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Hot take: I could see Russia throwing in the towel in 2026 and accepting reduced terms as Ukrainians are getting tougher and are going to be able to inflict enough damage on Russia to be a problem soon. That and Trump likely stepping up attacks on Russia because Putin wouldn't make him look good by negotiating terms he could sell as a win.

Russian intelligence and air power is still very inadequate (in absolute terms and compared to NATO) as they're unable to both locate the factories for Ukrainian production of drones/weapons and/or deliver the high power munitions necessary to put them out of commission such as glide bombs because of inability to suppress Ukrainian air defenses properly. I think the Ukrainians probably severely damaged the Russian strategic bomber force in their drone attack gambit and I think Russia's response was very weak to that and only encouraged the west with the idea that Russia is a weakened animal that can be killed off or at least left severely damaged and weakened. I expect Russia to probably shirk again and again. They can't really step up from where they are now to my knowledge without either using nukes, doing a mass mobilization/forced conscription which would be very unpopular or really engaging in very aggressive attacks which will rack up much higher casualties than I think they're willing to accept.

So the grinding attrition strategy which many hailed as brilliant really had and has a time limit before the west and Ukraine catch up and start making it painful for Russia to go slowly.

Once they take the territory that has been legally incorporated by Russian law into Russia (up to the Dnieper river) I think they'll give up on the total disarmament thing, the denazification thing and only demand no NATO and no western troops, and maybe settle for that and new elections. NATO will spin this as a win for them and Ukraine and the visible defeat of the west will be averted. Obviously if they do this it will come back to bite them as the Ukrainians will spend about 2-5 years building up a massive stockpile of missiles, drones, and weapons then go ape on Russia right as the US opens up on China with the rest of western NATO in the SCS and abroad. This will nicely tie down Russia from being able to help China and vice versa and free up western Europe NATO to join the US in fighting China while Ukraine on its own keeps Russia occupied for at least 12 months. But the Russians are liberal capitalists unfortunately and still very much seek a rapprochement with Europe and the US.

Also as above posts notes by destroying the old patriot systems and other old weapons it creates demand for new US sales of new weapons to Europe and also arms Europe to the teeth with weaponry that will make a war against Russia quite possible and quite painful for Russia. Oreshnik may not be able to overcome these new intercept systems but more worryingly their nukes may not be able to overcome them except in numbers.

I think the goal of Ukraine at this point is to turn it into a cheap weapons factory and resource for the west for especially maintaining drone power against significant producers like China or to hold down Russia in a future conflict with China to prevent them from helping say their BRICS+ multipolarity partners as the US takes the fight to them and China at once and knocks them down one by one with Russia too pre-occupied to supply weapons or troops to help. They'll churn out cheap weapons and they'll churn out deranged Nazi fascists hardened by battle and CIA trained for use in Africa, in Asia, around the world crushing multipolarity and serving the empire in clandestine missions and spectacularly well thought out, well engineered drone assisted attacks like we've only just begun to see. They also want its minerals and farmland for their climate fortress plans later this century and would prefer to depopulate it significantly to make it easier to exploit and plunder and use those resources and are using Russia to achieve that.