increase pressure on conscription-age citizens and push them toward signing contracts with the Russian Armed Forces. Human rights advocates and activists warn that such year-round conscription would allow the state to keep men under constant mobilization surveillance, enabling rapid replenishment of army ranks without formally declaring mobilization.
The numbers behind Russia’s war machine
Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi reported that, as of late June, approximately 695,000 Russian troops, including operational reserves, were engaged in the war against Ukraine. Over the past year alone, over 440,000 contract soldiers have joined Russia’s ranks.
At the same time, Russia continues forced conscription in temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories and is actively recruiting foreigners.
Despite recent Ukrainian advances in the Sumy region — where several settlements were successfully liberated from Russians — the situation in Donetsk region remains critical, mainly due to the overwhelming concentration of Russian forces there.
This systematic expansion suggests Moscow views the conflict as a war of attrition that it can win through numerical superiority.
Ukraine’s strategic calculation for long-term conflict
Therefore, people in Ukraine do not believe in the prospects of lasting peace with Russia soon. On the contrary, Ukrainian authorities indicate that Russia’s main goal for 2025 is to fully capture the remaining parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, and by 2026, build on the success east of the Dnipro River, including an attempted occupation of Odesa and Mykolaiv, thereby cutting Ukraine off from the sea entirely.
This timeline explains why Kyiv does not believe in a lasting peace with Russia without security guarantees, nor in the effectiveness of any negotiations about Ukraine conducted without Ukraine. On 9 August, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized that Ukraine is ready for real steps that could lead to peace, but no agreements “against Ukraine and without Ukraine” can be considered peaceful. At the same time, he stressed that Kyiv, together with international partners, is ready to seek ways to achieve a genuine and lasting peace “that will not collapse due to Moscow’s ambitions.”
Ukraine’s position, particularly regarding the inviolability of international borders, was supported in a joint statement by the leaders of Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. The leaders of the Baltic and Northern European countries also stated that “negotiations can only take place in the context of a ceasefire.”
Ukraine’s asymmetric response strategy
In response, Ukraine’s military and political leadership is actively seeking ways to strengthen national defense. Given that Ukraine’s mobilization reserve is significantly smaller than Russia’s, Kyiv is focusing on military innovation and asymmetric responses to Russian aggression.
In particular, drones’ success on the battlefield led to the creation of the world’s first Unmanned Systems Forces, which use aerial, naval (both surface and underwater), and ground-based drones in combat operations.
Alongside the general mobilization announced after the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has also introduced a voluntary recruitment pathway. This allows citizens to apply directly to specific units or branches of service and choose roles based on their skills and interests.
Author: Oksana Kuzan
The full article is published on EuromaidanPress
Photo: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine