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re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Posted on 4/23/25 at 5:00 pm to cypher
Posted on 4/23/25 at 5:00 pm to cypher
Christopher Miller
@christopherjm.ft.com
Chief Ukraine correspondent for the Financial Times. 15 years in Ukraine.
Trump asked today, why didn’t Ukraine fight back in Crimea in 2014? As I wrote in my book, The War Came To Us, Ukraine’s decision to not fight against Russia’s invasion was largely influenced by behind-the-scenes pressure from the US. Here’s what then-interim President Oleksandr Turchynov told me:
@christopherjm.ft.com
Chief Ukraine correspondent for the Financial Times. 15 years in Ukraine.
Trump asked today, why didn’t Ukraine fight back in Crimea in 2014? As I wrote in my book, The War Came To Us, Ukraine’s decision to not fight against Russia’s invasion was largely influenced by behind-the-scenes pressure from the US. Here’s what then-interim President Oleksandr Turchynov told me:
3
Posted on 4/23/25 at 5:28 pm to VolSquatch
Russia has a LOT of low IQ vodka infused willing to be meat wave in attrition warfare but not like it did in past wars. Men didn't live that long in WWI and WWII. The population is much older on average today as it is in demographic collapse mode
Posted on 4/23/25 at 7:25 pm to CitizenK
Posted on 4/23/25 at 7:26 pm to John Barron
Posted on 4/23/25 at 8:11 pm to cypher
Posted on 4/23/25 at 8:47 pm to cypher
Volodymyr Zelenskyy /
@ZelenskyyUa
·
Emotions have run high today. But it is good that 5 countries met to bring peace closer. Ukraine, the USA, the UK, France and Germany. The sides expressed their views and respectfully received each other’s positions. It’s important that each side was not just a participant but contributed meaningfully. The American side shared its vision. Ukraine and other Europeans presented their inputs. And we hope that it is exactly such joint work that will lead to lasting peace. We are grateful to partners. Ukraine will always act in accordance with its Constitution and we are absolutely sure that our partners in particular the USA will act in line with its strong decisions.
@ZelenskyyUa
·
Emotions have run high today. But it is good that 5 countries met to bring peace closer. Ukraine, the USA, the UK, France and Germany. The sides expressed their views and respectfully received each other’s positions. It’s important that each side was not just a participant but contributed meaningfully. The American side shared its vision. Ukraine and other Europeans presented their inputs. And we hope that it is exactly such joint work that will lead to lasting peace. We are grateful to partners. Ukraine will always act in accordance with its Constitution and we are absolutely sure that our partners in particular the USA will act in line with its strong decisions.
Posted on 4/23/25 at 9:04 pm to cypher
Anything Zelensky says will be taken with a grain of salt
Posted on 4/23/25 at 9:05 pm to John Barron
quote:
One of the ballistic missile hits in Kiev.
I was going to say I hope it didn’t hit dear leader. But he’s never in Ukraine anyways
Posted on 4/23/25 at 9:08 pm to Auburn1968
David Sacks makes great points about Zelensky
Crimea should be the easiest concession for Zelensky to make because:
1) it’s been part of Russia for the last decade.
2) the vast majority of its population are ethnic Russians who (as western polling shows) want to be part of Russia.
3) Ukraine has no military way to retake it. The disastrous Summer Counteroffensive of 2023 made that abundantly clear.
If Zelensky won’t concede this, he won’t concede anything, so a deal with him is impossible. The Secretary of State is right to walk away."
Crimea should be the easiest concession for Zelensky to make because:
1) it’s been part of Russia for the last decade.
2) the vast majority of its population are ethnic Russians who (as western polling shows) want to be part of Russia.
3) Ukraine has no military way to retake it. The disastrous Summer Counteroffensive of 2023 made that abundantly clear.
If Zelensky won’t concede this, he won’t concede anything, so a deal with him is impossible. The Secretary of State is right to walk away."
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If tweet fails to load, click here. 
Posted on 4/23/25 at 10:03 pm to John Barron
quote:
3) Ukraine has no military way to retake it. The disastrous Summer Counteroffensive of 2023 made that abundantly clear.
And they’re rapidly approaching the point where they won’t be able to even hold the land they control now. Either Ukraine accepts the best deal they can get now, or they keep fighting and end up losing everything.
Posted on 4/24/25 at 12:20 am to Darth_Vader
This doesn't count the non-descript green men that Putin sent to help his brothers.
Posted on 4/24/25 at 12:25 am to John Barron
This might be the most accurate meme I have seen in a long time 
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If tweet fails to load, click here.Posted on 4/24/25 at 12:49 am to John Barron
Does everyone Remember Ukraine’s 2023 Counteroffensive? 
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If tweet fails to load, click here. Posted on 4/24/25 at 1:17 am to texag7
quote:
Anything Zelensky says will be taken with a grain of salt
Even the bots know you're a fricking clown...
Posted on 4/24/25 at 1:46 am to cypher
Zelensky Visits South Africa Today.
This is not good news for Russia. South Africa is a founding member of BRICS and has supported Russia (and Iran) consistantly in this conflict. However Ramaphosa has a long history of negotiation, starting with miner's unions and moving on to the peaceful transfer of government from the Apartheid regime in the early 1990's - quite notable for its avoidance of civil war in the country.
Pretoria is listening. The constant Russian terrorist attacks and colonial nature of the Putin regime are slowly giving the South Africans second thoughts. Also not to be underestimated is the mutual problems both countries have with Trump. Personally visiting and showing respect to South Africa during the war at home is an initial but very significant step by Zelensky and will be remembered.
quote:
this was a long-awaited visit. It was Zelensky’s first, to both South Africa and Africa. He said the visit was not “ off the cuff” – it was the culmination of systematic work by Ukraine with Africa, and South Africa in particular, which initiated the visit that was agreed to last September. “It’s also a response to the visit of President Ramaphosa to Ukraine with the African peace mission in 2023,” he told Daily Maverick, referring to Ramaphosa’s visits to both Kyiv and St Petersburg at that time.
quote:LINK
Kyiv appears to have different ambitions for the meeting between Zelensky and Ramaphosa, with a narrower focus on the role South Africa could play in negotiations – by helping to secure the release of the [20,000] Ukrainian children who Russia abducted from occupied Ukrainian territories and deported to Russia.
Kyiv also seems to have a more general interest in improving relations with South Africa – and with Africa – an important Ukrainian objective since the war started.
This is not good news for Russia. South Africa is a founding member of BRICS and has supported Russia (and Iran) consistantly in this conflict. However Ramaphosa has a long history of negotiation, starting with miner's unions and moving on to the peaceful transfer of government from the Apartheid regime in the early 1990's - quite notable for its avoidance of civil war in the country.
Pretoria is listening. The constant Russian terrorist attacks and colonial nature of the Putin regime are slowly giving the South Africans second thoughts. Also not to be underestimated is the mutual problems both countries have with Trump. Personally visiting and showing respect to South Africa during the war at home is an initial but very significant step by Zelensky and will be remembered.
Posted on 4/24/25 at 1:59 am to Coeur du Tigre
Good article on the education and subsequent behavior of Russian diplomats. The university for training diplomats is the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO University).
quote:
Last week, while Russian missiles rained down on Ukrainian cities, the Kremlin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev landed in Washington with an offer of economic cooperation. To many, this seemed like cognitive dissonance. To me, it felt eerily familiar. Charm the West with trade. Threaten neighbors in the background. Speak diplomacy, practice coercion. That isn’t just hypocrisy, it’s a strategy. It’s the realpolitik we were trained to believe in and to carry out.
quote:
Unlike the West, where diplomats are usually brought up on liberal institutionalism — the idea that diplomacy is about cooperation — MGIMO teaches the opposite: offensive realism. Not the nuanced academic kind, but its hardened, ossified version where power is truth, might makes right and "spheres of influence" are gospel. From day one, we were taught that Russia is and must remain a derzhava — a “great power.” Not just one country among many, but a pole in a multipolar world. A country destined to challenge the West. That belief — fused with resentment, imperial nostalgia and a constant sense of grievance — forms the backbone of Russian diplomacy.
quote:LINK
There was almost no space for alternative ways of thinking at MGIMO. Liberalism? Mocked. Constructivism? Ignored. Postcolonialism or feminism? Unthinkable. MGIMO’s curriculum was Cold War nostalgia meets KGB street smarts meets legal gymnastics. All this is tailor-made for President Vladimir Putin’s worldview. Everything revolved around ponyatiya (understood codes), honor, betrayal and (dis)trust. At MGIMO, we were taught to cite international law while violating its spirit, to defend norms while dismantling them and to speak of peace while justifying and waging wars. Georgia. Syria. Ukraine. These weren’t deviations. We deployed whichever claim of “Territorial integrity” or “self-determination” suited the day’s talking point. This is Russian anti-normism in action.
This post was edited on 4/24/25 at 2:01 am
Posted on 4/24/25 at 5:53 am to cypher
Posted on 4/24/25 at 6:37 am to Coeur du Tigre
quote:
Zelensky Visits South Africa Today.
The entire nation is a shitshow and has been for a few decades. Boer farmers have been leaving for decades for other nations in Africa. In fact, in the 2000's a now deceased friend had negotiated between Qaddafi and a group of farmers to be given thousands of hectares of olive orchards to bring the orchards back to productivity, included were funds to build an olive processing plant, and guarantee them religious freedom. Boers are devout Calvinists.
Despite its abundance of natural resources, the vast majority live in poverty. One of its major companies, Sasol, has become a shitshow itself with DEI in its engineering and executive ranks and why it went WAY TF over budget by a reported $10 billion in its Lake Charles expansion. The constant field revisions to the fabricated process modules were that costly. Then it had to sell part of the $20 billion expansion to Lyondell to remain solvent. The downstream units now have to buy ethylene from its new world class ethane to ethylene and propylene cracker.
Back in the 1980's the South African Consul in Houston was a neighbor with his family. Super nice guy, Boer of course. His eldest son was a good friend of my son in elementary school. The consul was a great guy, but you could tell that he was on the constant alert always in tune to ALL of his surroundings and movements without being obvious.
While I (as well as that consul) did not approve of apartheid, SA has gone downhill economically since it ended.
This post was edited on 4/24/25 at 6:42 am
Posted on 4/24/25 at 7:12 am to John Barron
Fact, Russia is trying to talk their way to victory. To date their military has completely failed.
Posted on 4/24/25 at 7:27 am to cypher
Who was president in 2018 when that declaration was made?
Wasn't it that guy who the leftist Ukraine-maxers call a Russian puppet?
Wasn't it that guy who the leftist Ukraine-maxers call a Russian puppet?
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