Russian President Vladimir Putin (69) is said to assume that the West will soon drop Ukraine. Until then, he wants to rely on a war of attrition. Various analyzes that can currently be read in the media point in this direction. The Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podoliak (50) says in an interview with "Medusa": "It can take another two to six months." During this time, Putin hopes that the mood in the West will change.

Opinion in the West should “change”

The Washington Post says a Russian billionaire who wants to remain anonymous: Putin "believes he will win in the long run because the West will be exhausted." The Kremlin chief assumes that public opinion, which is currently clearly pro-Ukrainian, "can change within a day."

Putin assumes that the sanctions will lead to price increases, which at some point the public in the West would no longer appreciate. The coming oil embargo does not scare Putin either. A Russian official told the newspaper: "The mood in the Kremlin is that we cannot lose."

Putin wants to trigger a wave of refugees

A second point that should lead to a Russian victory in the long term is the grain blockade in Ukraine. This should "lead to instability in the Middle East and trigger a new wave of refugees," said Sergey Guriev (50), former chief economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

According to the Washington Post, the Kremlin is already seeing the first signs that the West's position is beginning to crumble. The weeks of discussions about the oil embargo should confirm Putin's view.

Likewise the fact that Chancellor Olaf Scholz (63) and French President Emmanuel Macron (44) phoned him to discuss the grain blockade. Putin sees himself as confirmed that this measure gives him a good means of exerting pressure. (eu)