Minsk 3.0?
Russia continues to demilitarize the Kiev Regime along the entire contact line.
Kiev has responded with terrorist attacks on civilian sites and infrastructure in Russian Ukraine and Russia itself, as well as is usual atrocities – murdering civilians.
But the war that the US started so many years ago is clearly lost and now the US needs to withdraw— and pretend they had nothing to do with the fiasco. What it wants is Minsk 3.0, which leves most geographic ‘Ukraine” intact— along with the investments of American companies like Blackrock.
It is therefore trying to shift responsibility to Europe, as if this was always Europe’s war instead of theirs. If Trump had wanted, he could have kept the peace by supporting Minsk 2.0 back when . Instead he undermined that agreement, piling on sanctions on Russia and facilitating arms transfers that allowed Ukraine to build Europe’s strongest, best equipped and trained army to carry out a “final solution”, scheduled for 2022,
Let us keep in mind that the peoples of Donbas and Lugansk were resisting the denial or their language and culture by a regime they had seized power illegitimately, and which was trying to enforce its will by shelling civilian centers killing women and children. While the peoples of the DPR and LPR had voted overwhelming for independence, MInsk 2.0 was a compromise — guaranteeing their ethnic rights and local autonomy in a federal system controlled from Kiev.
Kiev was and occupying power - two-thirds of their land—and there wasn’t much they could do, until the Russians recognized their independence and came to their aid in 2022 .
Trump didn’t care about any of this during his first term.
But now he doesn’t have any choice to accept whatever the Russians offer him.
Trump’s support for democracy
When the US starts talking about “democracy”, you know they are really talking about something else. They don’t care about human rights in Europe - or at home even — and certainly not in Palestine.
The US support for “democracy” in Europe—means support for rightwing populist movements, similar in spirit to Trump’s. They also are as tired of fighting a losing war as he is. That doesn’t mean anything will improve under their rule any more than anything will improve under Trumps. Birds of a feather? Not exactly.
Not all birds are equal.
The European elites had thought they belonged to the American flock. Now they realized they were being raised for slaughter.
The US is doing to Europe what it had hoped to do to Russia in the 20th Century – balkanization and control. Transnational rape.
Europe was once a collection of small ethnically defined kingdoms which became nation states only in the 19th Century. Now it is returning to that state.
Europe doesn’t have natural resources like Russia – but it does have a skilled workforce, technology and capital—which the US wants to exploit.
JD Vance and the Trumpian Mindset
One Russian site analyzed JD Vance’s recent speech this way.
It is still too early to say which part of Ukrainian territory will remain under Russian control;
It is also too soon to determine what security guarantees Washington and its Western allies might offer Kyiv;
The Trump administration aims to convince Putin that Russia can achieve more at the negotiating table than on the battlefield.
Moscow’s current isolation from Western markets has made it a junior partner to Beijing.
It is not in Putin’s interest to be the junior partner in an alliance with China.
#1. As far Russia, is concerned, they will decide what parts of Ukraine they control. A lot of Russians want to incorporate almost all of “Little Russia’ leaving Galicia to the Poles, a neutral, landlocked buffer state.
The New Ukraine?
The four oblasts and Crimea now part of the Russian Federation are not up for discussion –but there is the entire area east of the Dnieper and the Black Sea oblasts, not to mention Kiev and other Russian language areas which will be offered referenda to choose as part of a surrender agreement and re-constitution of Ukraine. As I write, the Russians have advanced from the Kursk region across the border into Ukraine. You can expect them to ‘liberate” all of Kharkov and Sumy.
#2 Is moot if the Kiev regime falls and Russia controls Ukraine directly— or through a proxy Ukrainian government put together by someone like Medvedchuk.--who is one of the few Ukrainian politicians to oppose the NeoNazis. "Little Russia” can only have a future with Russian help and the Russian federal system allows its republics considerable autonomy — more than they would under Western control.
#3. What could Putin gain at the negotiating table? Nothing much.
Lifting sanctions would benefit American business more than Russia, which has used them to incentivize reindustrialization and economic and social growth.
On the battlefield, Russia gains new citizens, skilled workers, and access to more than a trillion dollars worth untapped mineral wealth, hitherto not easily exploited but now more accessible with modern technologies, such as Russia’s new lithium processing tech - and the help of allies like China. Turkey is already signalling it wants to a piece of the action,
#4. The US economic war on China and its attempts to restrict its access to resources makes Moscow an equal—not junior— partner to China. In addition, Russia’s innovative progress has made huge progress in certain technologies, including quantum computing, the aforementioned lithium processing technology, metallurgical advances with aerospace applications, semiconductor fabrication and defense. These are things that China needs - and China has much to offer in return. as it faces Western threats in the Pacific.
#5 It is not in Russia’s interest to be any kind of partner with the US, which cannot be relied on, having already cost Russian billions and hundreds of lives. Partners need to responsible and trustworthy. China keeps its word. The US just changes its mind. Russia and China are civilizations. The US is a corporation,.
Trust not!
Trump does not exactly inspire trust. He is the Contradiction in Chief. He does not have dementia but he is quite as demented as Joe.
Russia is aware that while the US may withdraw from Ukraine, it is not talking— so far at least — about withdrawing troops or weapons from Europe or embargoing weapons to Europe. In fact it is still encouraging Europe to fight on. And Russia is still the Enemy to the East.
Russia is also aware of the US’s hostility for Russian allies like China and Iran, so important to the development of BRICS, Unlike the US, Russia is loyal to its agreements and faithful to its friends. It’s contributions to BRICS are based on its reputation for evenhandedness, transcultural respect and honest.
But the US is the world’s greatest terrorist state, which has managed to kill 20 to 30 million people since WWII. It has a long history of terrorism and subversion.
US military, CIA coups and clandestine operations in foreign countries since 1845
🇮🇷 Iran: 1946
🇨🇳 China: 1946-1949
🇬🇷 Greece: 1947-1949
🇮🇹 Italy: 1948
🇵🇭 Philippines: 1948-1954
🇰🇵 Korea: 1950-1953
🇮🇷 Iran: 1953
🇻🇳 Vietnam: 1954
🇬🇹 Guatemala: 1954
🇦🇷 Argentina: 1955-1976
🇱🇧 Lebanon: 1958
🇵🇦 Panama: 1958
🇭🇹 Haiti: 1959
🇨🇩 Congo: 1960
🇻🇳 Vietnam: 1960-1964
🇨🇺 Cuba: 1961-1962
🇱🇦 Laos: 1962
🇪🇨 Ecuador: 1963
🇵🇦 Panama: 1964
🇧🇷 Brazil: 1964
🇻🇳 Vietnam: 1965-1975
🇮🇩 Indonesia: 1965
🇨🇩 Congo: 1965
🇩🇴 Dominican Republic: 1965
🇱🇦 Laos: 1965-1973
🇬🇭 Ghana: 1966
🇬🇹 Guatemala: 1966-1967
🇰🇭 Cambodia: 1969-1975
🇴🇲 Oman: 1970
🇱🇦 Laos: 1971-1973
🇨🇱 Chile: 1973
🇰🇭 Cambodia: 1975
🇦🇴 Angola: 1976-1992
🇮🇷 Iran: 1980
🇱🇾 Libya: 1981
🇸🇻 El Salvador: 1981-1992
🇳🇮 Nicaragua: 1981-1990
🇱🇧 Lebanon: 1982-1984
🇬🇩 Grenada: 1983
🇭🇳 Honduras: 1983-1989
🇮🇷 Iran: 1984
🇱🇾 Libya: 1986
🇧🇴 Bolivia: 1986
🇮🇷 Iran: 1987-1988
🇱🇾 Libya: 1989
🇵🇭 Philippines: 1989
🇵🇦 Panama: 1989-1990
🇱🇷 Liberia: 1990
🇮🇶 Iraq: 1990-1991
🇮🇶 Iraq: 1991-2003
🇭🇹 Haiti: 1991
🇸🇴 Somalia: 1992-1994
Yugoslavia: 1992-1994
🇧🇦 Bosnia: 1993-1995
🇭🇹 Haiti: 1994-1996
🇭🇷 Croatia: 1995
🇨🇩 Zaire (Congo): 1996-1997
🇱🇷 Liberia: 1997
🇸🇩 Sudan: 1998
🇦🇫 Afghanistan: 1998
Yugoslavia: 1999
🇲🇰 Macedonia: 2001
🇦🇫 Afghanistan: 2001-2021
🇻🇪 Venezuela: 2002
🇮🇶 Iraq: 2003-present
🇭🇹 Haiti: 2004
🇺🇦 Ukraine: 2004, 2013-present
🇵🇸 Palestine: 2006-2007
🇾🇪 Yemen: 2009-present
🇸🇾 Syria: 2005-2009, 2011-present
🇱🇾 Libya: 2011
*note this is not a full list
Sovereignty vs Suzerainty
The US concept of “sphere of influence’ is a notion of suzerainty. The US wants to become suzerain to all countries in the American continent— and Europe as well—not to mention the Middle East using Israel as a proxy.
Russia will be offered bits of central Asia and parts of Ukraine. China gets walled off.
Africa is up for grabs.
The problem is that the majority of the world don’t want to return to the 19th Century.
Riyadh
The Americans have nothing to offer Russia— but, as a legacy empire, it is still powerful. Therefore, the Russians agreed to meet the Americans in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, which is committed to BRICS in the long term, but balancing business needs with the West in the short term.
The Russian brand is peace—but they will fight for what they believe in . The American brand is war—as long as someone else is doing the dying. They don’t really believe in anything.
What did the Saudi’s think?
In Riyadh, the Middle East had a good look the respective styles of Russia and the US. The Russian sent a team of their best diplomats including Lavrov - skilled and experienced negotiators. The Americans sent a ragtag bunch of beltway politicos with little to no experience in international negotiations. Trump’s pro-Zionist policies have alienated the Arab Street and have not gone over well with the Saudis.
The Russians are sober, rational, pragmatic and knowledgeable— all the things that the Americans are not.
The result—the Russians agree to talk more — later.
The next BRICS summit is in July in Brasilia.
One reason that Russia is persisting with these negotiations with the US is to demonstrate it commitment to rational diplomacy and international equality of nations —the kind of thing I quoted Wang Yi talking about in a previous post.
Trust
A little love goes a long way. As you can see Ichi is a lot bigger than Chappy but always gentle with him.
Chappy and Ichi are tired. They spent the day helping me research Putin.
Please buy them a coffee! Maybe they will give me some too! Click here
"Minsk 3 - The Final Hoax" is not going to happen. Trump has already bailed out of the flaming wreck after yelling to his European co-belligerents "good luck!"
For domestic politics Trump will wash himself of the fiasco by blaming it all on Biden & UK.
Having disposed of Ukraine, what does Trump want from Russia? Maybe just to be recieved in Moscow the way Reagan was at the end of the Cold War. That may be good enough for Trump.
Julian, this is news I’ve been hoping for for a long time - I’m 87, very long retired. I hope the process, now started, will continue. But Russians build relationships, the US fixes things, to their satisfaction (??) CIA one way, Trump another. I hope my cynicism is unjust. We’ll see. But Chappy and Itchi will get their case of cat food as soon as I can do it. They need to keep you going.