This might be a little tougher than Putin thought...
- Thread starter Nole Lou
- Start date
Putin is getting desperate is why.
"Drone attack was reported across Russia on social media. Explosions were heard around the Dyagilevo Airbase, close to Ryazan.Drones and explosions are also reported in Novorossiysk, Taganrog, and Bryansk."
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Trump's plan for Ukraine comes into focus: Territorial concessions but NATO off the table
WASHINGTON, Dec 4 (Reuters) - Advisers to Donald Trump publicly and privately are floating proposals to end the Ukraine war that would cede large parts of the country to Russia for the foreseeable future, according to a Reuters analysis of their statements and interviews with several people close to the U.S. president-elect.
The proposals by three key advisers, including Trump's incoming Russia-Ukraine envoy, retired Army Lieutenant-General Keith Kellogg, share some elements, including taking NATO membership for Ukraine off the table.
Trump's advisers would try forcing Moscow and Kyiv into negotiations with carrots and sticks, including halting military aid to Kyiv unless it agrees to talk but boosting assistance if Russian President Vladimir Putin refuses.
Trump repeatedly pledged during his election campaign to end the nearly three-year-old conflict within 24 hours of his Jan. 20 inauguration, if not before then, but has yet to say how.
Analysts and former national security officials voice grave doubts Trump can fulfill such a pledge because of the conflict's complexity.
Taken together, however, his advisers' statements suggest the potential contours of a Trump peace plan.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, facing manpower shortages and growing territorial losses, has indicated that he may be open to negotiations.
While still intent on NATO membership, he said this week that Ukraine must find diplomatic solutions to regaining some of its occupied territories.
But Trump may find Putin unwilling to engage, analysts and former U.S. officials said, as he has the Ukrainians on the back foot and may have more to gain by pursuing further land grabs.
"Putin is in no hurry," said Eugene Rumer, a former top U.S. intelligence analyst on Russia now with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think tank.
The Russian leader, he said, shows no readiness to drop his conditions for a truce and talks, including Ukraine abandoning its NATO quest and surrendering the four provinces Putin claims as part of Russia but does not fully control, a demand rejected by Kyiv.
MORE THAN ONE PLAN
As of last week, Trump had yet to convene a central working group to flesh out a peace plan, according to four advisers who requested anonymity to describe private deliberations. Rather, several advisers have pitched ideas among themselves in public forums and - in some cases - to Trump, they said.Ultimately, a peace agreement will likely depend on direct personal engagement between Trump, Putin and Zelenskiy, the advisers said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it was “not possible to comment on individual statements without having an idea of the plan as a whole.”
Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt noted that Trump has said he "will do what is necessary to restore peace and rebuild American strength and deterrence on the world stage."
A Trump representative did not immediately respond to a follow-up question about whether the president-elect still plans to resolve the conflict within a day of taking office.
The Ukrainian government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
One former Trump national security official involved in the transition said there are three main proposals: the outline by Kellogg, one from Vice President-elect JD Vance and another advanced by Richard Grenell, Trump's former acting intelligence chief.
Kellogg's plan, co-authored with former National Security Council official Fred Fleitz and presented to Trump earlier this year, calls for freezing the current battle lines.
Kellogg and Fleitz did not respond to requests for comment. Their plan was first reported by Reuters.
Trump would supply more U.S. weapons to Kyiv only if it agreed to peace talks. At the same time, he would warn Moscow that he would increase U.S. aid to Ukraine if Russia rejected negotiations. NATO membership for Ukraine would be put on hold.
Ukraine also would be offered U.S. security guarantees, which could include boosting weapons supplies after an accord is struck, according to that proposal.
In a June interview with Times Radio, a British digital station, Sebastian Gorka, one of Trump's incoming deputy national security advisers, said Trump had told him he would force Putin into talks by threatening unprecedented weapons shipments to Ukraine if Putin refused.
Gorka, reached by phone, called Reuters "fake news garbage" and declined to elaborate.
Vance, who as a U.S. senator has opposed aid to Ukraine, floated a separate idea in September.
He told U.S. podcaster Shawn Ryan that a deal likely would include a demilitarized zone at the existing front lines that would be "heavily fortified" to prevent further Russian incursions. His proposal would deny NATO membership to Kyiv.
Representatives for Vance did not make him available for comment, and he has yet to offer additional details.
Grenell, Trump's former ambassador to Germany, advocated the creation of "autonomous zones" in eastern Ukraine during a Bloomberg roundtable in July but did not elaborate. He also suggested NATO membership for Ukraine was not in America's interest.
Grenell, who did not respond to a request for comment, has yet to secure a position in the new administration, although he still has Trump's ear on European issues, a senior Trump foreign policy adviser told Reuters.
That person said Grenell was one of the few people at a September meeting in New York between Trump and Zelenskiy.
PUSHBACK LIKELY
Elements of the proposals would likely face pushback from Zelenskiy, who has made a NATO invitation part of his own “Victory Plan,” and from European allies and some U.S. lawmakers, say analysts and former national security officials.Last week, Ukraine's foreign minister sent a letter to his NATO counterparts urging them to issue a membership invitation at a foreign ministers' meeting on Tuesday.
Some European allies have expressed a willingness to ramp up aid to Ukraine and U.S. President Joe Biden is continuing to send weapons. That could cost Trump some leverage to push Kyiv to the table.
The Kellogg plan, which hinges on increasing aid for Ukraine if Putin does not come to the table, could face blowback in Congress, where some of Trump's closest allies oppose additional military aid for the Eastern European nation.
"I don’t think anybody has any realistic plan for ending this," said Rumer, the former U.S. intelligence officer.
Peace for our time.
"A drone belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine attacked the center of Grozny today, crashing into the roof of the building of the Akhmat Kadyrov special police regiment named after him."
"68th Separate Hunting Brigade.The night is our space. You lose control and we speed up and see more"
(The hypersonic missile they tested against Ukraine recently.)
"The pathetic campaign to update "Oreshnik" continues. This time Gerasimov contacted the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff #США General Brown. According to the NY Times, during the conversation Gerasimov convinced Brown that " #Орешник " was a terrible thing. And Brown didn't care."
"The pathetic campaign to update "Oreshnik" continues. This time Gerasimov contacted the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff #США General Brown. According to the NY Times, during the conversation Gerasimov convinced Brown that " #Орешник " was a terrible thing. And Brown didn't care."
SIAP...pretty sobering.
The tone is dark, even angry.
“The situation is getting worse every day.”
“We don’t see the goal. Our land is not here.”
Almost four months after Ukrainian troops launched a lightning offensive into the Russian region of Kursk, text messages from soldiers fighting there paint a dismal picture of a battle they don’t properly understand and fear they might be losing.
We’ve been in contact, via Telegram, with several soldiers serving in Kursk, one of whom has recently left. We’ve agreed not to identify any of them.
None of the names in this article are real.
They speak of dire weather conditions and a chronic lack of sleep caused by Russia’s constant bombardment, which includes the use of terrifying, 3,000kg glide bombs.
They’re also in retreat, with Russian forces gradually retaking territory.
“This trend will continue,” Pavlo wrote on 26 November. “It’s only a matter of time.”
Pavlo spoke of immense fatigue, the lack of rotation and the arrival of units, made up largely of middle-aged men, brought directly from other fronts with little or no time to rest in between.
To hear soldiers complain - about their commanding officers, orders and lack of equipment - is hardly unusual. It’s what soldiers often do in difficult circumstances.
Under immense pressure from the enemy and with winter setting in, it would be surprising to hear much optimism.
But the messages we’ve received are almost uniformly bleak, suggesting that motivation is a problem.
Some questioned whether one of the operation’s initial goals - to divert Russian soldiers from Ukraine’s eastern front - had worked.
The orders now, they said, were to hang onto this small sliver of Russian territory until a new US president, with new policies, arrives in the White House at the end of January.
“The main task facing us is to hold the maximum territory until Trump’s inauguration and the start of negotiations,” Pavlo said. “In order to exchange it for something later. No-one knows what.”
Towards the end of November, President Zelensky indicated that both sides had the change of US administration in mind.
“I am sure that he [Putin] wants to push us out by 20 January,” he said.
“It is very important for him to demonstrate that he controls the situation. But he does not control the situation.”
In an effort to help Ukraine thwart Russian counterattacks in Kursk, the US, UK and France have all permitted Kyiv to use long-range weapons on targets inside Russia.
It doesn’t seem to have done much to lift spirits.
“No-one sits in a cold trench and prays for missiles,” Pavlo said.
“We live and fight here and now. And missiles fly somewhere else.”
Atacms and Storm Shadow missiles may have been used to powerful, even devastating, effect on distant command posts and ammunition dumps, but such successes seem remote to soldiers on the front lines.
“We don’t talk about missiles,” Myroslav said. “In the bunkers we talk about family and rotation. About simple things.”
For Ukraine, Russia’s slow, grinding advance in eastern Ukraine underlines the necessity of clinging on in Kursk.
In October alone, Russia was able to occupy an estimated 500 sq km of Ukrainian territory, the most it’s taken since the early days of the full-scale invasion in 2022.
By contrast, Ukraine has already lost around 40% of the territory it seized in Kursk in August.
“The key is not to capture but to hold,” Vadym said, “and we’re struggling a bit with that.”
Despite the losses, Vadym thinks the Kursk campaign is still vital.
“It did manage to divert some [Russian] forces from the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv regions,” he said.
But some of the soldiers we spoke to said they felt they were in the wrong place, that it was more important to be on Ukraine’s eastern front, rather than occupying part of Russia.
“Our place should have been there [in eastern Ukraine], not here in someone else’s land,” Pavlo said. “We don’t need these Kursk forests, in which we left so many comrades.”
And despite weeks of reports suggesting that as many as 10,000 North Korean troops have been sent to Kursk to join the Russian counter-offensive, the soldiers we’ve been in contact have yet to encounter them.
“I haven’t seen or heard anything about Koreans, alive or dead,” Vadym responded when we asked about the reports.
The Ukrainian military has released recordings which it says are intercepts of North Korean radio communications.
Soldiers said they had been told to capture at least one North Korean prisoner, preferably with documents.
They spoke of rewards - drones or extra leave - being offered to anyone who successfully captures a North Korean soldier.
“It’s very difficult to find a Korean in the dark Kursk forest,” Pavlo noted sarcastically. “Especially if he’s not here.”
Veterans of previous doomed operations see parallels in what’s happening in Kursk.
From October 2023 until July this year, Ukrainian forces attempted to hold onto a tiny bridgehead at Krynky, on the left bank of the Dnipro River, some 25 miles (40km) upstream from the liberated city of Kherson.
The bridgehead, initially intended as a possible springboard for advances further into Russian-held territory in southern Ukraine, was eventually lost.
The operation was hugely costly. As many as 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers are thought to have been killed or gone missing.
Some came to see it as a stunt, designed to distract attention from the lack of progress elsewhere.
They fear something similar might be happening in Kursk.
“Good idea but bad implementation,” says Myroslav, a marine officer who served in Krynky and is now in Kursk.
“Media effect, but no military result.”
Military analysts insist that for all the hardship, the Kursk campaign continues to play an important role.
“It’s the only area where we maintain the initiative,” Serhiy Kuzan, of the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Centre, told me.
He acknowledged that Ukrainian forces were experiencing “incredibly difficult conditions” in Kursk, but said Russia was devoting vast resources to ejecting them - resources which it would prefer to be using elsewhere.
“The longer we can hold this Kursk front - with adequate equipment, artillery, Himars and of course long-range weapons to strike their rear - the better,” he said.
In Kyiv, the senior commanders stand by the Kursk operation, arguing that it’s still reaping military and political rewards.
"This situation annoys Putin,” one said recently, on condition of anonymity. “He is suffering heavy losses there."
As for how long Ukrainian troops would be able to hold out in Kursk, the answer was straightforward.
"As long as it is feasible from the military point of view."
www.bbc.com
Ukraine’s exhausted troops in Russia told to cling on and wait for Trump
The tone is dark, even angry.
“The situation is getting worse every day.”
“We don’t see the goal. Our land is not here.”
Almost four months after Ukrainian troops launched a lightning offensive into the Russian region of Kursk, text messages from soldiers fighting there paint a dismal picture of a battle they don’t properly understand and fear they might be losing.
We’ve been in contact, via Telegram, with several soldiers serving in Kursk, one of whom has recently left. We’ve agreed not to identify any of them.
None of the names in this article are real.
They speak of dire weather conditions and a chronic lack of sleep caused by Russia’s constant bombardment, which includes the use of terrifying, 3,000kg glide bombs.
They’re also in retreat, with Russian forces gradually retaking territory.
“This trend will continue,” Pavlo wrote on 26 November. “It’s only a matter of time.”
Pavlo spoke of immense fatigue, the lack of rotation and the arrival of units, made up largely of middle-aged men, brought directly from other fronts with little or no time to rest in between.
To hear soldiers complain - about their commanding officers, orders and lack of equipment - is hardly unusual. It’s what soldiers often do in difficult circumstances.
Under immense pressure from the enemy and with winter setting in, it would be surprising to hear much optimism.
But the messages we’ve received are almost uniformly bleak, suggesting that motivation is a problem.
Some questioned whether one of the operation’s initial goals - to divert Russian soldiers from Ukraine’s eastern front - had worked.
The orders now, they said, were to hang onto this small sliver of Russian territory until a new US president, with new policies, arrives in the White House at the end of January.
“The main task facing us is to hold the maximum territory until Trump’s inauguration and the start of negotiations,” Pavlo said. “In order to exchange it for something later. No-one knows what.”
Towards the end of November, President Zelensky indicated that both sides had the change of US administration in mind.
“I am sure that he [Putin] wants to push us out by 20 January,” he said.
“It is very important for him to demonstrate that he controls the situation. But he does not control the situation.”
In an effort to help Ukraine thwart Russian counterattacks in Kursk, the US, UK and France have all permitted Kyiv to use long-range weapons on targets inside Russia.
It doesn’t seem to have done much to lift spirits.
“No-one sits in a cold trench and prays for missiles,” Pavlo said.
“We live and fight here and now. And missiles fly somewhere else.”
Atacms and Storm Shadow missiles may have been used to powerful, even devastating, effect on distant command posts and ammunition dumps, but such successes seem remote to soldiers on the front lines.
“We don’t talk about missiles,” Myroslav said. “In the bunkers we talk about family and rotation. About simple things.”
For Ukraine, Russia’s slow, grinding advance in eastern Ukraine underlines the necessity of clinging on in Kursk.
In October alone, Russia was able to occupy an estimated 500 sq km of Ukrainian territory, the most it’s taken since the early days of the full-scale invasion in 2022.
By contrast, Ukraine has already lost around 40% of the territory it seized in Kursk in August.
“The key is not to capture but to hold,” Vadym said, “and we’re struggling a bit with that.”
Despite the losses, Vadym thinks the Kursk campaign is still vital.
“It did manage to divert some [Russian] forces from the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv regions,” he said.
But some of the soldiers we spoke to said they felt they were in the wrong place, that it was more important to be on Ukraine’s eastern front, rather than occupying part of Russia.
“Our place should have been there [in eastern Ukraine], not here in someone else’s land,” Pavlo said. “We don’t need these Kursk forests, in which we left so many comrades.”
And despite weeks of reports suggesting that as many as 10,000 North Korean troops have been sent to Kursk to join the Russian counter-offensive, the soldiers we’ve been in contact have yet to encounter them.
“I haven’t seen or heard anything about Koreans, alive or dead,” Vadym responded when we asked about the reports.
The Ukrainian military has released recordings which it says are intercepts of North Korean radio communications.
Soldiers said they had been told to capture at least one North Korean prisoner, preferably with documents.
They spoke of rewards - drones or extra leave - being offered to anyone who successfully captures a North Korean soldier.
“It’s very difficult to find a Korean in the dark Kursk forest,” Pavlo noted sarcastically. “Especially if he’s not here.”
Veterans of previous doomed operations see parallels in what’s happening in Kursk.
From October 2023 until July this year, Ukrainian forces attempted to hold onto a tiny bridgehead at Krynky, on the left bank of the Dnipro River, some 25 miles (40km) upstream from the liberated city of Kherson.
The bridgehead, initially intended as a possible springboard for advances further into Russian-held territory in southern Ukraine, was eventually lost.
The operation was hugely costly. As many as 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers are thought to have been killed or gone missing.
Some came to see it as a stunt, designed to distract attention from the lack of progress elsewhere.
They fear something similar might be happening in Kursk.
“Good idea but bad implementation,” says Myroslav, a marine officer who served in Krynky and is now in Kursk.
“Media effect, but no military result.”
Military analysts insist that for all the hardship, the Kursk campaign continues to play an important role.
“It’s the only area where we maintain the initiative,” Serhiy Kuzan, of the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Centre, told me.
He acknowledged that Ukrainian forces were experiencing “incredibly difficult conditions” in Kursk, but said Russia was devoting vast resources to ejecting them - resources which it would prefer to be using elsewhere.
“The longer we can hold this Kursk front - with adequate equipment, artillery, Himars and of course long-range weapons to strike their rear - the better,” he said.
In Kyiv, the senior commanders stand by the Kursk operation, arguing that it’s still reaping military and political rewards.
"This situation annoys Putin,” one said recently, on condition of anonymity. “He is suffering heavy losses there."
As for how long Ukrainian troops would be able to hold out in Kursk, the answer was straightforward.
"As long as it is feasible from the military point of view."
Ukraine’s exhausted troops in Russia told to cling on and wait for Trump
Ukrainian soldiers paint a bleak picture of a battle they don't understand, and fear they will lose.
www.bbc.com
Could have saved a lot of words to just write "give Russia everything it wants."
Damn. Three quarters of a million by tomorrow. Sounds like a lot for a three day operation.
The NATO thing doesn’t bother me so much. But what safety guarantees does Russia offer. A DMZ doesn’t seem nearly enough. Plus reparations.
"5th Separate Kiev Assault Brigade.We burn the enemy in the holes and huts. Pokrovsky direction. Destruction of enemy infantry in cover "
"Bulgaria is providing Ukraine with its seventh military aid package this year. The list of donated equipment is secret, but it is stated that the weapons and ammunition being sent now will not affect the capabilities of the Bulgarian armed forces. This probably means that old, no longer-used equipment is being transferred to Ukraine.
Bulgaria was not a member of the Soviet Union, but while in the Eastern Bloc, it was dependent on the Soviets. This also meant that Bulgaria was obliged to buy Soviet military equipment. Over the decades, that equipment became obsolete. In addition, Bulgaria joined NATO in 2004 and must update the standards of its military equipment. Many old armored vehicles were put up for storage and are now being handed over to Ukraine. Many of these vehicles are not in good condition, but Ukraine can use them as spare parts if refurbishing them is not an option.
It is worth noting that in 2022, Bulgaria covered 1/3 of Ukraine’s ammunition needs and did so quietly. Later, Bulgaria donated old but still useful BTR-60 armored personnel carriers and missiles for the S-300 anti-aircraft system. Those might have been used as parts donors, but that is still a valuable contribution.
Bulgaria transferred to Ukraine a large number of 82 and 120 mm mortar shells, 122 and 152 mm artillery shells, and 122 mm rockets for salvo systems. Some of this ammunition comes from Bulgarian factories and not old warehouses. Bulgaria has a productive defense industry and the ammunition it produces is often intended for Soviet-standard systems, which still suits Ukraine at this time.
Bulgaria is a country of about 6.5 million people. It is far from the richest member of the European Union. However, Bulgaria is sending its limited resources to war, because otherwise they would rust pointlessly and Ukraine simply needs more weapons to defend itself."
"Bulgaria is providing Ukraine with its seventh military aid package this year. The list of donated equipment is secret, but it is stated that the weapons and ammunition being sent now will not affect the capabilities of the Bulgarian armed forces. This probably means that old, no longer-used equipment is being transferred to Ukraine.
Bulgaria was not a member of the Soviet Union, but while in the Eastern Bloc, it was dependent on the Soviets. This also meant that Bulgaria was obliged to buy Soviet military equipment. Over the decades, that equipment became obsolete. In addition, Bulgaria joined NATO in 2004 and must update the standards of its military equipment. Many old armored vehicles were put up for storage and are now being handed over to Ukraine. Many of these vehicles are not in good condition, but Ukraine can use them as spare parts if refurbishing them is not an option.
It is worth noting that in 2022, Bulgaria covered 1/3 of Ukraine’s ammunition needs and did so quietly. Later, Bulgaria donated old but still useful BTR-60 armored personnel carriers and missiles for the S-300 anti-aircraft system. Those might have been used as parts donors, but that is still a valuable contribution.
Bulgaria transferred to Ukraine a large number of 82 and 120 mm mortar shells, 122 and 152 mm artillery shells, and 122 mm rockets for salvo systems. Some of this ammunition comes from Bulgarian factories and not old warehouses. Bulgaria has a productive defense industry and the ammunition it produces is often intended for Soviet-standard systems, which still suits Ukraine at this time.
Bulgaria is a country of about 6.5 million people. It is far from the richest member of the European Union. However, Bulgaria is sending its limited resources to war, because otherwise they would rust pointlessly and Ukraine simply needs more weapons to defend itself."
If NATO is off the table...
The only way to prevent another invasion down the road is to keep arming Ukraine. Upgrade their Air Force significantly and keep the weapons and training pipeline open.
Putin moved because he thought Ukraine was going to be a cake walk. He knows different now but ensuring Ukraine is an even tougher nut to crack will be critical.
Russia will be looking to rearm and implement lessons learned from the war.
This is funny if you know about Russia's absolute failure in building aircraft carriers. Right now they have only one carrier and it doesn't work
"As of November 2024 the non-operational Admiral Kuznetsov is the Russian Navy's only carrier, leaving the Russian Navy without an operational aircraft carrier."-Wiki
"As of November 2024 the non-operational Admiral Kuznetsov is the Russian Navy's only carrier, leaving the Russian Navy without an operational aircraft carrier."-Wiki
Bulgaria gets it. What tweets await Bulgaria if they aren't on board with Ukraine surrendering their territory to Russia? What if Romania and Poland aren't on board with a peace for our times?
Ukrainians were finding them on the battlefield back in March.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2024/03/08/russian-fiber-optic-drone-can-beat-any-jammer/
