How does the war in Ukraine end? Earlier this year, former President Donald Trump boasted that if he were re-elected, he’d “have that war settled in one day, 24 hours.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin is making a slightly less ambitious forecast: If things go his way, the war can be over in a week.
In remarks Thursday at the annual meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club, a Kremlin-friendly confab on global issues, Putin predicted that Ukraine would collapse if the West turns off the taps of military aid and economic assistance.
“By and large, the Ukrainian economy cannot exist without external support,” he said. “Once you stop this, everything will be over in a week. Finished. The same applies to the defense system: Imagine that supplies will stop tomorrow — you will only have a week to live when the ammunition runs out.”