In 2026, we can expect Russia to go for broke in Ukraine. This is not due to an impending Russian victory but because Moscow literally has no other choice than to surrender.
We have already seen much of this increasing desperation on the part of Moscow in late 2025. Russia has launched attacks all over Ukraine and even in Europe, designed to promote terror as opposed to achieving military objectives. By itself, this is telling.
Incursions into NATO territory are not something to be celebrated, but are not something to be feared either. For all the talk of Russia attacking NATO in the traditional sense with conventional forces, it will not happen. They can’t even win in Ukraine. So its incursions into NATO only make sense in terms of desperation to try and fracture the alliance in the vain hopes of scaring the peoples of said NATO nations. Case in point, the German V Bombs sent to attack the British population in 1944-1945 did nothing to enhance the German effort in World War II and, more than likely, deflected resources that could have been more effectively used elsewhere on the Western Front (and even more so the Final Solution used even greater resources that could have been used on the Eastern Front).
The Russians are nearly as desperate as the Nazis.
Ukraine does not even have a navy, but in one of the most unsung victories of the entire war, they have neutralized the Russian Black Sea Fleet, including valuable submarines, ensuring safer passage through that strategically important body of water. This victory, accomplished primarily through drones, is being expanded to where Russian shadow tankers in the Mediterranean Sea, which are defying American/NATO sanctions, are now hit.
Ukraine is also successfully striking Russian oil refineries, further decimating the Russian “war machine” that has such poor equipment in the first place that it is once again cannibalizing its Soviet era museums for spare parts.
And what does Russia do in response, it strikes the electrical grid of Ukraine; certainly causing inconvenience but extremely little long term damage. These military resources would much better be used by Russian to attack military targets as opposed to the civilian populace. But again, when looked at through the lens of desperation, they have little choice, and the Russian actions actually make sense.
History shows that irrationality in war, including the greatest amount of casualties, especially by the loser, occurs even after the major turning points of the war, as shown by the experience of the Confederate States in the American Civil War or the German experience after the Battle of Stalingrad. There are varied reasons that a loser keeps on fighting, but mostly it comes down to prestige and fear; fear of the enemy (especially reprisals in the case of the Germans vs. the Soviets) as well as fear of their own regime collapsing at home from civil unrest, grieving mothers, inflation, etc. Putin has no choice, for he has staked everything on this war. President Trump knows that, and that is why he has given Putin the opportunity to publicly save face even while tightening the economic noose around Moscow.
Time is running short for this member of the Moscow-Beijing Axis. As Congressman Charlie Wilson said about another Russian graveyard called Afghanistan, which is true for Moscow in Ukraine: “They’re [the Russians] are digging in. And they’re going to lose…And I love it.”
Views expressed in this article are those of the author and not any government agency.