As Lord Eddard Stark said in Game of Thrones, “Winter is coming.” Winter across the forests and steppes of Ukraine is bitterly cold and brutal.

Our good friends at The Washington Post have spent the last 1,437 days being wholly supportive of President Joe Biden and every move he has ever made, so when they tell readers that “Russian forces have continued to make gains and maintain the offensive initiative” in Ukraine, you know that it’s serious.

As Ukraine marks Christmas, exhausted soldiers wonder if Trump can end the war

Asked for their thoughts about a potential ceasefire in 2025, Ukrainian soldiers said they’d welcome a reprieve but were skeptical one was coming soon

By Isabelle Khurshudyan and Serhii Korolchuk | Thursday, December 26, 2024 | 2:01 PM EST

DNIPROPETROVSK REGION, Ukraine — Christmas on Ukraine’s front line started, fittingly, in an old barn filled with hay. Soldiers filed in as Lt. Mykola Bagirov, the brigade’s chaplain, began chanting prayers in a setting straight out of a Nativity scene — never mind the M113 armored personnel carriers parked beside him.

Bagirov spent the rest of the day dressed in a colorful jacket and carrying a painted spinning star while merrily singing traditional Ukrainian carols and banging a tambourine against his thigh.

His audience, though thankful for the attempt at holiday cheer, was noticeably less enthused.

“There’s no good mood,” said Kyrylo, a deputy battalion commander with Ukraine’s 33rd Mechanized Brigade. The Post is identifying the 37-year-old and other Ukrainian service members by just their first names, in keeping with military protocol.

“No one feels like the end is near,” Kyrylo said. “The morale keeps sinking lower and lower, getting worse and worse.”

I have been saying for months now that it doesn’t matter how much money and equipment we provide to Ukraine, they cannot defeat the Russians without US and NATO troops on the ground moving in to directly fight the Russians. They’ve done an amazing job so far, in holding Russia to a 2¾ year long stalemate, but that’s it, they’re exhausted. Occasional surprise moves, such as the Ukrainian advance into Russia proper near Kursk, provided some optimism, but that move ground to a halt after small gains, and has faced Russian counterattacks.

While I prefer not using photos from the Post, the one on the right is important. If you click on it, it will enlarge, and what you will see are six Ukrainian soldiers standing during the meager Christmas service: one woman in her twenties, and five men, who appear to be in their forties and fifties.

Inside one of the brigade’s medical stations for soldiers with minor injuries, 48-year-old Oleh was spending Christmas recovering from shrapnel wounds in his spine. “This won’t end soon,” he said.

48 years old, and fighting along the front lines.

But most Ukrainian military personnel acknowledge that soldier shortages are now just as critical as the weapons deficits. Some specialized jobs in the 33rd — such as a driver for armored personnel carriers — were down to just one person in a battalion, soldiers said, complicating logistics to transport troops safely back and forth from trench positions.

“Do we even have infantry?” said 37-year-old Denys, a drone operator. “It’s down to a couple of guys, and they’re over 50 years old. What are they going to do?”

Felix, 39, who is responsible for providing logistical and moral support for his unit, said fighters are simply exhausted. He hoped Trump’s January inauguration would mark a turning point in the war toward negotiations because it could provide soldiers with a much-needed break.

“It can’t go on like this,” Felix said. “We’re withdrawing. And they’re pushing further and further. What kind of victory will happen? … If our officials can’t put an end to it, maybe Mr. Trump can.”

Former and future President Trump has promised that he’d end this war, which can only mean that he’s counting on Russian President Vladimir Putin to be willing to make a reasonable deal, and that’s something which remains to be seen. Mr Putin has been chastised by reality: if the Ukrainians can’t push the Russians out, neither has Russia been able to win the easy, rollover victory many foresaw in 2022. The great fear of the Red Army rolling through the Fulda Gap to conquer the West has been exposed as a mirage of the Cold War, and this war has given the lie to the idea that if we “let” Russia win in Ukraine, Mr Putin will start invading other countries: unable to conquer Ukraine, Russia’s losses have been so dramatic that it would take a ten-year major rebuilding effort before the Russians could invade anyplace else.

With our change in Administrations, along with the chaos in the French government, and Germany having to call new, snap elections, Western help to Ukraine is far more likely to diminish than increase.

The Wall Street Journal reported, three months ago:

A confidential Ukrainian estimate from earlier this year put the number of dead Ukrainian troops at 80,000 and the wounded at 400,000, according to people familiar with the matter. Western intelligence estimates of Russian casualties vary, with some putting the number of dead as high as nearly 200,000 and wounded at around 400,000.

Yes, Russian casualties have been significantly higher than Ukraine’s, but Russia has more than thrice Ukraine’s population. But perhaps a million people dead or wounded, and for what? Russian has little additional territory beyond what was seized in 2014, and their economy has been seriously battered. The bulk of the fighting has been in Ukraine, and even peace this instant would still leave the country seriously damaged, as winter deepens.

Perhaps President Trump will be able to wrangle a face-saving deal for President Putin, but there’s one great truth to this war: everybody has lost.