Vladimir Putin may have a reputation among some as a ruthless autocrat, a master manipulator on the international stage, but the Russian president does not have a poker face.
John McCain, the late US senator, joked that when he looked into Putin's eyes, he only saw three things, "K, G and B", a reference to his past life. Soviet intelligence officer.
I was reminded of this while watching a video of the Russian leader sitting across from American envoys in the Kremlin.
He was unable to hide his emotions, giving the impression of a self-confident man.
Putin believes the diplomatic tide has turned in his favor, with improved relations with America and breakthroughs on the battlefield.
Some analysts argue that Putin has no reason to give up his demands: that Ukraine cede the last 20 percent of Donetsk that it still controls, that the international community recognize all occupied territory as Russian, that the Ukrainian army be reduced to the point of impotence, and that NATO membership be forever excluded.
As things currently stand, there are several potential scenarios.
The first is that US President Donald Trump could try to force Ukraine into a ceasefire under terms that are unfavorable to it.
One of them is to give up territory, and there are not enough security guarantees to prevent any future Russian aggression.
If Ukraine does not agree or Russia vetoes, Trump has hinted that he may wash his hands of this war.
"Sometimes you have to let people fight their own battles to the end," he said in mid-December.
Trump could cut off the flow of crucial American intelligence needed for Ukraine to detect incoming Russian drones and attack Russian energy facilities.
Another possibility is that the war simply continues to roll on, with Russian forces continuing to make slow advances in the east.
The Trump administration's new national security strategy indicated that Russia was no longer an "existential threat" to the United States and called on America to "reestablish strategic stability" with Russia.
American support for Ukraine has come under serious question.
What, if anything, could potentially change Putin's mind, and what could Ukraine, Europe, and even China do differently?
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Can Europe do more?
If America stops sending military aid, could Europe, on its own, do more?
At this moment, the Old Continent is preparing for a truce.
Under the flag of "coalitions of the willing", he is preparing an international military force to help Ukraine repel a future Russian invasion, along with financial efforts to help rebuild the war-torn country.
But some officials suggest that Europe should instead prepare for the war to continue.
They want to help Ukraine not only “win the battle tonight,” with more drones and cash, but also provide longer-term support and preparations for 15 to 20 years of war with Russia.
Europe could also do more to protect Ukrainian airspace from drones and missiles.
There is already a plan, called the European Sky Shield Initiative, which could be expanded to allow European air defense to protect western Ukraine.
Others argue that European troops could be sent to western Ukraine to help patrol the borders, freeing up Ukrainian soldiers to fight on the front lines.
Most proposals like this one have been rejected for fear of provoking Russia or escalating the conflict.
That is based on “nonsense,” as Western troops are already on the ground and Sky Shield could be activated in western Ukraine with very little chance of any conflict with Russian aircraft, said Keir Giles, senior consulting fellow for the Russia and Eurasia program at think tank Chatham House.
European leaders, in his opinion, "should intervene in the conflict in a way that will actually make a difference."
"The only thing that could unequivocally and indisputably stop Russian aggression is the presence of sufficiently strong Western forces in the places Russia wants to attack and a demonstrated willingness and determination to use them for defense," Giles says.
This strategy will encounter political difficulties.
Some voters in Western Europe are simply not willing to risk conflict with Russia.
However, few analysts expect Ukraine to turn the tide and make breakthroughs of its own.
Having spent a few weeks in Ukraine recently, I heard no mention of a spring offensive, only the need to slow the Russian advance and increase the price it is paying in blood and treasure.
Some Western diplomats claim that Russian generals are lying to the Russian president, pretending that the situation on the ground is better than it really is.
In doing so, they contribute to what they see as a deliberate strategy of exaggerating Russian progress, suggesting that Ukraine is at a disadvantage and should strive for peace.
Russia captured just one percent of Ukrainian territory in 2025 at a cost of more than 200.000 dead and wounded, claims Thomas Graham of the Foreign Affairs Committee (Foreign Affairs).
The thing that works in Putin's favor the most is that many people believe Ukraine is losing, says Fiona Hill, a senior fellow at the Center for the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution.
Hill was on Trump's National Security Council during his first term.
“Everyone talks about Ukraine as a loser, and it actually has the strongest army in Europe right now,” she says.
"Just think of what they did to Russia."
"It's remarkable that Ukraine has managed to hold out for so long, especially considering it's fighting with one hand tied behind its back," he adds.
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Trade, sanctions and the Russian economy
There is also leverage in the form of sanctions - the Russian economy is certainly suffering.
Inflation of eight percent, interest rates twice as high, growth slowing, budget deficit skyrocketing, real incomes falling, consumption taxes rising.
Time is running out for Russia's war economy, claims a report by the Evidence Platform on Peace and Conflict Resolution.
“The Russian economy is significantly less able to finance the war than it was at its beginning in 2022,” the authors say.
So far, it seems like none of this has changed the Kremlin's stance much, especially since companies have found ways to circumvent the restrictions, such as oil transportation on unregistered ghost ships.
Western messages about sanctions were complicated and had too many loopholes, said Tom Keating, director of the Centre for Finance and Security at the Royal United Services Institute.
Moscow is managing, he said, to circumvent the most recent US sanctions imposed on two Russian oil giants, Lukoil and Rosneft, simply by relabeling the oil for export as coming from companies not under sanctions.
If the West really wanted to hurt Russia's war economy, it would impose an embargo on all its oil and fully implement secondary sanctions on countries that still buy it, Keating argues.
"We need to stop being cautious and impose a complete embargo."
"We need to take our enforcement of sanctions as seriously as the Kremlin takes their circumvention," he added.
In theory, sanctions could also influence Russian public opinion.
An October poll by the state-run Center for Public Opinion Research (VCIOM) found that 56 percent of respondents said they felt "very tired" of the conflict, up from 47 percent in 2024.
But the consensus among Kremlinologists is that a large portion of the Russian public still supports Putin's strategy.
The European Union could agree on and use around 200 billion euros in frozen Russian assets to generate the so-called "reconstruction loan" for Ukraine.
The European Commission's latest proposal is to take out a loan of 90 billion euros for two years, and officials in Kiev are already counting on receiving that money.
But the EU is still hesitant.
Belgium, where most of Russia's assets are held, has long feared being sued by Russia, and on December 12, the Russian Central Bank announced a lawsuit against the Belgian bank Euroclear in a Moscow court.
Belgium says it will not agree to the loan unless the legal and financial risks are explicitly shared with other EU member states.
France is concerned about its own huge debts and fears that using frozen assets will undermine the stability of the eurozone.
EU leaders will try once again to reach an agreement when they meet in Brussels on December 18 for their last summit before Christmas.
But diplomats say there are no guarantees of success.
There is also disagreement over what to spend the cash on: on maintaining the Ukrainian state, which is currently over-indebted, or on paying for its reconstruction after the war.
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Ukrainian conscription issue
As for Ukraine, it could mobilize more of its own armed forces.
Its army is still the largest in Europe (after Russia) and the most technologically advanced – but it still has problems protecting its 1.300-kilometer front line.
After nearly four years of war, many soldiers are exhausted, and the desertion rate is rising.
Military recruiters are finding it increasingly difficult to fill the gaps as some young people are hiding from recruitment patrols or fleeing the country.
But Ukraine could expand its own laws on military service.
Currently, only men between the ages of 25 and 60 are required to be available for combat.
This is a deliberate strategy by Kiev to deal with Ukraine's demographic challenges.
A country with a low birth rate and millions living abroad cannot afford to lose what it calls the "fathers of the future."
But this confuses outsiders.
“I find it incredible that Ukraine has not mobilized its own young people,” a senior British military official told me.
"I think Ukraine is among the few countries in history that faced an existential threat and didn't throw their own crazy 20-year-olds into the fight."
Ukraine has simply learned the lesson of history and the disastrous consequences of World War I for 20th-century European empires, which collapsed after failing to restore the population growth that was behind their enormous economic rise, Fiona Hill points out.
"Ukraine only thinks about its demographic future," he adds.
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Strikes, diplomacy and Trump
If Ukraine were able to import and produce more long-range missiles, it could strike Russia harder and deeper.
In 2025, it intensified air strikes on the occupied territory and in the Russian Federation.
In early December, Ukrainian military commanders told Radio Liberty that they had hit more than 50 fuel plants and military-industrial infrastructure in Russia during the fall.
Some Russians have experienced fuel shortages firsthand in early 2025, claims Alexander Gabuyev, director of the Carnegie Center for Russia and Eurasia.
“By the end of October, Ukrainian drones had hit more than half of Russia’s thirty-eight major refineries at least once.
"Production outages have spread to many regions, and some Russian gas stations have started rationing fuel," he says.
Would more deep-sea strikes on Russia leave a mark, when both the Kremlin and public opinion in Russia seem to think otherwise?
Deep strikes are not a magic solution, says Mick Ryan, a former Australian major general.
"They are extremely important military endeavors, but they are not enough on their own to force Putin to the negotiating table or to win the war," explains Ryan, now a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Multiple deep strikes would certainly disrupt Russia's energy and military infrastructure, and would consume their air defense missiles, notes Siddharth Kaushal, a senior research fellow in military science at the Royal United Services Institute think tank.
He also warned that this tactic could be counterproductive.
“It could reinforce the Russian leadership’s argument that an independent Ukraine poses a massive military threat,” he says.
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There is also a diplomatic route.
Some analysts claim that if Putin were offered a way out of the war, he might accept it.
The theory is - a negotiated agreement that allows both sides to declare victory.
For example: ceasefire around the contact line, some areas demilitarized, no formal recognition of the territory, Ukrainian army large enough to protect its own borders, EU accession, but NATO membership unavailable.
Compromises on all sides.
But reaching an agreement would require the US to engage significantly in contacts with Russia, establishing negotiating teams, using its own force to enforce the agreement to completion.
"The United States must exploit its own considerable psychological superiority over Russia," argues Thomas Graham.
"The role of the US and Trump personally in confirming Russia as a great power and Putin as a world leader cannot be overemphasized."
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The influence of China
China is a wild card.
Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, is one of the few world leaders to whom Putin listens.
When, in the early days of the conflict, Xi Jinping warned that Russia should not threaten to use nuclear weapons, the Kremlin quickly obeyed.
The Russian war machine is also heavily dependent on Chinese shipments of dual-use goods, such as electronics, or machinery that can be used for both civilian and military purposes.
If Beijing decides that it is no longer in China's interest to continue the war, then it would have significant power to influence the Kremlin's thinking.
For now, the US shows no signs of trying to encourage or force China to put pressure on Moscow.
The question, then, is whether President Xi would be willing to exert any pressure on his own.
For now, China seems content that the US is busy with other things, that the transatlantic allies are divided, and that the rest of the world sees China as a source of stability.
If the Russian invasion escalates, the world market collapses, and America imposes secondary sanctions on China as punishment for its consumption of cheap Russian energy, then Beijing's stance could change.
For now, however, Putin believes he is in a favorable position and that time is on his side.
The longer this conflict drags on, analysts say, the more Ukrainian morale will decline, the more disunited its allies will become, and the more territory Russia will conquer in Donetsk.
"Either we will liberate these territories by force, or Ukrainian troops will leave these territories," Putin said. at the beginning of December.
“Nothing will change his attitude,” Fiona Hill tells me.
"Unless he finds a way out of the picture. Putin is currently betting that he can keep this going long enough for the circumstances to turn in his favor."
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