Ukraine

Trump will try to offer both sides an ultimatum such as:

Putin, make a cease fire or we will increase support to Ukraine

Zelensky, make a cease fire or we will end Ukraine support

In the end Ukraine will likely be the one getting screwed, they will have to give up their land and likely get little in return. Almost no chance this ends up working.

It's politically embarrassing for Putin to start 2025 with Ukraine still holding Russian territory.

Because Trump wants to end the war, but the US is not the country to make the call. Ukraine still has a strong military and arms industry itself and many European countries and the EU have the money and arms industry to keep Ukraine in the fight. In fact we saw that when the Republicans blocked aid to Ukraine for months. Today it is even worse for Russia as both Ukraines and the EUs arms industry have grown.

Russia on the other hand has been hit by sanctions for years, which make no mistake have hit the Russian economy hard. We are talking high inflation, problems finding money for the government, gas sales having collapsed, a somewhat likely housing crisis, defaults of lots of companies in Russia, coal industry collapsing, private bancrupcy rising fast and a lot more bad stuff. The Soviet era weapon stockpiles are running low and Russia has increasing problems finding new recruits.

Ukraine can keep the fight going for quite some time, without US help. That might be long enough to bring down Russia. The key word being might, as it depends on a lot of factors, most notably European support, but also the oil price and a lot of other factors.

Looking at this taking land has two main advantages for Putin. First of all it lowers European support for the war, as they might believe that Ukraine is going to loose, hence pushing for peace and secondly in a peace deal it gives him leverage.

I think people are being too pessimistic about Trump in this context. Trump is terrible, sure, but one of the things that makes him terrible is total self-interest. I don't think he's as reliable a puppet of Putin as commonly thought.

I'm thinking perhaps Putin is worried Trump might decide to flip the script and act the tough guy against him this time, since Putin is significantly weaker now than in his previous term. Getting Kursk back would be absolutely vital if it looks like Trump is going to try to freeze the conflict or force negotiations.

The GOP as a whole is not reliably pro-Putin either, there are some hawks in there that would love to finish Putin off.

In general, this is an uncertain time approaching.

Because trump is going to end this war one way or another. Russia is now on a very short deadline and is throwing whatever they can to gain whatever land they can. After trump decides to do his thing, the lines will be frozen, for better or worse. Whatever deal ends up being written has to take that into account.