What are Putin's plans for summer campaign?

Putin is not fighting for Kramatorsk, nor does he dream of "liberating" Donetsk or Zaporizhzhia regions. Even the occupation of Kyiv or Lviv is not his goal. For him, this war is about spheres of influence, about dividing the world between Russia and the West, about control over Europe.

His goal is not so much to conquer Ukraine as to publicly break it. To make the West “understand on its own” and surrender everything willingly. As if to say: look, Ukraine refused to give up Zaporizhzhia - and this is what happened to it. You wouldn’t want the same fate for Riga or Helsinki, would you?

"That’s why Putin is interested in negotiations - because political demands can only be fulfilled through political agreements. He needs to put his claims to control over Europe on paper, portraying it as a continent supposedly incapable of defending itself."

For the Kremlin, the war is simply a tool of pressure. They had various options, but chose the "weekend war" scenario, which according to Russian plans, was supposed to end back in February 2022. Now, to increase pressure, Russia is expanding the front: advancing into the Sumy region and continuing fighting in the Kharkiv and Mykolaiv regions. Unlike Kherson, these areas aren’t even “secured” in the Russian constitution. But it’s clear - this is an attempt to force Ukraine into concessions.

The Russians believe now is a convenient moment to break through Ukrainian defenses and force Ukraine to surrender. Like last year, they are stretching the front line to find a weak spot for a breakthrough. Their plan is that at some point the Ukrainian army will collapse, allowing a Russian offensive to break through the rear with no one left to stop it. This is supposed to create panic in Kyiv and pressure the government to agree to “peace” on Putin’s terms, including all his “denazification” demands.

We’ve seen similar plans back in 2022 - and we remember how they ended. Back then, hardly anyone believed in us. No one except ourselves. Today, Ukraine has an army, weapons, and military technologies that were unimaginable three years ago. Thousands of workshops in Ukraine and abroad produce batches of drones that make up for the shortage of manpower. Rough estimates say that about 70-80% of hits in this war are done by drones. Our allies from the US, Europe, and many other countries continue supplying weapons and supporting the Ukrainian economy. So, no matter how hard it gets, the situation is not fundamentally worse than at the start of the full-scale invasion.

It’s clear that the summer of 2025 will be one of the toughest periods of the war. But even if the campaign repeats last year’s pattern - where the Russians captured territory but couldn’t break through Ukrainian defenses - it will still be a failure for Putin. Because the Kremlin’s plans rely on breaking Ukraine’s defense, and if it holds, they lose. Our task is to endure and stay united. That hasn’t changed since 2014.

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About the author. Mykola Kniazhytskyi, journalist, Ukrainian MP.

The editors do not always share the opinions expressed by the blogs or column authors.