View from USA: “What Putin said today implies that the West cannot support Ukraine while Russia regenerates”

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President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Thursday did not rule out a U.S. and Ukrainian proposal for a monthlong cease-fire, but he set down numerous conditions that would most likely delay any truce — or could make one impossible to achieve, ‘The New York Times’ notes.

Mr. Putin’s comments during a news conference highlighted the balance he was trying to strike, exuding confidence in Russia’s position on the battlefield while seeking to continue talks with the United States and avoid upsetting President Trump. The U.S. president, having antagonized the country’s allies and realigned American foreign policy in Russia’s favor, has emerged as a key geopolitical partner for Mr. Putin.

In sharp remarks later in the day Zelensky said the Russian leader set so many conditions “that nothing will work out at all or that it will not work out for as long as possible.”

Mr. Putin’s comments came before he was to meet with Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s Middle East envoy, to discuss the cease-fire proposal that Ukraine had already agreed to.The Kremlin had not commented on how the meeting went. But the Kremlin said Mr. Putin had also spoken by phone with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, about Ukraine.

Mr. Putin’s remarks also came as Russia kept up its momentum in the key battle in the Kursk region of Russia, where Moscow’s forces appeared close to pushing Ukraine out of the territory it seized last summer. Such a development would reduce Kyiv’s leverage in future peace talks.

“The idea itself is the right one, and we definitely support it,” Mr. Putin said, referring to the cease-fire proposal. “But there are questions that we need to discuss, and I think that we need to talk them through with our American colleagues and partners.”

Mr. Putin’s comments were the first about the cease-fire offer that emerged from negotiations between the United States and Ukraine in Saudi Arabia this week. They suggested that the Russian leader viewed that proposal as just a part of a broader negotiation between Washington and Moscow, and that he was eager to show that he was engaging with Mr. Trump’s efforts to end the war.

Mr. Putin said he might “have a call with President Trump and talk it over with him.” When asked later if he would speak with the Russian president, Mr. Trump said he would “love to meet” and talk with him.

Mr. Putin appears keen to stay on Mr. Trump’s good side, given the geopolitical victories that the U.S. president has already delivered for the Kremlin.

But Mr. Putin’s comments also showed that the Russian leader saw his forces as having the upper hand on the battlefield and that it would be to Russia’s advantage to draw out the negotiations.

He said that Russia would continue to insist on a peace deal that addressed the “original causes” of the war — suggesting that his push for major Western concessions, such as a reduction of NATO’s presence in Eastern Europe, hadn’t changed, though it wasn’t clear if he would make them a stipulation for a monthlong cease-fire.

Ukraine stunned Russia in last August with a cross-border incursion into Kursk, seizing several hundred square miles of territory.

But Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Thursday that the country’s military had regained full control of Sudzha, the main town in Kursk that Ukraine had seized. Ukrainian officials have not confirmed a retreat from the town, where Wednesday night Kyiv’s military reported fierce fighting. If confirmed, such a retreat would leave only small pockets of Russian land along the border under Ukrainian control.

Still, Dara Massicot, a Russian military specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which is based in Washington, called Mr. Putin’s new demands “very dangerous for Ukraine.”

“What Putin said today implies that the West cannot support Ukraine while Russia regenerates,” she said.

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