I suspect Russia can no longer gamble on getting a peace deal from the present Ukrainian regime. Backed by the collective western elites who have an incentive to keep the conflict going it seems to me that ideas of an eventual settlement rather than capitulation are fading.
Maybe the offensive is still going....maybe it is better than thought originally or maybe it is not. I think Brian Berletic has offered a good analysis of it: “Kherson Offensive: What Went Wrong?”
The Russian Armed Forces do not publish timetables and they take their time.
This war runs on their schedule, they are there to destroy the Ukrainian Armed Forces, take all the productive regions of The Ukraine and they will leave the Kyiv Government, incompetent as they are, right where they are. Because they are incompetent.
Maybe the offensive is still going....maybe it is better than thought originally or maybe it is not. I think Brian Berletic has offered a good analysis of it: “Kherson Offensive: What Went Wrong?”
https://libya360.wordpress.com/2022/09/04/kherson-offensive-what-went-wrong/
But, sadly, I do agree with your second option. Thank you.
Not quite.
The Russian Armed Forces do not publish timetables and they take their time.
This war runs on their schedule, they are there to destroy the Ukrainian Armed Forces, take all the productive regions of The Ukraine and they will leave the Kyiv Government, incompetent as they are, right where they are. Because they are incompetent.
As US General Curtis LeMay pointed out decades back, you wins wars by killing people. When you kill enough of them, they give up. Quoted here in greater detail and context . . . https://les7eb.substack.com/p/great-game-ukraine-long-proxy-war