His prediction coincided with Russia's foreign intelligence service publishing its latest such report about this scenario, which claimed that Zaluzhny is being seriously considered by the US as his replacement and is also deemed to be more suitable for negotiating peace with Moscow than others.

It was explained last month how "Russia Hopes To Influence Ukraine's Possibly Impending US-Backed Regime Change Process" after that same service released a related report about this at the time. This strategy continues unfolding as evidenced by President Putin declaring two weeks ago that the Rada Speaker is now the legitimate leader of Ukraine if the Constitution is still being followed. Accordingly, he said that Russia could negotiate with him or someone else if Kiev is interested in peace, but not Zelensky.

As regards the conflict's military-strategic dynamics, they continue trending in Russia's favor and won't be changed by minor adjustments to US policy such as letting Ukraine use its arms to hit any targets across the border that are allegedly planning to cross the frontier.

The only variable that can make a meaningful difference at this point in time is if NATO stages a conventional intervention, but that would spike the risk of World War III by miscalculation.

Returning back to President Putin's prediction about Zelensky being replaced in the first half of next year, he's either assuming that no such conventional intervention will occur or that the subsequent escalation would remain manageable instead of spiraling into the apocalypse.

Regarding the first possibility, there's a chance that this won't happen since it's dependent on Russia achieving a military breakthrough across the front lines, which NATO could then exploit to justify directly involving itself in this conflict.

That might either not happen and thus rule out this scenario, or it'll unfold and then set that sequence of events into motion, therefore leading to the second possibility of them managing this escalation.