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Welcome to The Adversarial. Every other week, we’ll provide you with expert analysis on America’s greatest challengers: China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and jihadists. Read more below.***RussiaThe Kremlin will be feeling relieved about the war in Ukraine. The counter-offensive has culminated. Ukraine’s leading general has admitted the war is in a stalemate. President Volodymyr Zelensky in a Time magazine story appears exhausted and frustrated. And now the U.S. Congress may be unable to pass a renewal of U.S. security assistance to Ukraine, which could dramatically shift the war in Russia’s favor. Winter is coming, and Russia has been able to maintain the production of missiles and drones, enabling it to once again bombard Ukraine in the hopes of sapping its will to fight. That is unlikely to succeed but will cause considerable mayhem. Instead of being content with a stalemate, Russian overconfidence and determination to fully take the Donbas are resulting in a continuation of costly offenses by Russia, such as at Avdiivka.A relatively fixed frontline will also prompt Ukraine to focus on other ways to impose costs on Russia, which will leave Moscow on edge.A Russia that feels more confident in the war may feel more emboldened and shift some of its focus to “retaliating” against the West. Repeating the successes the Kremlin achieved interfering in Western elections in 2016–17 will prove difficult, as the West has since built up its resilience. But there is also little to deter Russia from adopting more aggressive and kinetic activities, as the West has little left to sanction. Hence, a series of incidents damaging undersea critical infrastructure in the Baltic (not yet attributed to Russia) raise concerns that Russia may try to bring the war home to the West.A Russian soldier training in Kaliningrad via the Ministry of Defence of the Russian FederationChinaLast month saw the release of