By making harsh, uncompromising demands in peace talks with Ukraine while continuing to pummel it with waves of missiles and drones, Russian President Vladimir Putin is sending a clear message: He will only accept a settlement on his terms and will keep fighting until they’re met.

At the same time, he has sought to avoid angering U.S. President Donald Trump by praising his diplomacy and declaring Moscow’s openness to peace talks — even as he set maximalist conditions rejected by Kyiv and the West.

Trump, who once promised to end the 3-year-old war in 24 hours, has upended the U.S. policy of isolating Russia by holding calls with Putin and denigrating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. At the same time, Trump warned Putin against “tapping me along” and threatened Moscow with sanctions if it fails to back his peace proposals.

In recent days, Trump signaled he was losing patience with Putin, declaring the Russian leader had gone “crazy” by stepping up aerial attacks on Ukraine. He also said: “What Vladimir Putin doesn’t realize is that if it weren’t for me, lots of really bad things would have already happened to Russia, and I mean REALLY BAD. He’s playing with fire!”

Dmitry Medvedev, a former Russian president who serves as deputy head of Putin’s Security Council, fired back: “I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!”

Fyodor Lukyanov, a Moscow-based analyst familiar with Kremlin thinking, said Putin is engaged in a “psychological game” with Trump, with both men thinking they understand each other well.

“Putin’s tactics is apparently based on an assumption that the issue has a lesser priority for his interlocutor, who wants to get rid of it one way or another, while for the Russian side, nothing compares to it in importance,” Lukyanov wrote a commentary. “In this logic, the one who sees it as something of lesser importance will eventually make concessions.”

While Ukraine’s European allies urge Trump to ramp up sanctions against Moscow to force it to accept a ceasefire, some fear that Trump may end up distancing the U.S. from the conflict. If the U.S. halts or reduces military aid to Kyiv, it would badly erode Ukraine’s fighting capability.

Many observers expect Russia to expand its offensive over the summer to capture more land and set tougher terms for peace.

“Moscow thinks its leverage over Ukraine will build over time, and since Trump has strongly implied that he will withdraw from negotiations, the Russian military is set to intensify its operations,” said Jack Watling of the Royal United Services Institute in London.

Sergei Markov, a pro-Kremlin, Moscow-based analyst, said the long-expected offensive hasn’t begun in earnest because Russia is cautious not to anger Trump.

“If Kyiv derails peace talks, the Russian army will start a big offensive,” he said.

Putin has demanded that Ukraine withdraw its forces from Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson — the regions that Russia illegally annexed in 2022 but never fully controlled. That demand had been rejected by Kyiv and allies, but the Russian side reportedly repeated it at May 16 talks with Ukraine in Istanbul.

Those talks, the first since botched negotiations in the opening weeks of the war, came after Putin effectively rejected a 30-day truce proposed by Trump that was accepted by Kyiv. Russia had linked such a ceasefire to a halt in Ukraine’s mobilization effort and a freeze on Western arms supplies.

Putin proposed talks to discuss conditions for a possible truce. Trump quickly prodded Kyiv to accept the offer, but the negotiations yielded no immediate progress except an agreement to exchange 1,000 prisoners each.

Russia offered to hold another round of talks Monday in Istanbul, where it said it will present a memorandum setting conditions for ending hostilities. It refused to share the document before the talks.

Seeking to underline that Moscow will press home its initial demands, Putin appointed his aide Vladimir Medinsky to lead the Russian delegation in Istanbul. He also led the Russian side in the 2022 talks. Kyiv reportedly has asked the U.S. to encourage Putin to replace him.

The soft-spoken, 54-year-old career bureaucrat, who was born in Ukraine, ascended through the Kremlin ranks after writing books exposing purported Western plots against Russia.

On Russian state television after the May 16 talks, Medinsky pointed to Russia’s 18th century war with Sweden that lasted 21 years, a signal that Moscow is prepared to fight for a long time until its demands are met.

“History repeats itself in a remarkable way,” he said.