4/22/2025 — OPINION: Why Putin Can’t End the War: 5 Traps He Built for Himself

While the world debates how to stop the war, one truth becomes increasingly clear: Putin himself can’t end it. Here are five reasons why.

From: Kyiv Post By Andrew Novitskyi

In this pool photograph distributed by the Russian state agency Sputnik, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin meets with workers and wards of the Defenders of the Fatherland State Fund, the foundation supporting veterans of the Russian military action in Ukraine, at the Unified Support Centre for participants in the military campaign and their families, in Moscow on March 6, 2025. (Photo by Mikhail METZEL / POOL / AFP)

Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine was meant to be swift and victorious. But more than three years later, Russia remains stuck in a bloody, expensive, and destabilizing war. While the world debates how to stop the war, one truth becomes increasingly clear: Putin himself can’t end it. Here are five reasons why.

The return of broken men

More than 700,000 Russian soldiers have been fighting in Ukraine, many of them poorly trained, traumatized, or brutalized by war. Those who return home often carry deep emotional and psychological wounds – some of them turn violent, committing crimes like assault, rape, or even murder.

Voice of Ukraine