Ukraine and Russia are both suffering as the war enters its fifth year

When the Russian army unleashed its large-scale air and ground invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, there was widespread expectation that the war would wrap up in Moscow’s favor relatively quickly. During the war’s first week, the U.S. intelligence community delivered an assessment to the administration of President Joe Biden that Russian forces could capture Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, in days. The projection wasn’t entirely outlandish at the time; the Russians, after all, had far more men and a federal budget that dwarfed Ukraine’s own, which meant that Russian President Vladimir Putin could keep the conflict going until the Ukrainian army collapsed.

Those first assessments have proven wildly off the mark. The war in Ukraine will enter its fifth year later this month, a consequence of stiff Ukrainian military resistance, poor Russian decision-making, the emergence of drone warfare and the combatants’ inability to agree on how to settle it. President Donald Trump’s administration, meanwhile, continues to try to facilitate peace talks between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a process that is as laborious and unsatisfying as you might expect from two leaders who view each other as illegitimate.

At this point in the war, both sides are suffering greatly. Gone are the days when one side or the other makes spectacular territorial gains that change the contours of the map. The last time the Ukrainians recaptured large swaths of territory was in the fall of 2022, when their soldiers beat back unprepared Russian troops from a large section of Kharkiv in Ukraine’s northeast. Moscow has managed to capture several midsize towns in the Donbas region since 2024, but not without massive personnel losses. The war has shown that the Russian army is far from the juggernaut many in the West assumed it was. War-games conducted that once anticipated a Russian blitzkrieg into Eastern Europe now look fanciful.

Four years into Europe’s largest conflict since World War II, the trend lines aren’t particularly bright for either party. Ukraine may now be the envy of the West for resisting the big, bad Putin with such tenacity, but as the smaller party in a war of attrition, Ukrainian policymakers must be wondering how long the fighting can go on before they need to reassess their negotiating position.