Politico reports:

When Vladimir Putin sent at least 19 drones into Poland last week, the Russian president was delivering a message: He’s not planning to end his war against the West anytime soon.

The Russian incursion into NATO airspace follows weeks of aerial attacks in Ukraine that killed dozens of civilians, damaged buildings housing the EU and British delegations and struck for the first time a government building in central Kyiv.

Far from being ready to strike a peace deal with Ukraine under pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, Putin has pegged his political survival to a simmering conflict with the United States and its allies.

“Putin is the president of war,” said Nikolai Petrov, a senior analyst at the London-based New Eurasian Strategies Center. “He has no interest in ending it.”

Having fashioned himself as a wartime leader, going back to being a peacetime president would be tantamount to a demotion. “No matter what the conditions are, he cannot give up that role,” Petrov said.

As Putin’s full-scale assault on Ukraine drags toward its fourth year, the Russian president arguably has the most cause for optimism since the early days of the war when the Kremlin hoped to capture the country in a matter of days.

With Ukrainian forces hamstrung by a lack of weapons and manpower, Russia has been grinding deeper into the country.

But Moscow’s progress has been slow — and costly. The Kremlin’s armed forces have suffered an estimated one million casualties and the conflict has taken its toll on the Russian economy, which threatens to tip into recession.

And yet, politically, ending the conflict comes with risks.

The Kremlin’s tight control over the media and the internet would likely allow it to sell a peace deal to most Russians as a victory. But that’s not who the Russian president will be worrying about.

With Russia’s liberal opposition decimated, a small but vocal group of nationalists now presents the biggest threat to his rule, said Petrov. And he has promised them a grandiose victory, not only over Ukraine but over what the Kremlin calls “the collective West.” [Continue reading…]