Putin pushes the myth of Russian invincibility, seemingly to set his terms for peace

• When Russian President Vladimir Putin recently declared to a television reporter that inflicting a "strategic defeat" on Russia is "unrealistic," it may have sounded like standard wartime bravado.
• Instead, his boilerplate rhetoric may signal something deeper: positioning ahead of a diplomatic endgame as international pressure grows to end the war in Ukraine.
• "It is impossible to defeat Russia on the battlefield," Putin told the reporter on Oct.