Russia plans to keep fighting at least until spring, analysts say
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In February, the Russians will try to increase pressure on the front lines and will attempt to actively wage war until at least spring, according to Andrii Kovalenko, head of the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.
"Russia will try to increase pressure on the front in February, both in the east and in other areas, but the Russians' plans are known in advance, and they will not achieve their goals," Kovalenko says.
According to the head of the Center, Russia will try to actively fight until at least spring.
Armed Forces of Ukraine's withdrawal from Donbas will not stop Russia
Earlier, analysts at the US Institute for the Study of War noted that Russia's territorial and political demands are much broader than the statements about Donbas that the Kremlin is making to Western audiences.
Moscow's public signals about its readiness for a peace settlement conceal a strategic goal: to force Ukraine and the West to accept capitulation terms.
According to the ISW, Russia's chief negotiator Kirill Dmitriev claims that the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from Donbas could be a path to peace.
At the same time, other senior Russian officials are demonstrating a completely different position. In particular, Chief of Russian General Staff Valery Gerasimov publicly mentions the creation of so-called buffer zones in the Kharkiv, Sumy, and Dnipropetrovsk regions, indicating Moscow's much broader territorial ambitions.
In addition, despite the so-called optimism of the negotiations in Abu Dhabi, experts predict either an exhausting struggle or Ukraine being forced to make difficult territorial concessions.
Furthermore, a protracted or deadlocked situation in the war against Ukraine could push Vladimir Putin to use chemical weapons of mass destruction.
