Putin believes, like Trump does, that he has all the cards

It's clear that Vladimir Putin is not in any hurry. All he has to do is say he supports the US-proposed 30-day ceasefire and then get on with what he wants to do which is to push ahead as far and fast as he can to grab more territory in eastern Ukraine and drive the Ukrainian forces out of Kursk in western Russia. He thinks he is - and he IS - in a much stronger position than Zelensky who is now desperate for a peace deal. Putin's troops are successfully hammering away at the Ukrainian troops who seized a large chunk of Kursk last August and are in the process of forcing them back over the border. Until a ceasefire agreement comes into play, if it ever does, Putin will do his best to seize more territory and destroy more of Ukraine's energy power plants. The only real pressure he is getting is coming from Trump, not Zelensky or Zelensky's army, and at some point he will have to make up his mind whether to stay friends with Trump abd therefore meet him half way over stopping the fighting or break from the Americans altogether and plough on as before. But Putin is a clever calculator. He will want to keep Trump on side but without doing any favours to Zelensky whom he loathes. On the surface it doesn't look as if Putin is remotely interested in a peace deal, at least not now. He has too much to sort out in Ukraine before he is prepared to really start negotiating. Yet at the same time he doesn't want to enrage Trump who might do what he is threatening to do which is to strangle Russia economically. But, again, Putin has all the cards because he knows full well that Trump's threat is bluster. Trump doesn't want to act against Moscow, not while there is even the remotest chance of a peace deal to end the war. So Putin will bide his time and see what happens.