The Russian–Ukrainian war enters 2026 as a protracted conflict, where battlefield attrition coincides with accelerating technological and tactical adaptation. On the military front, Russia continues to register incremental territorial gains without achieving decisive victory, while consolidating control over additional Ukrainian areas.

Politically, multiple settlement initiatives—American, European, and Russian—remain under discussion. However, none has yet produced a meaningful breakthrough capable of delivering a sustainable ceasefire. This impasse reflects unresolved disagreements, most notably over the status of the Donbas region and the nature of security guarantees that could substitute for Ukraine’s NATO membership.

Mutual Attrition

Despite Russia’s slow, steady advances, Ukraine has managed to disrupt them, albeit without regaining a strategic advantage. As a result, the conflict has become a sustained war of attrition, impacting both belligerents and Ukraine’s external backers. The following outlines the military and political situation as it stood at the end of 2025 and the start of 2026:

1- Sustained Russian Strikes on Ukraine’s Energy Infrastructure: On the night of 13 January 2026, Ukraine experienced one of the most intense strikes since the start of the year, with 25 missiles and 293 drones launched across multiple regions. The attacks focused primarily on energy generation facilities and electrical substations, reviving the "electricity war" dynamic. They resulted in civilian casualties in Kharkiv and renewed power outages in Kyiv. In response, Ukraine has sought to disrupt this pattern through counterstrikes targeting drone production chains inside Russian territory. Notably, the renewed intensity of fire in early 2026 has further constrained prospects for political de-escalation in the absence of a verifiable halt to infrastructure attacks.

2- Deployment of Exceptional Weapons and Extended Deterrence Signaling: On 9 January 2026, Moscow announced the operational use of the hypersonic Orechnik missile as part of a large-scale strike targeting energy facilities and drone-related production sites. Beyond its technical implications, the deployment carried clear political signaling. The use of such a system at this juncture is widely interpreted as an effort to pressure Kyiv’s external supporters, particularly amid reports of explosions near areas of heightened strategic sensitivity close to the Polish border. Although Western assessments continue to question the weapon’s decisive battlefield value, its reintroduction elevated escalation risks and further complicated ceasefire calculations.

3- Continued Russian Advances and Ukraine’s Inability to Regain the Initiative: Throughout 2025, Russia made steady territorial gains estimated at approximately 6,000 square kilometers—roughly double its gains in 2024. This progress, however, did not restore Moscow to the peak level of control achieved in late summer 2022. The front line has become increasingly fragmented and fluid, with some newly captured areas described as unstable or contested. Russia maintained the offensive for most of 2025 and now controls around 21% of Ukrainian territory, while Ukraine’s efforts have largely focused on delaying advances rather than reversing them. Consequently, Ukraine may disrupt or slow Russian progress on land but remains unable to regain the strategic initiative.

4- Redefinition of Combat Tactics Amid Changing Frontline Dynamics: The conflict is no longer defined by a narrow, clearly delineated front line. Instead, it has evolved into a broad and highly lethal battlespace—commonly described as a "kill zone"—extending several kilometers and exceeding 20 kilometers in some sectors. Within this zone, combat is shaped not only by firepower but also by rapid detection through observers, sensors, and unmanned systems. Early in the war, the interval between target detection and strike ranged from 20 to 30 minutes; by 2026, this window has narrowed to as little as three to five minutes. This compression has sharply reduced opportunities for concealment and maneuver, rendering frontline deployment increasingly exhausting and dangerous. Logistics, resupply, and medical evacuation have become exceptionally difficult, driving greater reliance on drones and robotic platforms to mitigate personnel losses.

5- Ukraine’s Recruitment Constraints Versus Russia’s Manpower Resilience: The war increasingly resembles a prolonged contest of endurance, in which success depends less on rapid battlefield victories than on the ability to exhaust the adversary’s capacity to sustain operations. Russia has therefore prioritized strikes against the foundations of Ukraine’s military resilience, including energy systems, transportation networks, rail infrastructure, and recruitment centers. Ukraine already faces acute manpower shortages and persistent recruitment challenges, complicating its ability to replace battlefield losses over time. These vulnerabilities have been exacerbated by attacks on civilian and energy infrastructure alongside strikes on recruitment and training facilities. By contrast, Russia has demonstrated greater manpower resilience through large-scale contract recruitment, with approximately 417,000 new enlistments recorded in 2025. With Russian forces controlling nearly 75% of Donetsk, the balance of time increasingly favors Moscow unless this dynamic shifts significantly.

6- Preventing the Collapes of Ukraine’s Air Defenses: By 2025, Ukraine’s air defense systems faced the risk of severe depletion as Russia dramatically intensified its drone campaigns, creating a mismatch between the volume of aerial threats and the availability of interceptor missiles. In response, Kyiv adopted a multi-layered air defense architecture designed to match defensive tools to threat types. The first layer relied on Mirage 2000 aircraft to intercept drones and missiles. During 2025, Ukraine conducted approximately 1,300 aerial interceptions compared to roughly 300 ground strikes, underscoring the defensive orientation of its air operations. The second layer involved a low-cost early warning network known as Sky Fortress, consisting of around 10,000 sensors at a total cost lower than that of two Patriot missiles. Leveraging artificial intelligence for rapid data analysis, the system directs defensive responses toward cheaper assets such as German Gepard systems and ZU-23 cannons. Despite these measures, ballistic missiles remain difficult to intercept, limiting the system’s effectiveness to damage mitigation rather than threat elimination.

7- Expanding the Conflict into Russian Territory: In the second half of 2025, Ukraine expanded the conflict into Russian territory through targeted operations, including Operation Spiderweb, which struck four Russian bases located deep inside Russia—one approximately 4,800 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. This was followed by a wave of 58 attacks between August and October 2025 targeting Russian economic infrastructure, including refineries, pumping stations, storage facilities, and export terminals, at distances of up to 2,000 kilometers. On the maritime front, Ukrainian operations shifted toward Russia’s so-called "shadow fleet," a sanctions-evasion network estimated at around 600 vessels. The strike on a Russian tanker near the island of Crete in the Mediterranean, reportedly using aerial drones, signaled the geographical expansion of the conflict beyond traditional theaters. The stated objective of these actions is to undermine Russia’s war financing and increase the cost of sustaining the war ahead of negotiations.

8- Accelerated Diplomacy without Substantive Breakthroughs: Diplomatic activity intensified in late 2025 through a series of high-level engagements, beginning with the Berlin meeting (14–15 December) between U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. This was followed by consultations in Miami (20–21 December) involving Ukrainian and Russian representatives with European participation, culminating in a Trump–Zelensky meeting at Mar-a-Lago on 28 December, following a same-day phone call between Trump and Vladimir Putin. Despite these efforts, no final agreement was reached. Negotiations coalesced around multiple proposals, including a revised 20-point plan coordinated between Washington and Kyiv and transmitted to Moscow. Zelensky indicated that Ukrainian–American alignment reached 90% on the revised version, with the remaining 10% unresolved. Outstanding issues include Ukraine’s potential withdrawal from the Donbas region and the security guarantees Kyiv demands following any ceasefire, modeled on NATO’s Article 5.

Complex Arrangements

The continuation of the war or the achievement of a settlement depends on a complex set of conditions involving all parties to the conflict, which can be addressed as follows:

1- Translating security guarantees into enforceable arrangements: From 6 January 2026, a more structured European–Western track emerged through the Paris Declaration within the ‘Coalition of the Willing,’ (CoW) encompassing around 35 countries. The initiative includes provisions for deploying a multinational force following a peace agreement, alongside a ceasefire monitoring mechanism with U.S. participation. Public discussion has included the potential deployment of 5,000 French troops as a reassurance and support force positioned away from the front line. This development ties any ceasefire to a credible deterrence framework and makes the success of a 2026 settlement contingent on transforming abstract guarantees into enforceable political and military arrangements.

2- Prospects for European consensus amid internal constraints: Despite French and British advocacy, European deliberations suggest that the concept of ‘CoW’ does not automatically translate into broad readiness to deploy forces. Only a limited number of states have signaled willingness to participate, while domestic political constraints—parliamentary approval, public opinion, and governing coalitions—continue to shape decision-making in key capitals. Meanwhile, Moscow has warned that any Western military presence in Ukraine would be treated as a legitimate military target, raising participation costs and reinforcing hesitation. On 12 January, EU institutions reiterated that resuming direct dialogue with Putin "is not yet on the table," underscoring the slow and conditional nature of the political process.

3- Designing a ceasefire through verifiable field-control mechanisms: The feasibility of any settlement in 2026 depends on moving beyond a political declaration of ceasefire toward technically verifiable arrangements. A ceasefire would function not merely as a pause in hostilities but as a non-aggression agreement requiring an international monitoring regime along the line of contact. Proposals emphasize the use of unmanned aerial surveillance to enable rapid detection of violations and immediate dispute resolution. In practical terms, this approach is linked to freezing the front line along its current positions as the foundation for any durable de-escalation.

4- Addressing the Donbas territorial dilemma: Territory remains the core issue of any prospective settlement. Moscow seeks arrangements that formalize its gains, while Kyiv views any explicit concession of Donbas as a constitutional and societal red line. Consequently, prevailing proposals favor freezing the line of contact rather than resolving sovereignty questions immediately. Under this framework, Russia would undertake limited withdrawals from axes within Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv regions as a precondition for initiating the arrangement, in exchange for stabilizing the ceasefire along existing deployment lines in the eastern and southern fronts. To mitigate the risk of renewed fighting in Donetsk, proposals include establishing a buffer zone, a demilitarized zone, or a special economic zone within Kyiv-controlled areas, based on reciprocal force withdrawals sufficient to eliminate direct threats to cities such as Kramatorsk and Sloviansk. Moscow’s acceptance of such measures, however, remains uncertain given the centrality of Donbas to its war objectives.

5- Security guarantees as an alternative to NATO membership: For Kyiv, credible security guarantees are essential to preventing renewed conflict. Ukraine has therefore sought guarantees comparable to NATO’s Article 5, coupled with border monitoring arrangements. While the United States has offered to support such guarantees, Kyiv continues to press for longer-term commitments and the deployment of international forces as a credible enforcement mechanism. European proposals similarly envision troop deployments under a "coalition of the willing" to sustain any ceasefire agreement.

6- Managing the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant: The Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant presents a particularly complex challenge, intersecting issues of security, energy, and sovereign legitimacy. Proposals have included joint management involving the United States, Ukraine, and Russia, effectively transforming the facility into a political-economic bargaining element. Kyiv, however, has expressed reservations about any direct postwar commercial partnership with Russia, favoring instead bilateral U.S.–Ukrainian management. Given the plant’s prewar role in supplying a substantial share of Ukraine’s electricity, its governance will directly affect reconstruction and long-term stability.

7- Constitutional legitimacy and Ukrainian representation: No settlement in 2026 can bypass the question of who is authorized to sign on behalf of the Ukrainian state and under what mandate, particularly in light of Russian challenges to the legitimacy of Ukraine’s current leadership. Kyiv maintains that elections during wartime are constrained by constitutional and security considerations. Emerging negotiating frameworks therefore link elections to a post-agreement phase rather than imposing short timelines that could destabilize the domestic political environment. Any potential referendum on territorial concessions is likewise conditioned on a verifiable 60-day truce to safeguard its legitimacy and avoid internal polarization.

8- Sustaining financial support for Ukraine: The war’s financial burden remains substantial. Without stable funding, Ukraine would be unable to pay salaries, operate state institutions, or sustain military operations. European commitments to provide large-scale financial assistance over the next two years—such as the recently approved €90 billion package—enhance Ukraine’s resilience and bargaining position. Nevertheless, disputes persist within Europe over the use of frozen Russian assets, the structure of future compensation, and responsibility for funding. Divisions also remain over which actors should design and enforce security guarantees. France and the United Kingdom advocate a stronger security role. Germany seeks to consolidate its position, while Italy pursues a more cautious approach. As a result, financial support has become as much a political variable as an economic one. Any decline or inconsistency in U.S. support would further increase Moscow’s ability to prolong the conflict.

Conclusion

A settlement of the Ukraine war in 2026 appears more plausible in the form of a tightly managed ceasefire than a comprehensive peace agreement. The negotiation process continues to be constrained by two core obstacles: territorial concessions—particularly in Donbas—and the provision of credible security guarantees as a functional alternative to NATO membership. The durability of any ceasefire will depend on effective monitoring and verification mechanisms capable of stabilizing the line of contact and preventing rapid escalation. On the other hand, external variables, such as the cohesion of U.S. support and the consistency of European funding, will remain decisive in determining whether the conflict moves toward settlement or continues along a path of prolonged attrition.

What Are the Prospects for Settling the Ukraine War in 2026?