Vladimir Putin made a big deal of Russia’s success in seizing control of Kupyansk in eastern Ukraine late last year, even as Volodymyr Zelenskyy immediately challenged the claim by making a video address from the town.

Now Russian forces are gradually being pushed out of Kupyansk by Ukrainian troops, according to two people in Moscow with knowledge of the situation.

It’s an embarrassing reversal for President Putin as the warring sides prepare to intensify fighting again with winter snows giving way to spring on the battlefield. Russia’s Defense Ministry hasn’t commented on the situation in the town that’s an important rail hub.

While the setback is more tactical than strategic for Russia, it underlines that Putin remains far from achieving his declared objectives in the war that’s now in its fifth year. Russian forces are making some creeping territorial gains and Ukrainian troops are pushing forward in other areas, but the frontline is largely stuck with neither army able to make a decisive breakthrough.

Both sides are seeking “to deny their adversary freedom of movement not just 30 kilometers on either side of the line of contact, but out to 300 kilometers,” said former NATO Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe James Everard. “Whoever dominates in-depth can strangle the other side, by stopping the flow of supply and reinforcements. This is the fight.”

Hopes for a diplomatic resolution to the war are being set back as the U.S.-Israel attack on Iran consumes the attention of President Donald Trump. U.S.-led talks between Ukraine and Russia have stalled with little sign that negotiations will resume soon on a potential peace deal.

The Russian army is gearing up for a new offensive campaign, said people familiar with Kremlin discussions and the situation on the frontline. Without a breakthrough in negotiations, the war may drag on for another year or two, one of them said. Advances are likely to be minimal because the army can’t overcome Ukraine’s wall of drone defenses, said another person.

Ukraine expects a renewed Russian push in April and May against the fortified cities of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk in the eastern Donetsk region, though Moscow likely still lacks the force required to take them, according to Mykola Bielieskov, a researcher at Kyiv’s National Institute for Security Studies.

“Unfortunately, Russia’s inability to break through our defenses means that the focus will likely shift toward the destruction of Ukraine’s critical infrastructure,” he said.

The battlefield calculus for each side is brutally simple.

According to the Kremlin, Russia’s military goals for 2026 are to take over the rest of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas, comprising the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, and as much other territory as possible to strengthen Moscow’s position in peace talks.

For Ukraine, the strategy is to kill or wound more Russian soldiers than Moscow can recruit as replacements, gradually weakening its ability to sustain advances and creating opportunities for counterattacks.

Ukraine has set a target of 50,000 Russian casualties per month, exceeding the Kremlin’s monthly average of 35,000-40,000 new recruits, though Kyiv hasn’t hit that goal so far.

President Zelenskyy said on March 17 that Russia has been recruiting as many as 45,000 people per month, and that Ukraine has killed or injured almost 100,000 Russian troops in the last three months.

The U.S. told allies last week that it still believes it can bring Russia and Ukraine to the table, though there’s no movement for now and the sides remain far apart. It stood by a decision to ease U.S. sanctions on Russia on some oil sales, but said it was temporary, according to a person familiar with the discussions, asking not to be identified because the matter isn’t public.

Russia hasn’t budged on its demands, including the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from territory in eastern Donetsk that Moscow’s forces have failed to capture in fighting since 2014. Ukraine rejects that concession and the U.S. has proposed turning the area into a free economic zone.

Zelenskyy expressed hope on Monday that the trilateral discussions will be renewed in the coming weeks.

“I don’t believe this is a dead end,” he said in an audio recording to reporters. “What should we do if it’s a dead end? Surrender? Relax?”

Surging oil prices over the Middle East war are handing Moscow a budget windfall that’s easing Putin’s ability to finance the invasion. That’s as the government in Kyiv must reckon with the risk of a slowdown in flows of U.S. weapons, including air-defense missiles, bought by its European allies as Washington focuses resources on the conflict with Iran.

Zelenskyy toured Middle East countries at the weekend, seeking to reap benefits from sharing Ukraine’s anti-drone expertise and technology with Persian Gulf states confronting repeated Iranian attacks. He signed 10-year defense agreements that he said were worth “billions” with Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

Zelenskyy’s hoping to trade supplies of Ukraine’s low-cost drone interceptors to Gulf states for access to reserves of vital air-defense missiles he needs to protect Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities against Russian attacks. He said he signed a deal for more than a year of diesel supplies in visits to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, without elaborating.

While Russia continues relentless air attacks on Ukraine, including with a campaign targeting energy infrastructure throughout the winter, Ukraine is also bringing the war that Putin started closer to home for Russians.

There were more than 23,000 Ukrainian aerial strikes on Russian infrastructure in 2025, up almost four-fold from 6,200 attacks in 2024, according to the Russian Security Council.

“The pace of the development of means of destruction, primarily unmanned systems, and the sophistication of the methods of their use are such that no region of Russia can feel safe now,” Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu said March 17, according to the Interfax news service.

Ukraine is currently seeking to undermine Russia’s ability to benefit from the rise in crude prices with drone strikes targeting its oil export infrastructure at the Baltic Sea ports of Primorsk and Ust-Luga.

Russia’s improved economic fortunes will lead to “stronger military recruitment and procurement than previously anticipated,” said Nick Reynolds, research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

Still, “Ukrainian military adaptation may allow them to continue to minimize their own casualties while inflicting heavy losses on Russia’s ground forces, and to hold the line through the summer,” he said.

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