Russia is watching US policy like a hawk.
That was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s message to reporters last week in Kyiv as he answered a question about Moscow’s willingness to negotiate. “It depends on the elections in the United States,” he said.
If elected, Kamala Harris is expected to largely continue the policies of the Biden administration, which have been supportive of Ukraine despite some friction points, like the use of Western weapons to strike deep inside Russia.
Taking a drastically different position, Donald Trump has suggested he will end support for Kyiv’s war effort and claimed he could settle the war “in one day.” Terms of a peace plan floated by his vice-presidential nominee JD Vance are strikingly similar to Putin’s wish list.
American policy is at a crossroads, but that won’t necessarily translate to a turning point in peace negotiations, analysts say.
That’s because nothing suggests Russia is ready to come to the table, regardless of who ends up in the White House.
“What [Trump] thinks he can do, what leverage he has, is unclear at this point – but I don’t think it’s a quick process,” said Thomas Graham, a Russian foreign policy expert and distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
A reduction in US aid spending could very well translate to changes on the battlefield, though, experts say.
With either potential president, Putin will be looking to exploit what he sees as political dysfunction in the United States, as well as “cracks in Western unity,” Graham told CNN.
Those cracks could come in the form of a Trump administration reducing US aid and taking a lesser role in NATO, or a split US Congress, among other factors. Financial pressures on European allies also play a role, as well as rifts in NATO, with pro-Russian leaderships in member states such as Hungary and Slovakia.
“Absent Western unity, absent a clear demonstration that the West and Ukraine have a common vision of what they’re trying to achieve… Putin has no reason to reconsider what he is doing in Ukraine at this point,” Graham added.
The scope of the war is also too large for a simple negotiation between Moscow and Kyiv, experts say. They argue it’s a much broader conflict between Russia and the West.
For Putin, “Ukraine is just a means to an end, and the end is to further limit US influence in international affairs,” said John Lough, an associate fellow in the Russia and Eurasia Program at the London think tank Chatham House.
“When [Trump’s] advisers explain to him what’s really going on here and the fact that China has played a key role in sustaining Russia’s ability to continue fighting this war… he may feel suddenly very strongly that he’s not so well disposed to Putin,” Lough said, adding that Beijing will perceive any concessions “as a further indication of US weakness.”
That goes against Trump’s tough rhetoric on the threat posed by China.
Attritional war playing into Putin’s hands
Ukraine is already outmanned, and Putin appears ready to accept a high number of casualties. More than 600,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded, according to NATO.
“The enemy is increasing its troops to drive the Ukrainian Armed Forces out of the Kursk region at any cost,” said Oleh Shiryaev, commander of the 225th Separate Assault Battalion that is fighting in Ukraine’s surprise incursion across the Russian border. “Russia’s main element in this war is the number of its troops – these are meaty assaults and offensive actions. They do this in all parts of the frontline.”
In Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, another commander with the Security Service of Ukraine said, “By sending a large number of personnel into battle as cannon fodder, they are trying to gain a foothold in the grey areas of the front.” The officer, who asked to be named only by his call sign “Bankir,” which means accountant, told CNN that a complex system of fortifications in Zaporizhzhia is helping Ukraine defend the frontline.
But Kyiv knows that’s not enough. On Wednesday, Ukraine’s Parliament voted to extend martial law and the draft for an additional 90 days. There are plans to call up an additional 160,000 people, the National Security Council announced.
The Ukrainian servicemen who spoke to CNN said Russia has other advantages too, like countless drones, expensive aircraft and more vehicles that enable fighting during the muddy fall and winter.
Ukraine needs support for both its infantry and its equipment coffers, servicemen said.
“We have ammunition, but as artillerymen say, there is never enough,” said 15th Brigade National Guard Spokesman Vitaliy Milovidov, who is fighting in the eastern Donetsk region, where Russian forces continue to make incremental gains.
If a potential Trump administration cuts US aid, Ukraine would become increasingly outgunned.
European nations are scrambling to increase ammunition production for Ukraine to prevent backsliding, in the event that US support drops off.
But even if US policy continues along the current trajectory, Kyiv’s Western allies don’t appear willing to send the level of resources needed to make major battlefield gains.
“My hunch is that this is going to continue, at a lower intensity possibly, but for a long time,” Chatham House’s Lough added. “A Harris administration certainly wouldn’t sell out the Ukrainians, but it would really test their Ukrainian resolve and whether they are prepared to continue to fight this attritional war.”
That’s why Putin’s strategy also appears aimed at demoralizing Ukraine’s population.
Russia has repeatedly attacked civilians and civilian infrastructure. It has also hammered Ukraine’s energy grid, which exacerbates problems for everyday Ukrainians who will face a winter marred by lack of heating and water.
Analysts say the Ukrainian population is certainly exhausted, but they too don’t appear ready to settle in any way. After the mass killings of civilians in Bucha and Mariupol, the brutal treatment of Ukrainian prisoners in Russian custody, and the forcible deportation of Ukrainian children by the Russian state, they know the brutal realities of Russian occupation.
Zelensky, meanwhile, continues to call for support from both parties. If Trump “just wants to force Ukraine to give up everything and thus reach a deal with Russia, I don’t think that’s possible,” he said Thursday.