Said Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, quoted in
"U.S. and Russia Pursue Partnership in a Head-Spinning Shift in Relations/The two sides met in Saudi Arabia for their most extensive discussions in years. In addition to Ukraine, business ties were on the table" (NYT).
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, American officials did not dwell on Russia’s violation of international law in attacking Ukraine, its alleged war crimes or the three years of devastation that Russian shelling and bombardment had wrought in parts of Ukraine. Instead, they repeatedly lauded Mr. Trump for trying to stop the fighting by talking to Russia in a way that his predecessor did not.
“For three years,” Mr. Rubio said, “no one else has been able to bring something together like what we saw today, because Donald Trump is the only leader in the world that can.”...
“We were not invited to this Russian-American meeting in Saudi Arabia,” Mr. Zelensky said while on a visit to Turkey. “It was a surprise for us — I think for many others as well.”
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61 comments:
In this context, consider that the Doomsday Clock people just moved the setting from 90 seconds to midnight to 89 seconds to midnight. You see, AFTER Trump arrived the world became MORE dangerous. When Biden's puppetmasters were launching weapons into Russia we were soooooo much safer!
With all credibility now squandered:
https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/2025-statement/
" its alleged war crimes or the three years of devastation that Russian shelling and bombardment had wrought in parts of Ukraine."
Did Russia dwell on the ten years of shelling of ethnic Russians in Ukraine by the ethnic Ukrainian army? Shelling with only stopped recently with the Russian capture of all of the territory in artillery range of Donetsk City, for example? Although I think that the Ukrainians are still using HIMARS to attack cities with cluster munitions.
There are lots of war crimes accusations to go around. Maybe the US could lift its objection to a UN Security Council investigation of Bucca that the Russians requested, and that we vetoed...
You won't read about this stuff in the New York Times though, will you.
"because Donald Trump is the only leader in the world that can.”...
Progressives: "That's because he's a tool of Putin!!!"
Those of us that lived through the 80's when Democrats like Bernie Sanders extolled the virtues of the USSR, the 90's when Bill Clinton began normalizing relationships with Russia and Communist China while Tim Walz travelled to China, and then the 2000s as Progressives told us we needed to learn to have peace with Islamic nations rather than war; we wonder why having peace talks is now verboten.
If I were Europe, I would go cut a deal with Putin, blame the whole war on America —It was our fault, and cut the Americans out and rebuild their economies on cheap Russian resources and set up tariff barriers with the US.
I will get off of my soap box after saying this: Blinken and Bided fully understood Russia's position, they just thought that Russia was weak, and we were strong, and they could use Russia's legitimate concern for its own security to force Russia to take on the odium of starting a war that we had set as the trap that we thought was going to bring down the Russian Federation, the same way the Soviet Union broke up, and allow us to waltz in and scoop up their untold trillions in natural resources at looter's prices, and leave China friendless to face us alone in the Pacific.
It was a bold strategy, Cotton, but it didn't work out.
peace breaks out
rich, and Dr We Evil most hurt
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has been around a long time. It was founded right after WWII by Einstein and others involved in the Manhattan Project, many of them not scientists at all. They were, and still are, a small and unrepresentative group of far left ideologues. They were among the KGB's "useful idiots" in the Cold War, working hard for the US to surrender to the inevitability of unitary communist world government. With victory in the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, they latched on to migration, climate change, biological and chemical warfare, racial disparities, and the rest of the usual left-wing laundry list. They are now no different than any other Soros tentacle working for our enslavement and impoverishment, and although I haven't checked, I'd bet next month's mortgage payment that they have a heavy influx of tax dollars through USAID and a myriad of other government agencies and NGO cutouts.
The presence of the CIA puppet is not needed.
Without USAID, they couldn't afford to send the coup representative to the meeting of democratic peers.
Jaq said... If I were Europe, I would go cut a deal with Putin, blame the whole war on America —It was our fault...
Yes, it was our fault. President Trump explicitly agrees.
It's been depressing to watch neocons and Cold War deadenders like Instapundit write enthusiastically about the need to "bleed Russia" at the expense of every remaining combat-age male in Ukraine, all while pretending the U.S. didn't help drive the 2014 coup against that country's elected president.
I think past a certain age it's hard for some people to process new events without forcing them into a template that only fit actual circumstances decades ago.
The best thing politically for Zelensky is to have the war end with him being able to credibly claim that the US stabbed him in the back. It kills me to say it but Ukraine can't win this war. The Russians might be able too. The Dems and the Euros seemingly want the war to go on until what exactly? The Russians win anyways because the Ukrainians ran out of soldiers to fight with? The Euros are fools or knaves to think that the US was ever going to put troops on the ground there, Dem or Republican presidents.
Zelensky's complaint that he wasn't invited reminds me of that scene in "Tombstone" when Doc turns to Johnny Tyler in the street and says, "Oh, I forgot you were there. You may go now."
Trump is a deal maker. Finding stuff to add and arrange so that everybody comes out ahead.
Zelensky is a dead man walking, so to speak. He'll be forced to hold elections before any deal is finalized. He's the illegitimate president of Ukraine. His term of office expired long ago. The final resolution will be signed by the newly elected president.
Kate @12:41pm. Hilarious. Exactly!
This is reminiscent of the September 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union to carve up Poland. I suspect this is less about ending the war in Ukraine and more about US-Russia relations.
Is it Zelensky or Zelenskyy? Choose one, MSM!
And I have an alternate more accurate take, NYTs:
"Writing about the meeting later, then NYT"s did not dwell on Ukraine's violation of international law in shelling civilians in Donbas, its violation of the Maidan agreements, its attacking the breakaway Republics, its alleged war crimes, or the three years of devastation caused by Ukraine's refusal to negotiate. Instead, they repeatedly attacked Mr. Trump for trying to stop the fighting by talking to Russia in a way that his predecessor did not."
I just hope Zelensky can continue to not hold an election, and "save Democracy".
How we going to have WW III if Trump keeps negotiating a peace deal? Talk about a far-right extremist!
The art of the deal.
Is peace an endpoint for Russia, or a rest stop?
Just remember that a boatload of manufacturing was shipped to Communist China in, supposedly, an effort to westernize the People's Republic. Last I looked, Communists were still in charge, speech is not free, and their military continues grow while CC's sphere of influence grows worldwide.
"American officials did not dwell on Russia’s violation of international law in attacking Ukraine,"
This caused an eye-roll from me. Do they not teach Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War anymore? There's no such thing as international law. Nations do whatever they want to do and think they can get away with. Our nation and our allies are hurt if our negotiators don't go the bargaining table intrinsically knowing this.
How much, in percentage terms, is the US funding the Ukrainian side of this war?
This is reminiscent of the September 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union to carve up Poland.
Which did result peace on the Eastern Front, until Germany attacked USSR in violation of that pact (and in which, if I understand history correctly, the Ukrainians were somehow involved).
Kaki is referring to the deal between Hilter and Stalin by which part of Poland was cut off and given to Ukraine, after which Stehpan Bandera, a national hero of Ukraine still, sent his force of nationalists in to cleanse that territory of Poles, and Jews, too, BTW, and Hungarians, any non Ukrainians who might have lived there. Polish farmers were murdered with their families on their farms, or simply locked in their homes, which were burned. Remember, this guy remains a national hero of Ukraine. Stephan Bandera's grandson Stevie Bandera lives in Canada, and commented once that he had visited Ukraine and was "treated like a god."
So it's always good to be reminded that Ukraine is a fake country pasted together by a rogues gallery of dictators from Lenin to Stalin to Hitler to Khrushchev. That the actual boundary of the ethnic nation of Ukraine is far smaller than the borders that fell under their control at the fall of the USSR, and that the Ukrainians had a plan to continue the kinds of things that they had done after the Hitler Stalin agreement.
There was no way that Ukraine could have regained control of the ethnic Russian regions, but if they did, they were going to be cleansed of ethnic Russians. There was no way that we could have, in good conscience, fought a war with Russia to hand over these people to the Ukrainians' tender mercies.
If Ukraine comes out of this with Odessa, they can consider themselves lucky and thank Donald Trump.
Russia has no reason to invade high population, low resource, Russia. Invasions are like voltage, the flow in one direction, towards resources away from population. And of course the same dynamic leaves Russia vulnerable to the same kinds of thoughts occurring to China, which we can use.
I mean that Russia has zero incentive to invade Europe. Hitler was after Russia's resources because he couldn't find them in Europe, which he controlled.
While I have always been sympathetic to the Ukrainian cause, I have always been opposed to the blank check approach to aid. To what end and what cost do we continue propping up this almost failed state? The idea of Ukraine joining NATO was always a losing proposition, as they couldn't possibly contribute 3-5% of their GDP. It was always a one way deal. Putin has failed as his goal was to defeat the existing government and install a pro-Russian government. He needs a way out. Zelensky has no real say. He only exists if the US and NATO support him. If we stop funding him, Europe doesn't have the money to fill the void.
Putin needs a way to exit and make it look like a win. It's a loss no matter what. He didn't get what he wanted and he wiped out his already meager young male population.
"Putin needs a way to exit and make it look like a win. It's a loss no matter what. He didn't get what he wanted and he wiped out his already meager young male population."
This is projection as pure as a Tiger Woods wedge shot in his prime.
How long before a lefty federal judge issues the TRO . . .
Marco Rubio looking like a diplomat of substance here. Not Jimmy Baker stature - yet - but a worthy envoy. Trump, with Rubio's deployment, has put the Ukraine on notice now, and with them, Europe - i.e., NATO. Not mentioned, because they're irrelevant: The United Nations. Also not mentioned, but in everybody's mind: China.
Nobody has said this yet unless it’s in the comments at the NYT which I couldn’t read via uploading to Pocket to get past the paywall. This has nothing to do with Ukraine. Thinks about the last week or so with VP Vance in Europe. They have been put on notice. “We’ll broker the peace but ya’ll got stand on your own two feet while we deal with a bigger threat”
This is about China. It’s one of the reasons why it was held in Saudi Arabia. It also aligns with Trump’s stance on Panama and Greenland. Russia is ruled by mob boss like thugs and Trump has some experience there. He’s neutralizing relationships developed via Chinese belt and road initiative, dangling sweet US access and biz dev to Russia for calling the dawgs off but still tossing some Crimean red meat, and boosting the profile of Saudi Arabia to get the Abraham Accords back on track.
We can’t trust Russia and Trump knows that but Trump can cater to their egos just as they cater to his. He’ll pull it off and we just may see China get a bit isolated. Whether it can outlast his term remains to be seen but a very strong Middle East with a diminished Iran, a Europe carrying own weight against a potential re-emerged threat in post-Trump Europe and stronger US ties in the Pacific with an isolated China would be a remarkable feat and definitely anchor Trump’s second term as a historical success.
LLR-democratical Rich: "This is reminiscent of the September 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop..."
LOL
No.
It's not.
But you've got nothing else so what the heck, right?
Ha! Aggie put it down before I could hit “Publish”. I tip my hat to you Aggie, from an old SWC Mustang! Gig’em and Pony Up!
Phaedrus: "This is about China. It’s one of the reasons why it was held in Saudi Arabia. It also aligns with Trump’s stance on Panama and Greenland. Russia is ruled by mob boss like thugs and Trump has some experience there. He’s neutralizing relationships developed via Chinese belt and road initiative, dangling sweet US access and biz dev to russia for calling the dawgs off but still tossing some Crimean red meat, and boosting the profile of Saudi Arabia to get the Abraham Accords back on track."
All correct, and there's more but this hits all the major piints.
The attempt to create the necessary wedges between the russkis and our only real existential threat to the US, the ChiComs, is what has the dems like LLR-democratical Rich up in arms since the dems have been and are fully in alliance with the ChiComs and the islamic supremacists against the US.
The dem-ChiCom / dem-islamic supremacist alliance explains pretty much every action you've seen the dems take over the last 40 years...with the assistance of far too many compromised/bought off republicans with Mitch McConnell at the head of that crew.
There is no question that Ukrainians were dying in huge numbers in service of the US's geo-strategic interests in the Pacific. I would argue with Phaedrus's language and spin, but not the substance of what he says. China is the reason that Rubio is on board with this. Europe too, BTW, is ruled by gangsters and thugs, who are happy to imprison anybody who points it out on social media.
What's the matter with Putin? He was supposed to be CONQUERING THE WORLD!!!, and yet he hasn't even taken Eastern Ukraine or Kharlov. Of course, it could be part of his incredibly devious plan, so deep and so long range that no mortal - except Putin - can understand it. LOL.
for 1000th time. Who controls the Donbas or even Ukraine is none of our business. Moscow ruled Ukraine for 500 years and no in the USA gave a damn.
Now suddenly who controls the Donbas is a vital USA interest. Give me a break! Trump wants peace. And that is the only USA interest in this slaughter.
In this context, consider that the Doomsday Clock people just moved the setting from 90 seconds to midnight to 89 seconds to midnight.
Trump’s proposal to cut US military spending in half far exceeds the wildest dreams and proposals of the formerly peacenik Chomsky left. The Doomsday Clock has always been a fraud targeting the dopiest American media.
Original Mike said...
“How much, in percentage terms, is the US funding the Ukrainian side of this war?“
35–45%
"War crimes!" got me to thinking. Ever since the use of Allied propaganda about German war crimes in Belgium in 1913 to rally recruiting, the notion that leaders of countries at war could enter into peace talks (even in the face of the pointless slaughter on the Western Front for 4 years) became unthinkable. Diplomacy is mostly incompatible with an idealistic, Good vs. Evil view of war and foreign policy. In the NYTimes article quoted by Althouse, you can already see the case against Trump: he betrayed Ukraine and the cause of "Our Democracy" just by talking to Putin. How dare an elected President presume to undercut the Deep State's strategic plans to bleed the evil Russian war machine and the eternal expansion of NATO?
"35–45%"
Kinda makes it "our" war, doesn't it? Or at least half our war. No wonder Russia wants to talk to us and Trump wants to talk to them.
Is Europe the rest? Does Ukraine contribute?
“Art of the deal” = give everything away before you start negotiating. 🤣
The Saudi’s own a lot of Ukrainian arable land. When someone tells you to fight for your country, always check who owns the assets because that is who you will be fighting for.
RCOCEAN: "Now suddenly who controls the Donbas is a vital USA interest. Give me a break! Trump wants peace. And that is the only USA interest in this slaughter."
As the SecDef in "Independence Day" stated, "that's not entirely accurate".
Ending the conflict in Ukraine is a strategic move that delivers on multiple key strategic objectives that feed several other larger strategic objectives related to desired eventual containment of The Dragon!
The Dragon of course being the ChiComs. Objectives which the dems oppose as a party because the dems are aligned with the ChiComs against the US.
And the dems were so confident of their ability to maintain power in the US that creeps like Swalwell knew he could doink a ChiCom spy and have the FBI cover it up and Diane Feinstein could have a ChiCom spy driver for 20 years and get away with it and ChiCom officials could shower Hunter Biden with cash and jewels and pay off biden's grandkids accounts and they would all just walk away.
"give everything away before you start negotiating"
What was your plan to keep Russia from taking Odessa that didn't put us on the brink of nuclear war? Or are you one of those people who think that it's "cowardly" not to risk nuclear war over borders thousands of miles and oceans away from our own?
"always check who owns the assets because that is who you will be fighting for."
You mean like BlackRock in Ukraine?
https://eraoflight.com/2022/08/12/monsanto-and-blackrock-are-buying-up-ukraine/
“Is Europe the rest? Does Ukraine contribute?”
Yes and yes.
Abacus Boy, LLR-democratical Rich: '“Art of the deal” = give everything away before you start negotiating"
Obambi gave Putin the Crimea.
Obambi gave Putin the Big Green Light to move into Syria as well.
Biden gave Putin Eastern Ukraine.
Putin oligarch pals paid 10's of $Millions into the Clinton slush fund.
Putin's oligarch pals paid millions directly to the biden crime family.
Blackrock and other financial houses paid off the New Soviet Democraticals to secure the rights to "rebuilding" a war-torn Ukraine...a deal worth a $trillion dollars...like a bigger version of James Biden, not a builder, getting lucrarive construction contracts worth $billions for "building" in Iraq.
Of course, the biden admin made sure the "sanctions" against russia were easily, EASILY, circumvented so 3rd party nations could resell russki commodities, into Europe!
Thanks for showing up Richie! I didn't know when you were going to pry yourself away from yahoo comments to rejoin us!
@Kaki sez: "Art of the deal” = give everything away before you start negotiating. 🤣...." But but Kaki - you haven't told us what you would do ! Give us your profound insights, bro ! And: Did the Saudis sit in on the discussions?
https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-money-has-the-us-given-ukraine-since-russias-invasion/
It’s a sellout
tommyesq said...
This is reminiscent of the September 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union to carve up Poland.
Which did result peace on the Eastern Front, until Germany attacked USSR in violation of that pact (and in which, if I understand history correctly, the Ukrainians were somehow involved).
Stalin ordered the Holomodor, which caused millions of Ukrainians to die of starvation. When Hitler invaded, a lot of Ukrainians welcomed the Germans as liberators and some joined to fight against the Soviet Union. It’s hard to blame them.
As others have said, China is the big issue. Russia is secondary, Ukraine and Europe tertiary.
But Russia is third great power, can play the other two off against each other. Ukraine war benefits China by making Russia dependent. Ending Ukraine war benefits US by possibly limiting China influence, allowing full US pivot to East. Not nice for Ukraine, but inevitable.
Thanks, Meade.
"Since February 2022, the United States has allocated $113.4 billion in emergency funding to support Ukraine in wartime."
I had the impression we had provided even more; USAID could fund that out of their pocket change. (I kid, I kid).
It's not a "sellout," it's was a betrayal to lead Ukraine "down the primrose path," as it was framed at the beginning of the conflict over a decade ago when the US overthrew Ukraine's elected government through street mobs paid by USAID and ultranationalist snipers.
The war is over but for the dying. Russia has won. We don't have the weapons to give the Ukrainians, we can't give them Tomahawk cruise missles without risking nuclear war, and we can't beat them on the ground. Ukraine is out of soldiers.
Obama said it back when he was president, "Russia will always have escalation dominance because it is an existential war for them, and Ukraine is not a vital US interest." You can argue that the Russians are just paranoid, but every Russian leader since Gorbachev has said that it would be, including those in the opposition, so your opinion, formed probably by Ukrainian propaganda, doesn't count.
Trump is the man who is not burdened by what has been, who takes the situation as it is, and who recognizes that every soldier who dies in this war, when it is obvious that Ukraine can't win, is dying in vain.
If we don't end it soon, Russia will take Odessa. Russia is approaching Kiev every day. The longer it goes on, the worse it will be for Ukraine.
Losing a war sucks. Ukraine screwed up, they trusted Joe Biden, and his judgements about Russia were wrong. I guess Ukraine can keep fighting until the Russian Army pulls his body out of a bunker, like Hitler did, but it would have been better for Germany if Hitler had surrendered when his military leaders knew that victory was impossible, meaning a year earlier or so, long before the Red Army got to Berlin.
"Stalin ordered the Holomodor"
Do you have a link to the text of that order? Or was that mass starvation caused by collectivization of the farms, which was going on at the time, that and which coincided with a horrific drought. We have plenty of historical records of Stalin's collectivization of agriculture, which led to the starvation of millions of non-Ukrainians too, BTW.
I think this discussion illuminates the effectiveness of Trump’s position. All this stuff needs to be set aside. Men are dying, cities are being destroyed. Let’s make a deal.
I think it was Churchill who said, “Jaw, jaw, jaw is better than war, war, war.”
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