Putin has said he wants Ukraine to drop its ambitions to join NATO, Russia to control the entirety of four Ukrainian regions it has claimed as its own, and the size of the Ukrainian army to be limited. Kyiv says those demands are tantamount to demanding its capitulation.

Well, if I recall correctly, the original terms at the beginning of the war were significantly more favourable: Ukraine could pursue EU membership with no pushback, No NATO, and I don’t even think Russia was going to absorb the eastern territories back then, just that they either had autonomy or whatever they wanted (maybe there were calls for more negotiations on that front but I cannot remember).

But this is what happens when you continue the war and even threaten to “make Russia small again” (Zelenskyy wore a shirt with that statement), the terms have changed after all this time, too much goodwill has been squandered. No way was Russia just going to take it on the chin and roll over. It makes me incredibly sad but what did anyone expect?

Edit: also, don’t those territories want to join Russia now? I believe initially they were only looking for autonomy, but after years of bombings and protection from Russia they’d rather be absorbed now. I could be entirely wrong of course.

Yeah I just saw a video that broke down the math and it’s incredibly weird. Anyway tariffs will definitely save the US!

This makes me think he just hit the tariff button and called it a day

Hopefully they make some great gains by 2030!

The way I would’ve kept my mouth shut and just took so many screenshots and recordings. But he’s not me.

Didn’t he also voluntarily leave said chat as well?

Dutch had just returned from the front lines when we met at the base of his new unit, Ukraine’s lethally effective Third Assault Brigade.

So Azov?

defend American values on Ukrainian soil.

So there’s your problem.

This is what happens when you place incredibly high tariffs on Chinese EVs because the US asked. What did they expect, exactly? Now they wanna cry to the WTO because China is retaliating? Be so for real. This country is so fucking stupid.

But Huawei Mate XT 😔

I’ve never had this kind of phone nor do I know anyone who does, so I can’t give a definitive answer except that the Huawei Mate XT looks so cool.

I’m glad they just outright stated it, of course I am not wholeheartedly believing them but the sentiment is nice.

Edit: the comments on the article are super fucking weird, some are downright offensive.

Typical woke war criminal Putin 🙄

Squeals with orgasmic glee!

Is a weird way of putting it…

This was literally me as I was watching. I couldn’t help but keep cringing, sometimes I had to physically look away.

In all seriousness, I finally watched the exchange and WOW the secondhand embarrassment I felt was strong. I had to watch this in 1.5x speed because it was so bad. I don’t think I’ve witnessed a more uncomfortable and unproductive conversation in my life. I had no faith in Trump, or Vance, to have a proper conversation about ending the war but this was worse than I expected. None of these people know what diplomacy is, also Vance lecturing Zelenskyy for a “thank you”, like he’s a child, was hard to watch and so stupid.

They keep talking about Russian imperialism but I don’t understand what they mean 😭

He is either betting on the lack of knowledge that people have on the Ukraine war or has really poor memory because didn’t he arm the Ukrainians when he was in office the first time? If he wanted to end the conflict for good he should’ve done it back then. But this is Trump we are talking about, he’s just an opportunist really.

The age discrepancy is a bit annoying. In that the younger people (around my age) prefer a “Western model” (if the translation is correct in the second article). But that Western model is trying to subjugate them, I do wonder where this perspective comes from. Maybe the current government is just not doing enough to court the younger generations, maybe it also has to do with the education system (depends on how the curriculum is created and taught) and interactions with the west (social media, NGOs, etc.). I am genuinely curious, I know Russia is definitely not a perfect country nor is it socialist, but I have to wonder where this perspective from younger people comes from.