Vladimir Putin has a theory of victory in Ukraine.
It’s not the Russian president’s first theory – that was a quick, dayslong campaign – nor his second or third, which involved different land offensives in the east that quickly petered out. Instead, Putin’s latest hypothesis is that the relentless bombing of Ukrainian cities will impose so much hardship on civilians that they will concede to Russia’s war aims.
Yet, as experts on conflict and public opinion, we believe there is a significant problem with this idea. Chiefly, extensive academic research shows that airpower alone rarely achieves decisive political goals.
Bombs terrorize civilians, but our survey findings in Ukraine suggest they don’t change war outcome preferences. Indeed, recent data shows that suffering from power outages and wartime stress in Ukraine has no relationship to support for territorial concessions to Putin.
Putin’s plan for destruction
The targeting of Ukraine infrastructure has been part of Russia’s way of war since the invasion of February 2022.
But since August 2026, Russia has significantly stepped up its attacks against Ukrainian power plants and grid systems, especially in Kyiv. And due to Ukrainian air defense shortages, more of Moscow’s missiles and jet-powered drones are finding their targets.
Russia aims to degrade the quality of life of Ukrainians, depriving them of electricity, water and transportation, according to a recently intercepted Russian military document.
“Russia is trying to cause a blackout in Ukraine – right before winter,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, adding: “Russia is trying to leave millions of our people without electricity and heating.”
The broader Russian aim appears to be to make the Ukrainian capital uninhabitable, imposing so much hardship that residents will either depart or revolt against continued war.
In combination with more aggressive Russian tactics and hard-right Ukraine skepticism in Europe, Putin calculates Ukraine will eventually be broken, isolated and defeated.
The city destruction strategy is not a new method of warfare by the Russian state. Post-Soviet Russia first employed a version of it during the first Chechen war of the mid 1990s, when much of the city of Grozny was reduced to rubble. The strategy was later revived by Russian airplanes in Aleppo, Syria.
But is there any evidence for Putin’s theory of victory? Polling suggests not. Along with the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, we polled a nationally representative sample of 1,801 Ukrainians from June 9-26, 2026.
The survey used a computer-aided telephone questionnaire and the results shown were proportionately weighted to accurately portray the view of residents in the area controlled by the Ukrainian government in Kyiv. It was the latest in a series of such nationwide polls we have conducted since December 2019.
Ukraine’s war trauma
There is no question that the Ukrainian population has been deeply traumatized by the escalation of the war since 2022. We asked Ukrainians nine well-being questions, which enabled us to create a stress index computed from how often they have experienced psychological symptoms since February 2022.
The results on the index reveal that nearly 1 in 4 Ukrainians suffer from high levels of stress characterized by concentration problems, depression, irritability, distrust, physical weakness and other physical problems. More than 40% of the respondents in the latest survey indicated that they experienced two indicators of stress – nervousness and anxiety – often or nearly always.
Stress is also related to war exposures. Asked about experiences of violence, roughly 20% of respondents said that they or a family member were personally injured due to Russian attacks, and 20% have directly witnessed violence by Russian forces. Sixty-nine percent of Ukrainians have a family member or close friend who has died as a result of this war.
Power outages have been rampant across the country over the past year, disrupting everyday life. Overall, 65% of Ukrainians reported losing utilities “often” or “very often.” Only 1.4% of Ukrainians report having never lost power since 2022, and just 9% say they rarely lost power.
There are important regional differences, however. While 73% of residents in Kyiv report that they lost power “often” or “very often,” the corresponding figure for residents in the western region is 54%.
The impact on war attitudes
While levels of stress are highly correlated with experiences of violence and a frequent loss of utilities, we examined whether this cumulative hardship affects preferences for a ceasefire. The survey asked whether the current front line should be accepted as a ceasefire line for the sake of peace.
The Ukrainian government has said it is willing to accept this position, but it remains controversial as it concedes part of the country’s territory to Russia, even if only temporarily.
Zelenskyy announced on Oct. 21, 2026, that freezing the current line of fighting was an option for negotiating peace; the Russian government, for its part, still covets all of the Donbas region of Ukraine and more.
Ukrainians are highly divided on accepting the current front line, with 39% of respondents in our latest survey indicating they would – with varying degrees of reluctance – be open to that possibility, compared to 38% who would not.
Critically, experiencing violence first-hand appears not to shape Ukrainian willingness to tolerate the de facto partition of their country at the current front line. Further, neither those who are more stressed nor those who have experienced more frequent power outages are more likely to favor accepting the existing front line as a ceasefire line.
Ukrainians not ready to concede
Our polling data from summer 2026 is affirmed by more recent polling by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology that supports the argument that bombing will not make Ukrainians more accepting of conceding territory.
In a survey fielded from Oct. 6-18, 61% of Ukrainians rejected giving Russia full control of the Donbas region in return for a ceasefire and security guarantees. Indeed, the institute has asked this question in seven polls throughout 2026, and opposition to conceding Donbas has risen from 54% in January to 61% over the course of the year. Kyiv has been pummeled by Russian missiles and drones in recent weeks. But among all Ukrainian regions surveyed, Kyiv respondents had the lowest support for conceding the Donbas territory.
Another question from the October 2026 survey asked how long respondents are willing to endure war: 62% chose the option “as long as necessary,” a 14-point increase from April this year and the same percent as December 2025. The figure at the outset of the war in May 2022 was only 9 points higher.
We know that historical evidence does not predict the future. Nevertheless, our survey results suggest that increasing wartime hardship against Ukrainians will not coerce them into accepting territorial concessions.
There is currently no persuasive survey evidence that bombing Ukrainians will succeed in making them capitulate to Russian demands. Ukrainians are stressed, war-weary and hungry for peace – but not on Russia’s terms.
