All the foreseeable advantages afforded Russia since its ill-fated 2022 invasion of Ukraine have been disappearing at an accelerative rate. The illusion of its military prowess with its limitless manpower and technological capabilities should have begun to raise doubts soon after the war began when it met the reality of Ukraine’s two counteroffensives in the latter part of 2022. More to say about the ongoing war immediately below but for Vladimir Putin, military failure is not his worst problem. It’s what awaits him in the last quarter of 2025. A fate reminiscent of the fall of the Russian Empire in 1917 and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 hangs in the balance before him now and may ultimately usher the despot and all his ugliness to an ignominious end.
Donetsk
Russia’s summer offensive in eastern Ukraine, much of it concentrated in the Pokrovsk sector of Donetsk Oblast, has failed to achieve its goal of overtaking the remainder of the oblast. This northern one-third of the oblast is what remains under Kyiv’s control and it has become a killing field for Russian infantry along with heavy losses of armament. To worsen matters recently, in early September, the Ukrainians retook five times more territory in the Pokrovsk sector in just over a week than the Russians had captured during the entire month of August. In the neighboring Dobropillia sector to the northwest, the Ukrainians regained twice the territory that Russians had recently occupied. Multiple military command structures were eliminated in the city of Donetsk, disrupting operations for Russia’s 41st Army and 20th Motor Rifle Division. A BUK-M1 medium-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) launcher deployed to the area was also lost in the process. This added to the destruction, during the previous month, of two Tor-M2 SAM batteries, a BUK-M3 SAM launcher and a BUK-M2 radar worth a total of $90 million.
In all, Ukrainian forces liberated more than 60 square miles of territory in eastern Donetsk Oblast including seven settlements in the course of a month. A further 65 square miles containing nine settlements were cleared of a controlling Russian presence. The offensive neutralized 2,500 Russian troops of which more than 1,300 were killed and about 100 captured. To the west of Pokrovsk, near the town of Udachne, a disorganized Russian assault was routed and the town retaken, stabilizing this additional sector.
In 2025 thus far, Russian casualties in Ukraine’s eastern front have amounted to 297,350 including 28,790 in August alone. The tally now exceeds a million personnel when added to the approximately 789,550 lost since the start of the invasion. Desertions from the front have increased notably particularly from within Russia’s Southern Military District whose troops are primarily deployed to Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts. By April 2024, over 18,000 Russian soldiers had deserted, 12,000 of whom were from the 8th Combined Arms Army deployed to Donetsk Oblast. Military recruitment in Russia was failing to reach targeted levels by 40-50% as early as 2023. By September 2024, more than 34,000 men had applied for assistance from an organization established to resist recruitment efforts by the Kremlin.
Loss of heavy armament has also continued to plague Russia’s military in 2025. In March alone, 1,644 artillery pieces were destroyed. A May report indicated the loss or damage of 1,159 Russian tanks and over 2,500 armored vehicles. Large stockpiles of ammunition and electronic equipment in addition to 19,000 drones were recently destroyed in the Donbas region after shipments were completed to replenish supplies for the Russian military thus seriously limiting any further attempt to engage in the Donetsk Oblast, in particular. The Institute for the Study of War had previously established that the Russian military would not be able to sustain its annual loss of near 9,000 armored vehicles through 2025. Reacting to such losses, the Russians have reduced the use of armored vehicles and resorted predominantly to direct infantry assault on electric scooters, motorcycles and all-terrain vehicles in their assaults.
Crimea
Although the occupation of Ukraine or control of it in some other sense has been the ultimate goal for Putin, the territorial linchpin in this war remains Crimea. It was the first part of Ukraine to be overtaken by Russia in 2014, and it will be a major deciding factor that determines Putin’s fate in the end. For Russia, it is of primary strategic importance as a military base extending its reach toward eastern Europe, the Middle East and the Mediterranean basin. Crimea was the traditional home of the Tatars who have occupied it since the 13th century only to suffer discrimination and forced displacement by tsarist Russia in the 19th century. The intent was to eliminate their culture and legacy in Crimea to create its own imperial outpost. Worse still, Soviet Russia under Josef Stalin would carry out a brutal program of deportation of almost 200,000 Tatars to Central Asia in what amounted to an ethnic cleansing and cultural genocide in the manner it was conducted. Their subsequent return to Crimea has been a slow process dictated by subsequent Kremlin leadership with formal permission finally granted in 1989, shortly before the collapse of the Soviet Union. Twenty-five years later, the Tatars found themselves again under occupation in 2014 by yet another Russian regime well-known for human rights violations and under which they remain currently.
The Crimean Tatar word for fire, atesh, is the name given to a clandestine paramilitary unit composed of Crimean Tatars, Ukrainians and Russians opposed to the occupation. Atesh has conducted acts of sabotage in collaboration with Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Crimea and elsewhere inside Ukraine as well as the Russian Federation. Apart from conducting reconnaissance and gathering intelligence, it has been engaged in destruction of military facilities, such as the strategic 758th Material and Technical Support Center in Sevastopol in western Crimea. Other logistical strikes targeting railways, bridges and power units continue to disrupt military supply lines. More direct attacks upon military installations have occurred as on the Kirovske airbase this summer which resulted in the destruction of multiple helicopters and an air defense system. Similar attacks have targeted the air defense system in Crimea’s centrally situated Simferopol district.
Long-range weapons systems deployed by Ukraine’s Armed Forces have furthered destruction of airfields, radar stations, communication infrastructure, ammunition depots, railway hubs and air defense systems throughout Crimea. Its prior maritime offensive destroyed more than a third of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and forced it to retreat from its base in Crimea to the Russian coastline along the eastern shore of the Black Sea. In late August 2024, Ukraine destroyed a Crimea-bound ferry carrying 30 rail cars loaded with fuel while still moored in Russia’s Krasnodar region. This was the last large rail ferry operating on this route following a number of aerial attacks upon the ferry system during the spring and summer. By autumn of 2024, as a result of its increasing isolation in Crimea, Russia removed its remaining air defense systems from the northwestern part of the peninsula eastward to concentrate them more in the vicinity of the Kerch Bridge that connects the Russian mainland with Crimea and which has been increasingly under threat by Ukrainian munitions. Accordingly, a Ukrainian drone strike in early August destroyed an advanced 98L6 Yenisei radar component of an S-500 air and missile defense system used to defend the bridge. A number of strikes upon the bridge have occurred raising issue over its structural integrity in the case of further attacks. Destruction of the $3.7-billion, 12-mile-long bridge, the major supply line for Russian servicemen stationed in Crimea, would not only humiliate Putin but call into question the security of the entire peninsula if not the occupied areas of eastern Ukraine.
The Russian Public
Returning Soldiers
By the beginning of 2025, more than 100,000 Russian soldiers were reported missing-in-action and relatives have begun to turn to a Ukrainian Government DNA project, “I Want to Find,” to seek answers after discovering that Russia’s Defense Ministry lacked a formal process of tracking missing servicemen. By May 2025, Ukraine had received over 88,000 requests for information with 9,000 having appeared in April alone. Adding to the problem, Russian officials at the Center for the Reception, Processing and Dispatch of the Deceased in Rostov admitted facing a backlog of about 15,000 unidentified deceased soldiers.
The situation has fueled considerable anger among families with accusations of indifference and irresponsibility communicated through online chat rooms within the Russian Federation. After six months following last contact with a missing soldier, combat pay is terminated and if the family is willing to formally declare their relative dead, it may then receive death benefits. More troubling for Russian families has been the revelation that Russian authorities transferred bodies of dead Russian soldiers to Ukraine claiming them as repatriated Ukrainians in an apparent attempt to mask real losses of their own armed forces. The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine has otherwise recently partnered with the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) to speed up the identification of Russian soldiers, either dead or missing.
Support for the war among the Russian people has been declining according to a Chicago Council on Global Affairs-Levada Center survey conducted in January 2025. A reported 61% believed it time to start peace negotiations with 65% wishing to prevent further deaths in contrast to 26% wanting to continue military operations. Greater numbers of Russians (50%) now distrust Kremlin reports of civilian and military casualties. Despite the distrust, 76% surprisingly believe they are winning. War fatigue not only is manifesting among Russian citizens but also within the military ranks. This stands in contrast to Ukrainian sentiments who see their struggle as existential, fearing the loss of their culture and national identity.
For those Russian soldiers left disabled by the war, Russia’s economy has little left to see to their welfare. A 20% decline in the number of hospitals has occurred since 2012 and only 10 actual veterans’ hospitals remain in the Russian Federation. At least 54% of returning soldiers are amputees and after receiving a one-time payment of upwards of $35,000 upon completion of their rehabilitation, many cannot find employment. For those that do, most have salaries far below what they had before entering the military. Standard Russian propaganda cannot stand up to the visible consequences of a battered and beleaguered military back within society among their own people.
Another facet of returning military personnel involves those who had been recruited from prison and who attained their freedom after their required six-month military service in Ukraine. Whatever level of criminal depravity they had committed that resulted in their incarceration does not seem to factor into the decision to release them back into society. Estimates of the number of convicts recruited to the military exceed 150,000. Government attempts at tempering societal anxiety over the return of thousands of criminals burdened by further war-induced psychological trauma into Russian towns and cities can be expected to fail. A dramatic surge in violent crime linked to the number of returning veterans has already taken place with 333,251 cases recorded during the first half of 2025, a 10.4% increase compared to the same period in 2024 and 32.3% higher than in 2019. Moscow itself has seen almost 43,500 serious crimes in this time period. The annual figures for violent offences are climbing after having already reached a staggering 617,301 cases in 2024, the highest number in 15 years. Not surprisingly, the number of murders committed has now been removed from public records by the Russia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Russian Consumers
The plight of the average Russian consumer in the midst of war has become much more evident this year than in the prior 34 months dating back to late February 2022 with the cost of living already increased by 10% over the year. Since the start of the war, the cost has climbed almost 30%, twice that of the average rise in the Eurozone. Food prices have significantly increased, exemplified by potatoes and butter doubling in price by late January 2025 with cabbage and onions rising by 56.8% and 87.2%, respectively. These factors contradict Putin’s claims in December 2024 regarding the stability of the economy and argue they are more the result of the war. For instance, the primary potato-growing region is situated in Bryansk, Kursk and Belgorod, all within the perimeter of combat operations along the border of Ukraine. Here is where expensive agricultural machinery is targeted and farmland is requisitioned for military use to lay minefields, store military equipment and build fortifications. Local workers are evacuated from combat zone operations while the agricultural sector experiences the greatest worker shortage since the end of World War II. Adding to the agricultural crisis have been sanctions that hamper replacement of lost and outdated machinery along with diversion of needed funding toward increased military expenditure.
Significant declines are also forecasted for Russia’s 2025 grain harvest marked by a 27% drop in corn production, 12% in oats and 11% in wheat. A 32% drop in sales of now unaffordable agricultural equipment and machinery in March was the lowest in 25 years. Current high inflation is likely to force a price cap on staple foodstuffs such as vegetables, dairy and poultry that forecasts a move toward government control of food production and distribution. This could trigger regional food shortages and long queues of consumers that would undoubtedly further aggravate the public as social anxiety over food insecurity and nutritional deficiencies quickly mount.
This summer, Ukraine undertook a campaign of relentless aerial attacks on Russian oil refineries, both near and far within the Russian Federation, often repeating attacks over time on several of them. These escalated in August so that by mid-September, 17 refineries representing 42% of Russia’s total oil refining capacity had been struck as reported on X by Igor Sushko. Domestically produced Ukrainian strike drones with artificial intelligence capability for target recognition and terminal guidance have been engineered to exceed 1,200 miles to target even remote facilities. The impact of this level of destruction has not only threatened military needs but, perhaps worse for Putin’s regime, attracted serious public attention.
Gasoline shortages have reached alarming levels in several regions of the Russian Federation, enough that the government imposed an export ban at the end of July. Nizhny Novgorod is Russia’s sixth largest city with a population of 1.25 million and an outlying conurbation of a further 2 million lies 273 miles east of Moscow in European Russia. Gas stations in its Sokolsky District were reported to have run dry for several days while fuel prices elsewhere were surging 40-50% by mid-August. The price on the black market had risen to $9 a gallon. With a tank capacity of about 15 gallons in a typical Russian passenger car, a fill-up would amount to $135 in a nation where the median salary equates to $300 a week. Adding to the misery is an imposed gas ration limit of 2.6 gallons, most of which will be used up waiting in the huge queues now seen at stations. By early September, the problem had spread to 10 areas just within European Russia.
Russian Economy
Russia’s defense industry is consuming nearly 8% of GDP and taking up 40% of the budget with military spending for 2025 amounting to $172 billion, a 12% increase over 2024, as Putin continues on his course of militarizing the economy despite international sanctions, high inflation and decline of living standards. Moreover, the regime plans to maintain military production without a defined endpoint with the intent of rearming its armed forces and replenishing its warehouses should the war come to an end. Otherwise, a sudden return to a civilian model would leave it with a stagnant economy comprised of a low growth rate, a serious drop in GDP and yet another financial crisis.
Russia has significantly depleted the liquid assets of its National Wealth Fund (NWF) in the course of the war and may run out entirely in the last quarter of 2025 due to war expenses and a drop in oil prices. The European Union (EU) lowered the price cap on Russian crude oil to $47.60 per barrel on September 3 replacing the prior $60 cap to further reduce export revenue. To address the growing budget deficit, Russia increased foreign currency sales from its NWF already in July, marking the second time in 2025 that the sovereign reserve was raided. Another ploy that Putin has instituted to sustain his war effort has involved the nationalization of private assets with 102 seizures amounting to $50 billion from private owners of mostly industries in strategic sectors since February 2022. Apart from creating dissatisfaction within the private sector, the practice undermines investor confidence and operational efficiency in the immediate and long-term making the prospects of future economic recovery more difficult.
By May 2025, Russia’s federal budget deficit of $40.7 billion was already almost 90% of the $45.5 billion originally allotted as the target for the year. The deficit amounted to a near fivefold increase over that in 2024 during the same period. The budget signed in December 2024 projecting a revenue of $508.5 billion was revised downward by mid-year to $485.9 billion. Industrial production slowed considerably in the first half of 2025 reflecting high interest rates, labor shortages and disruption of supply chain due to sanctions. On the other side, the level of military expenditure has seemingly not slowed over the summer with Russia’s ongoing offensive in eastern Ukraine and the persistent massive bombing of Ukrainian cities. Although Russian bombardment of urban areas throughout Ukraine increased in 2024, a dramatic further escalation of drone and missile assaults occurred throughout the summer of 2025, continuing now into the autumn. Despite the intent to weaken the resolve of the Ukrainian public, it appears to have done the opposite and, coupled with recent setbacks on the battlefield with its failed summer offensive, Russia is left to answer for its expensive errors.
Epilogue
Putin’s Russia has now proved that it’s not a world power but rather a corrupted national enterprise in decline with a failing economy, an inept military, an increasingly disillusioned populace and a flawed notion of exceptionalism. It boasts nuclear capability as a threat to others seemingly incapable of recognizing the threat to itself. The matter only further corroborates the lunacy behind having overproduced a nuclear arsenal at great cost that in the end will have no purpose. Russia is now a well-recognized “junior partner” in its alliance with China. Putin, for his part, pretends to act as an equal in this relationship, seemingly unaware of the massive disparity in this circumstance. In his current state of aging, Putin is pictured as having an “outdated” image, no longer in touch with domestic concerns or aware of the details of his war. After being first patterned in his early years in the persona of a well-oiled, secretive intelligence officer, the image shifted later to the manly, bare-chested, and virulent warrior type. Now that he is visibly older, the natural transition would be for him to assume the aura of a seasoned senior statesman were it not for the fact that he is a well-recognized murderer and an indicted war criminal.
It is Putin’s leadership that requires serious scrutiny as, in the end, he has shown little or no regard for his own people. He ordered an unjust war against the Ukrainian people while perpetrating a level of injustice upon his own not seen since World War II, and for reasons yet still hard to fathom. He has dramatically hastened an already recognized demographic decline of his nation in the process, creating an uncertain future that will last far longer than what time he has remaining. While this is taking place, the institutions entrusted with tending to the welfare of his people have been long underfunded and incapable of supporting their needs because of an ongoing rabid pursuit of war. Winter is coming to Moscow and elsewhere in the Russian Federation, and power grids are now vulnerable for the first time to Ukraine’s own long-range missiles.
There is no recourse for Ukraine and Europe but to hurry this war to its end on the battlefield as Putin has set his own course and must be demonstrably shown his fate in a way he will understand. Then it will be for Ukraine to recover and prosper as the sort of nation it has long wanted to be, at peace with its neighbors, and for Russia to come to terms with how it will move forward from this catastrophe with a new vision for itself if that can be made to happen.
Copyright @Kost Elisevich, MD, PhD 2025. All rights reserved. Any illegal reproduction of this content will result in immediate legal action.
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