We’ve had many posts and discussions about the Ukraine/Russia war over the last four years, with me making the case that both Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump have been (for different reasons) unwilling to support the Ukrainians with the type of military capability that would allow them to win the war. That failure to act in our interests (which I’ve argued is to make Russia, if not lose, dramatically weakened by the cost of the war), has actually led to far more casualties. Ukraine rightly sees this as an existential threat to their country, and they have much more willingness to fight than the Russians, who Mr. Putin has assiduously tried to ensure would pay no cost for his “special military operation.”* On the other side, Mr. Putin cares nothing for the “dregs” of his nation that he feeds into almost certain death. Russia for the last several months has suffered over 30k casualties/month, and now are over 1.3M casualties in total. This is unbelievable. And their “spring offensive” has now went in reverse, as since the first of the year when Mr. Musk turned off starlink, the Russians are are now actually losing some territory. April was a particularly bad month for the Russians. And Ukrainian innovation and internal production of deep strike capability is allowing them to punish Russia severely. As we remarked last year, Russia’s very size makes it almost impossible to defend. Almost every other night we see some of Russia’s energy capability degraded by drones and missiles. Seemingly Russia concentrates its drone attacks on civilians in order to degrade Ukrainian will to continue to fight, while Ukraine targets their ability to economically fund the war. And Ukraine now has the upper hand.

Last week we saw a drone strike in Moscow, only a few kilometers from the Kremlin. And Mr. Putin is scared; it’s certainly not the kindness of his heart that is asking for a one day ceasefire so he can have his victory parade in Moscow. He now knows that the Ukrainians can reach even heavily defended Moscow, and Russia has already announced their will be no military equipment in the parade. Mr. Zelensky has kindly offered to provide drone and missile demonstrations for the parade, and Mr. Putin evidently believes he might do it. Russian leadership has stopped the use of the popular telegram messaging app, as well as limited internet capability, which is starting to cause havoc among the Russian populace that he has tried to keep relatively immune. Their economy is imploding and Russians, who don’t seem to care at all about the human cost of the war, are getting upset at the loss of their internet. Russian oligarchs can see the value of their wealth implode. It is increasingly likely where this will go, and I would not be surprised to see Mr. Putin killed within a year.

Meanwhile, Ukraine benefits from the election defeat of pro-Russian Victor Orban of Hungary a few weeks ago (despite JD Vance campaigning for him!), as he had repeatedly vetoed a 90B Euro loan package to Ukraine. Now Ukraine has the resources to continue their fight. And increasingly, from the Gulf States, to Finland, to Poland, other countries are seeing that Ukraine is going to be the indispensable partner in the modern drone warfare world we live in. Ukraine is posturing its economy to meet this opportunity and on the other side of the war will benefit economically. Yet Russia is becoming not just weaker, it is increasingly isolated as its former vassals are rejecting it, including this week in Armenia. Mr. Putin thought this was his opportunity to reconstitute a czarist empire with a weakened Biden presidency, and yet everywhere he looks it’s getting worse and all his client states are getting thrashed. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.

But let’s not get too jubilant about Ukraine “winning.” After all, the definition of winning can be quite harsh.

* I’m referring to the true ethnic Russians, who he has not mobilized. He has focused on getting troops from prisons and remoter parts of Russia (in addition to North Koreans and now Africans) and paying handsome salaries and bonuses to those willing to go to the meat grinder.