The head of the Main Intelligence Directorate, Kyrylo Budanov, believes that the war may continue for a long time. The Russians will simply not sign any treaty with Kyiv and the coalition of allies, but will continue to carry out chaotic shelling of Ukraine, but without major hostilities, he said in a comment to NV.
"There are cases in history when long-standing wars between states have never been legally completed. A simple example is Russia and Japan, after 1945, they never signed a peace treaty over the Northern Islands (which Russia calls the Kuril Islands). This territorial problem is more than 70 years old. Therefore, this scenario is very likely to happen here, as Russia has significant territorial appetites for Ukraine, not only in Crimea. Of course, no one is going to satisfy these appetites," Budanov explained.
He also listed the factors that would determine how long Russia could conduct intensive hostilities: systemic changes in the Russian economy, external supplies of military and technical goods, and the psychological factor of growing war fatigue in society.
"So far, the Russian Federation is still economically stable. Yes, we are seeing a large-scale fuel crisis, a sharp rise in the price of food (prices have risen by 15-20% twice in the last two months) and other goods and services. All this is shaking their economy and social sphere, and they will face real problems in 2025," Budanov said.
However, Russia's production chains have not yet been destroyed and can survive for more than a year. War fatigue among Russians is growing rapidly and the population, including the male population, is shrinking, although this does not mean that Putin will have problems with cannon fodder.
Budanov emphasised that it is now very important to listen to economists who model situations based on a variety of data.
"There is hope that 2025 will be a turning point in terms of internal systemic destructive changes and processes in the Russian state, society and economy. But this is not a forecast, but an expectation. As of now, based on the available factors, this is likely to happen. But let's not forget that this war is globalising every month and generating new processes. They will also overlap with the situation and greatly change any preliminary calculations. This is a challenge that the world's leading analysts have already faced," the DIU chief believes.