Updates and events in the War in Ukraine 2025

[frank83628]

On 3/20/2025 at 2:52 PM, rabas said:

 

Textbook Russian propaganda—top to bottom deflection from their illegal grab, militarization, and reckless endangerment of Europe’s biggest nuclear plant. Ukraine shelling it? Sure, and they blew up their own dam too, right? Meanwhile, the IAEA’s just thrilled with the chaos.

Just like Russia blew up their own Nordstream pipelines🤔

[kwonitoy]

Same speech writers apparently 

[kwonitoy]

[thaibeachlovers]

22 hours ago, rabas said:

A good reminder to pro Putin laughing all way posters what despot Putin is really about. 

 

He greatly upped his civilian kill while saying he wanted peace. Latest of many examples:

 

Anything new to add, or just recycling the same old propaganda?

 

Meanwhile back in the real world........

[frank83628]

9 hours ago, kwonitoy said:

Same speech writers apparently 

Trump is stating the facts, zelensky was going to the talks in April 22, Boris Johnson flew out and put a stop to it. AUK&US told zelenkey they'd back him and to keep fighting, never expecting Trump to win the election.

You had 3 yrs of MSM lies under Biden, now you're hearing the truth but your brain won't accept it.

[Bkk Brian]

The terrorists in action yesterday attacking civilians with drones

 

Russian forces attacked civilians in Kherson with a drone while they were restoring a building. Another deliberate strike on innocent people just trying to rebuild.

 

[zmisha]

12 hours ago, kwonitoy said:

Same speech writers apparently 

Agree. The same for sure. However, there are two possible options: the speechwriter supports Russia or the speechwriter supports the USA.
All these nice people on Russian TV - they seem to say pro-Russian things. However, they say anything about Trump (mostly good things) 10 times more often than about Putin. As a result, a large number of Russians have an unconscious conviction that their real president is the American president - and they should listen to him and not to Putin.

[Digitalbanana]

[frank83628]

On 3/24/2025 at 9:41 AM, Bkk Brian said:

The terrorists in action yesterday attacking civilians with drones

 

Russian forces attacked civilians in Kherson with a drone while they were restoring a building. Another deliberate strike on innocent people just trying to rebuild.

 

So did someone just happen to be filming that building for no apparent reason and just happened to catch a russian drone strike?

[Bkk Brian]

1 hour ago, frank83628 said:

So did someone just happen to be filming that building for no apparent reason and just happened to catch a russian drone strike?

mmmmm, can't get down to that level of logic to explain, sorry. You need to work that one out yourself. 

[rabas]

NEW: As Ukraine steps up  attacks on Russian military and energy infrastructure, Putin strives for mass civilian casualties. One of several new attacks on civilians and children:

 

[Bkk Brian]

Not new, from last month. February 20 2025  but for those who fail to acknowledge that Russians themselves film their own war crimes. Here they are in their glory doing exactly that.

 

'Film me!’: Russia's executions of Ukrainian POWs point to a policy | FT Film

https://www.ft.com/video/cffdbfff-8bc3-4f9b-824c-b37c848f2cb4

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=619232557560059

[rabas]

On 3/24/2025 at 11:29 AM, Digitalbanana said:

 

Unfair, they gave Jesus 9 months to comeback and a peace deal just 7 days?

 

But the anti Christ wanted Ukraine in 3 days, now well into his 4th year and still "winning" as Russia's economy continues to die. Removing Putin would help everyone including Russians.  

[Mavideol]

the guy with principles and integrity was standing up to the moron without any integrity, respect or principles, that's a point that he couldn't understand

 

Zelensky on Trump-Vance meeting: ‘What I wanted to show were my values’

https://www.yahoo.com/news/zelensky-trump-vance-meeting-wanted-185859232.html

 

[Mavideol]

things are going from bad to worse in Russia's economy, last resort they have to sell state assets, maybe not a lot of countries have money to buy oil & gas

Russian economy meltdown continues as Kremlin forced to sell state assets

 

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/russian-economy-meltdown-continues-as-kremlin-forced-to-sell-state-assets/ar-AA1ByC2p?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=LCTS&cvid=49ac53ee0daa4bd9a909bd3d2bbb5d0a&ei=63

[thaibeachlovers]

On 3/24/2025 at 3:41 PM, Bkk Brian said:

The terrorists in action yesterday attacking civilians with drones

 

Russian forces attacked civilians in Kherson with a drone while they were restoring a building. Another deliberate strike on innocent people just trying to rebuild.

 

I've said it before, but if Ukraine keeps attacking Russia with drones they can expect a reply they don't like.

Zelensky knows that, but keeps attacking Russia ( even when the end is not far off )- what a numptie!

[thaibeachlovers]

11 hours ago, rabas said:

 

Unfair, they gave Jesus 9 months to comeback and a peace deal just 7 days?

 

But the anti Christ wanted Ukraine in 3 days, now well into his 4th year and still "winning" as Russia's economy continues to die. Removing Putin would help everyone including Russians.  

the anti Christ

 

Aw, a cute name for Putin . Never mind that he doesn't fit any of the criteria for being the anti Christ.

Keep 'em coming, we need more cute on here.

[problemfarang]

First beer tonight...

Time to forget the front.. hello bangkok

[Bkk Brian]

5 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

I've said it before, but if Ukraine keeps attacking Russia with drones they can expect a reply they don't like.

Zelensky knows that, but keeps attacking Russia ( even when the end is not far off )- what a numptie!

Lame attempt to justify Russian war crimes against civilians repairing a roof because you warned about retaliation that will not be liked. Great example of how morally corrupt you really are.

[Social Media]

@frank83628 yet another troll post has been removed, yet another of your posts that offers nothing to the topic of discussion other than deflect a credible link. Once more and you will also be removed yet again.

[Hakuna Matata]

Further considerations on the significance of the U.S.-Russia-Ukraine agreement on a maritime cease-fire.

 

The most important prompt for reconsidering the maritime cease-fire agreement lies in the terms set by the Russians for its implementation, namely a long list of the sanctions, financial and otherwise, relating to Russian farming, fishing and fertilizers which the U.S. must lift before the cease-fire comes into effect.

Interestingly, The Financial Times actually took the time to examine the demanded sanctions relief and put out some highly relevant figures showing that the sanctions have not prevented the Russians from finding alternative export routes and other work-arounds to continue their export earnings from food and fertilizer products. Indeed, as they cite, “Russian fertilizer exports hit a record 40mn tons last year and are expected to increase by up to 5 per cent in 2025….” They omit to say that news of the maritime cease-fire instantly caused the prices on global fertilizer markets to fall by 4%. Nor do they tell us who has really suffered from the restrictions imposed on the Russian fertilizer industry:  European and other world farmers and global consumers due to lower crop yields and higher food prices.

Indeed, thanks to work-arounds the Russian remained all this time the world’s biggest grain exporters, but the work-arounds distorted global trade flows and added to prices everywhere.
Nonetheless, true to their disposition to fault the Russians at every turn, for what they do and for what they do not do, the FT concludes that the real purpose of the Russian negotiators was not to free up trade in farm, fish and fertilizer products but to roll back Western sanctions generally, to create ‘holes in the western sanctions regime,’ rather than to boost exports.

I freely admit that they have a point. And yet there is more to the story than they put out. They do not mention the requirement that Russia now be given sanction-free access to acquire agricultural machinery and equipment needed by the fishing and fertilizer industries.

Over the past three years of sanctions, Russian producers of agricultural machinery such as harvesters, tractors and the like have stepped up their product assortment to fill gaps left by the departing U.S. and other Western manufacturers.  Through parallel trading via third countries like Turkey, the Russians have procured spare parts for previously purchased Western equipment.  But this has greatly complicated operations and led to production shortfalls versus what could have been achieved in normal times. Once implemented, the removal of sanctions surely will lead directly to a reentry into the Russian market of John Deere, FMC and other American manufacturers, resulting both in greater U.S. exports to Russia and greater efficiency for the Russian operators in the domain.

Last night’s Vladimir Solovyov show added several further considerations on the subject worth repeating here. One is that the single biggest beneficiary of the removal of sanctions on Russian agricultural exports will be…China.  After all, China alone accounts for half of all Russian export sales of grains. Supplies will henceforth be greater and prices, lower.  The U.S. itself will also benefit, they say, because lower global food prices also mean lower food prices domestically in the USA, which is good for the Trump administration in its fight against inflation.

Panelists on the show called attention to the greater credibility that the USA now has in the Kremlin following the conclusion of the agreement on a maritime cease-fire in its assumed role of honest broker or intermediary. The visuals of the talks in Riyadh suggest that U.S. negotiators were going back and forth between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in the same hotel to help them arrive at a deal.  The reality, say the panelists, is that all negotiations were between the U.S. and Russian teams. They reached agreements and then the U.S. team took their decision to the Ukrainians and imposed it on them, like it or not. This, per the Russians, is the only way that an eventual peace treaty can be achieved.
*****
Now let us look at one aspect of the Trump administration’s foreign policy initiatives that no one is talking about: their impact on U.S. military equipment sales abroad.  The widely held assumption is that this administration like all of its predecessors is beholden to the military industrial complex for delivering votes of the Congressmen it controls on any given piece of legislation.

Yet, the steps to end the war in Ukraine that we see the Trump Team pursuing in such haste, will turn off the spigot of weaponry to Kiev and work against the sales projections of the arms manufacturers.

It is less obvious but more relevant that all of the uncertainty that Team Trump has caused and aggravated in Europe over its reliability as a defense shield works directly against the interests of U.S. arms manufacturers. We see this in the ongoing discussions in Germany about breaking their contract for purchase of the F-35 multipurpose jets. While Europeans are now allocating hundreds of billions of euros for procurement of defense equipment, the emphasis is on placing orders with European defense suppliers, not Americans. The Europeans have belatedly come to see that the U.S. can at any moment withhold its approval for use of its military hardware in any given planned military operation. Or it can cut off supplies of spare parts, thus rendering the expensive acquisitions useless. While the nuclear warheads stored in European bases turn these countries into targets for Russian attack, their use against Russia depends entirely on the mood of Washington at any given moment. These facts were always present, but the possibility of U.S, reneging on its defense obligations never seriously existed before the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House.

[beautifulthailand99]

Russia has ‘seized the upper hand’ in Ukraine war and “is on a path to accrue greater leverage” to force favorable terms, intel community warns. An annual intelligence assessment of global threats also questions both countries’ willingness to reach a quick settlement to the war.-POLITICO

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/25/russia-has-seized-the-upper-hand-in-ukraine-war-intel-community-warns-00247753

 

“Even though Russian President [Vladimir] Putin will be unable to achieve the total victory he envisioned when initiating the large-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia retains momentum as a grinding war of attrition plays to Russia’s military advantages,” the report states. “This grinding war of attrition will lead to a gradual but steady erosion of Kyiv’s position on the battlefield, regardless of any U.S. or allied attempts to impose new and greater costs on Moscow.”

 

https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/2025 Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.pdf

[beautifulthailand99]

According to Trump’s Special Envoy Richard Grenell on the Budapest Memorandum, Ukraine's nuclear weapons were Russia's and were leftovers (from the USSR)

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Grenell

 

 

[beautifulthailand99]

The US Annual Intelligence report mentioned upthread is worth a careful read in the context of the Russia-Ukraine war and highlights in detail why current US interest wish to pivot away from support to Ukraine and end the war so they can concentrate their resources i nother areas they see of higher importance.

 

https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/2025 Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.pdf

 

Russia has shown it can navigate substantial economic challenges resulting from the ongoing drains of the war, Western cost imposition, and high inflation and interest rates, for at least the near term by using financial and import substitution workarounds, maintaining low debt, and continuing investments in the defense-industrial base. Russia’s economy remains the fourth largest in the world (based on GDP at purchasing power parity).

 

Moscow’s rising defense spending and investments in defense-industrial capacity will continue to enable a high level of production of critical capabilities—such as artillery, long-range missiles, one-way attack UAVs, and glide bombs—and ensure Russia retains a firepower advantage over Ukraine.

 

Despite having paid enormous military and economic costs in its war  with Ukraine, Russia has proven adaptable and resilient, in part because of the expanded backing of
China, Iran, and North Korea. President Vladimir Putin appears resolved and prepared to pay a very high price to prevail in what he sees as a defining time in Russia’s strategic competition with the United States, world history, and his personal legacy. Most Russian people continue to passively accept the war, and the emergence of an alternative to Putin probably is less likely now than at any point in his quarter-century rule.

[stevenl]

55 minutes ago, beautifulthailand99 said:

According to Trump’s Special Envoy Richard Grenell on the Budapest Memorandum, Ukraine's nuclear weapons were Russia's and were leftovers (from the USSR)

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Grenell

 

 

 

So who placed the weapons in Ukraine, Russia or the Soviet union?

[beautifulthailand99]

28 minutes ago, stevenl said:

So who placed the weapons in Ukraine, Russia or the Soviet union?

I ran his statement through ChatGPT to fact check his statement this is what it said. Grenell if you follow the Wiki link has an interesting career history to say the least. Besides which let's say for arguments sake that Ukraine had kept nuclear weapons and that hadn't deterred Putin from the invasion - what next use them ? Would the western world stand by if they proposed first use to deter the invasion ? Besides which if both countries have them then you're back to stalemate unless they are seriously rogue and the leader and his cohorts are backed into a corner with no escape and are seriously mad. Which Zelenskiy certainly isn't nothwithstanding the huge costs of maintaining and updating an arsenal you will never use.

 

The statement asserts that the nuclear weapons stationed in Ukraine after the Soviet Union's dissolution were Russian, not Ukrainian, and that Ukraine returned these weapons to Russia. This characterization aligns with historical records.

Following the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, approximately 1,800 nuclear warheads remained on Ukrainian territory. These weapons were part of the Soviet arsenal, and operational control was maintained by Russia. Ukraine lacked the necessary codes and infrastructure to deploy these weapons independently. In 1994, Ukraine agreed to transfer these nuclear warheads to Russia and dismantle related infrastructure in exchange for security assurances from Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom, formalized in the Budapest Memorandum.
 

While the weapons were located within Ukraine's borders, they were inherited from the Soviet Union and were under Russian control. Therefore, the statement accurately reflects the situation: the nuclear weapons were Russian remnants stationed in Ukraine, and Ukraine returned them to Russia.

[beautifulthailand99]

7 hours ago, Hakuna Matata said:

Further considerations on the significance of the U.S.-Russia-Ukraine agreement on a maritime cease-fire.

 

The most important prompt for reconsidering the maritime cease-fire agreement lies in the terms set by the Russians for its implementation, namely a long list of the sanctions, financial and otherwise, relating to Russian farming, fishing and fertilizers which the U.S. must lift before the cease-fire comes into effect.

Interestingly, The Financial Times actually took the time to examine the demanded sanctions relief and put out some highly relevant figures showing that the sanctions have not prevented the Russians from finding alternative export routes and other work-arounds to continue their export earnings from food and fertilizer products. Indeed, as they cite, “Russian fertilizer exports hit a record 40mn tons last year and are expected to increase by up to 5 per cent in 2025….” They omit to say that news of the maritime cease-fire instantly caused the prices on global fertilizer markets to fall by 4%. Nor do they tell us who has really suffered from the restrictions imposed on the Russian fertilizer industry:  European and other world farmers and global consumers due to lower crop yields and higher food prices.

Indeed, thanks to work-arounds the Russian remained all this time the world’s biggest grain exporters, but the work-arounds distorted global trade flows and added to prices everywhere.
Nonetheless, true to their disposition to fault the Russians at every turn, for what they do and for what they do not do, the FT concludes that the real purpose of the Russian negotiators was not to free up trade in farm, fish and fertilizer products but to roll back Western sanctions generally, to create ‘holes in the western sanctions regime,’ rather than to boost exports.

I freely admit that they have a point. And yet there is more to the story than they put out. They do not mention the requirement that Russia now be given sanction-free access to acquire agricultural machinery and equipment needed by the fishing and fertilizer industries.

Over the past three years of sanctions, Russian producers of agricultural machinery such as harvesters, tractors and the like have stepped up their product assortment to fill gaps left by the departing U.S. and other Western manufacturers.  Through parallel trading via third countries like Turkey, the Russians have procured spare parts for previously purchased Western equipment.  But this has greatly complicated operations and led to production shortfalls versus what could have been achieved in normal times. Once implemented, the removal of sanctions surely will lead directly to a reentry into the Russian market of John Deere, FMC and other American manufacturers, resulting both in greater U.S. exports to Russia and greater efficiency for the Russian operators in the domain.

Last night’s Vladimir Solovyov show added several further considerations on the subject worth repeating here. One is that the single biggest beneficiary of the removal of sanctions on Russian agricultural exports will be…China.  After all, China alone accounts for half of all Russian export sales of grains. Supplies will henceforth be greater and prices, lower.  The U.S. itself will also benefit, they say, because lower global food prices also mean lower food prices domestically in the USA, which is good for the Trump administration in its fight against inflation.

Panelists on the show called attention to the greater credibility that the USA now has in the Kremlin following the conclusion of the agreement on a maritime cease-fire in its assumed role of honest broker or intermediary. The visuals of the talks in Riyadh suggest that U.S. negotiators were going back and forth between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in the same hotel to help them arrive at a deal.  The reality, say the panelists, is that all negotiations were between the U.S. and Russian teams. They reached agreements and then the U.S. team took their decision to the Ukrainians and imposed it on them, like it or not. This, per the Russians, is the only way that an eventual peace treaty can be achieved.
*****
Now let us look at one aspect of the Trump administration’s foreign policy initiatives that no one is talking about: their impact on U.S. military equipment sales abroad.  The widely held assumption is that this administration like all of its predecessors is beholden to the military industrial complex for delivering votes of the Congressmen it controls on any given piece of legislation.

Yet, the steps to end the war in Ukraine that we see the Trump Team pursuing in such haste, will turn off the spigot of weaponry to Kiev and work against the sales projections of the arms manufacturers.

It is less obvious but more relevant that all of the uncertainty that Team Trump has caused and aggravated in Europe over its reliability as a defense shield works directly against the interests of U.S. arms manufacturers. We see this in the ongoing discussions in Germany about breaking their contract for purchase of the F-35 multipurpose jets. While Europeans are now allocating hundreds of billions of euros for procurement of defense equipment, the emphasis is on placing orders with European defense suppliers, not Americans. The Europeans have belatedly come to see that the U.S. can at any moment withhold its approval for use of its military hardware in any given planned military operation. Or it can cut off supplies of spare parts, thus rendering the expensive acquisitions useless. While the nuclear warheads stored in European bases turn these countries into targets for Russian attack, their use against Russia depends entirely on the mood of Washington at any given moment. These facts were always present, but the possibility of U.S, reneging on its defense obligations never seriously existed before the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House.

Great post and gave me some fresh insight into the global food supply/price calculus. This article in the Spectator refers to the sanctions win for Russia in the recent talks.  https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/ukraine-is-looking-like-the-loser-in-russia-us-peace-talks/

 

Oleksandra Ustinova, Ukrainian MP and adviser to the Defense Department, said the deal is conveniently timed as global demand for fertilisers surges and Russia is poised to replace Canada as a primary supplier to the US. On top of that, Russia have sold nearly $1 billion (£700 million) worth of Ukrainian grain it stole from occupied regions despite sanctions since 2022. That number will spike if the US reaches an agreement with the G7 and especially the EU where unanimity would be required to lift them.

[stevenl]

34 minutes ago, beautifulthailand99 said:

I ran his statement through ChatGPT to fact check his statement this is what it said. Grenell if you follow the Wiki link has an interesting career history to say the least. Besides which let's say for arguments sake that Ukraine had kept nuclear weapons and that hadn't deterred Putin from the invasion - what next use them ? Would the western world stand by if they proposed first use to deter the invasion ? Besides which if both countries have them then you're back to stalemate unless they are seriously rogue and the leader and his cohorts are backed into a corner with no escape and are seriously mad. Which Zelenskiy certainly isn't nothwithstanding the huge costs of maintaining and updating an arsenal you will never use.

 

The statement asserts that the nuclear weapons stationed in Ukraine after the Soviet Union's dissolution were Russian, not Ukrainian, and that Ukraine returned these weapons to Russia. This characterization aligns with historical records.

Following the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, approximately 1,800 nuclear warheads remained on Ukrainian territory. These weapons were part of the Soviet arsenal, and operational control was maintained by Russia. Ukraine lacked the necessary codes and infrastructure to deploy these weapons independently. In 1994, Ukraine agreed to transfer these nuclear warheads to Russia and dismantle related infrastructure in exchange for security assurances from Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom, formalized in the Budapest Memorandum.
 

While the weapons were located within Ukraine's borders, they were inherited from the Soviet Union and were under Russian control. Therefore, the statement accurately reflects the situation: the nuclear weapons were Russian remnants stationed in Ukraine, and Ukraine returned them to Russia.

It was a simple question, no need for the opinions.

 

So it were SU weapons, making grenell wrong.

[frank83628]

7 hours ago, Hakuna Matata said:

Further considerations on the significance of the U.S.-Russia-Ukraine agreement on a maritime cease-fire.

 

The most important prompt for reconsidering the maritime cease-fire agreement lies in the terms set by the Russians for its implementation, namely a long list of the sanctions, financial and otherwise, relating to Russian farming, fishing and fertilizers which the U.S. must lift before the cease-fire comes into effect.

Interestingly, The Financial Times actually took the time to examine the demanded sanctions relief and put out some highly relevant figures showing that the sanctions have not prevented the Russians from finding alternative export routes and other work-arounds to continue their export earnings from food and fertilizer products. Indeed, as they cite, “Russian fertilizer exports hit a record 40mn tons last year and are expected to increase by up to 5 per cent in 2025….” They omit to say that news of the maritime cease-fire instantly caused the prices on global fertilizer markets to fall by 4%. Nor do they tell us who has really suffered from the restrictions imposed on the Russian fertilizer industry:  European and other world farmers and global consumers due to lower crop yields and higher food prices.

Indeed, thanks to work-arounds the Russian remained all this time the world’s biggest grain exporters, but the work-arounds distorted global trade flows and added to prices everywhere.
Nonetheless, true to their disposition to fault the Russians at every turn, for what they do and for what they do not do, the FT concludes that the real purpose of the Russian negotiators was not to free up trade in farm, fish and fertilizer products but to roll back Western sanctions generally, to create ‘holes in the western sanctions regime,’ rather than to boost exports.

I freely admit that they have a point. And yet there is more to the story than they put out. They do not mention the requirement that Russia now be given sanction-free access to acquire agricultural machinery and equipment needed by the fishing and fertilizer industries.

Over the past three years of sanctions, Russian producers of agricultural machinery such as harvesters, tractors and the like have stepped up their product assortment to fill gaps left by the departing U.S. and other Western manufacturers.  Through parallel trading via third countries like Turkey, the Russians have procured spare parts for previously purchased Western equipment.  But this has greatly complicated operations and led to production shortfalls versus what could have been achieved in normal times. Once implemented, the removal of sanctions surely will lead directly to a reentry into the Russian market of John Deere, FMC and other American manufacturers, resulting both in greater U.S. exports to Russia and greater efficiency for the Russian operators in the domain.

Last night’s Vladimir Solovyov show added several further considerations on the subject worth repeating here. One is that the single biggest beneficiary of the removal of sanctions on Russian agricultural exports will be…China.  After all, China alone accounts for half of all Russian export sales of grains. Supplies will henceforth be greater and prices, lower.  The U.S. itself will also benefit, they say, because lower global food prices also mean lower food prices domestically in the USA, which is good for the Trump administration in its fight against inflation.

Panelists on the show called attention to the greater credibility that the USA now has in the Kremlin following the conclusion of the agreement on a maritime cease-fire in its assumed role of honest broker or intermediary. The visuals of the talks in Riyadh suggest that U.S. negotiators were going back and forth between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in the same hotel to help them arrive at a deal.  The reality, say the panelists, is that all negotiations were between the U.S. and Russian teams. They reached agreements and then the U.S. team took their decision to the Ukrainians and imposed it on them, like it or not. This, per the Russians, is the only way that an eventual peace treaty can be achieved.
*****
Now let us look at one aspect of the Trump administration’s foreign policy initiatives that no one is talking about: their impact on U.S. military equipment sales abroad.  The widely held assumption is that this administration like all of its predecessors is beholden to the military industrial complex for delivering votes of the Congressmen it controls on any given piece of legislation.

Yet, the steps to end the war in Ukraine that we see the Trump Team pursuing in such haste, will turn off the spigot of weaponry to Kiev and work against the sales projections of the arms manufacturers.

It is less obvious but more relevant that all of the uncertainty that Team Trump has caused and aggravated in Europe over its reliability as a defense shield works directly against the interests of U.S. arms manufacturers. We see this in the ongoing discussions in Germany about breaking their contract for purchase of the F-35 multipurpose jets. While Europeans are now allocating hundreds of billions of euros for procurement of defense equipment, the emphasis is on placing orders with European defense suppliers, not Americans. The Europeans have belatedly come to see that the U.S. can at any moment withhold its approval for use of its military hardware in any given planned military operation. Or it can cut off supplies of spare parts, thus rendering the expensive acquisitions useless. While the nuclear warheads stored in European bases turn these countries into targets for Russian attack, their use against Russia depends entirely on the mood of Washington at any given moment. These facts were always present, but the possibility of U.S, reneging on its defense obligations never seriously existed before the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House.

That why posts claiming Russia economy is doomed are laughable for those that follow non MSM news, that's also why 'Ukraine losing' came as such a shock to so many here, they've been lied to for 3yrs straight about the war,  it blew their minds when the bubble burst

[beautifulthailand99]

5 minutes ago, stevenl said:

It was a simple question, no need for the opinions.

 

So it were SU weapons, making grenell wrong.

It's a moot point who owns what when a decades long union/empire falls and the rule of laws governing that union all fall as well. As the Soviet Union ceased to exist they were defacto then Russia's where the c&c centres lay.