Zelenskyy has no cards to play against Russia or the West Russia-Ukraine war

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s technical skills have earned him a reputation for public diplomacy that is recognized by both friends and foes. The President of the United States Donald Trump, who publicly attacked him, called the Ukrainian leader “the biggest dealer in the world”. In a more sympathetic note, New York Times columnist David French recently described Zelenskyy as “the new leader of the liberal world”.

But Zelenskyy’s PR genius can do very little in terms of changing the military situation in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. In recent weeks, his administration and allies have gone to great lengths to signal that the battle is imminent. But the reality tells a different story.

For example, there were government claims that in February, Ukraine benefited more than Russia did. Some Ukrainian war monitoring platforms have supported these claims while others have not. It is important to note that this calculation can be misleading because there is a very gray area ahead where control is not clear. Progress measured in 150-200 kilometers per month. In other words, the strategy can be changed to give the impression you want: that Ukraine is growing.

To be honest, nothing shows any significant change in the war situation that has been going on for two years now.

More importantly, Russian forces are currently besieging several industrial cities in the northern part of the Donetsk region. Their advance on the northern border, in particular, is extending the front line by hundreds of kilometers, making the shortage of manpower in Ukraine even more difficult.

Four years into the war, the Ukrainian military carried out a brutal campaign of conscription, taking young men off the streets of towns and villages. Meanwhile, Russia can attract volunteers by offering high compensation.

Ukrainian officials also say Russia is losing more troops than it can recruit based on casualties. Zelenskyy, in particular, has said that Russians were seriously injured in March this year – 35,000. But his statement contradicts his Ministry of Defense, which said that Russia’s largest monthly loss exceeded 48,000 in January 2025, on average a month of about 35,000 in 2025.

Zelenskyy’s leader, the former head of military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, also denied the news that Russia is having a hard time sending workers. He admitted in a recent interview that the collapse of the Russian lobbying effort did not happen.

It should be remembered that Ukraine is conducting a successful drone campaign to destroy Russian oil fields. But it is unlikely that it will change anything beyond providing a picture of burning fuel tanks for the TV broadcasts.

In April, Russian oil revenues rose to $9bn, due to the US-Israel war on Iran. The windfall that Russia received in one month is equivalent to 10 percent of the loan that Ukraine will receive from the European Union over the next two years to support its military budget.

It cannot be denied that Russia has lost a great deal of wealth as a result of the war, and Russian President Vladimir Putin has admitted it. But Russia’s economy is showing a similar decline as other economies in Europe, which have also been affected by the wars in Ukraine and Iran.

Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) per capita adjusted for energy consumption (an indicator of living standards) now exceeds that of rich EU countries, such as Romania and Greece, according to IMF charts. The same sign in Ukraine is related to Mongolia and Egypt, where the ruins of the country have been destroyed and millions of Ukrainians have fled the country, most of them good.

With more optimism in Ukraine than ever before, the Ukrainian audience jumps at any news about Russia, which they hope could mean “disruption of the government”. Last month, Russian actress Victoria Bonya’s Instagram video made headlines in the West for her bold opposition to government policy. There may be disappointments in Russia, but the government is on the verge of collapse.

This story, however, distracts the citizens of Ukraine and the EU from the painful truth that the war is progressing and the fall of Ukraine is very bad. Zelenskyy may have received support with a $90bn euro loan, but his lack of vision and strategy for success is astounding.

The truth has already begun to emerge. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz recently said that Ukraine should accept some territory from Russia in order to end the war but get a fast track to EU membership in exchange. The EU’s defense chief, Andrius Kubilius, has gone ahead to say that Ukraine’s NATO membership has not been decided and that EU membership will be a “difficult process”. Instead, he asked for the cooperation of the Ukrainian military with other European countries – an idea that Moscow will reject, interpreting it as NATO through the back door.

What these contradictory statements show is that the main consensus on peace is not so much between Zelenskyy and Putin, but between Zelenskyy and his Western allies, especially in Europe.

As Budanov said recently, the positions of Kyiv and Moscow can be brought closer to what is possible in peace talks. But Zelenskyy has to show some benefit to Ukraine when the peace agreement was signed. Ideally, that gain would be EU membership or genuine security guarantees, but as Merz and Kubilius point out, the chances of achieving this are slim.

Frustration among Ukrainians is already visible. The head of the finance committee of the Ukrainian parliament, Danylo Hetmantsev, said that the European authorities should stop seeing the Ukrainians as a “tool to solve human problems” or a “human shield”. They have no right to define the future of Ukraine, he insisted.

But Zelenskyy, who is embroiled in a major corruption investigation involving his supporters, appears to have no cards to play against Russia or its Western allies. The status quo as a military leader serves him well, but it is becoming more and more unacceptable.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect Al Jazeera’s influence.