Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reaffimed his firm refusal to cede any territory, resisting U.S. pressure for a painful compromise with Russia as he continued to rally European support for Ukraine.
“Undoubtedly, Russia insists for us to give up territories. We, clearly, don’t want to give up anything. That’s what we are fighting for,” Zelenskyy said in a WhatsApp chat late Monday in which he answered reporters’ questions.
“Do we consider ceding any territories? According to the law we don’t have such right. According to Ukraine’s law, our constitution, international law, and to be frank, we don’t have a moral right either.”
Europe should stop acting like Trump is a reasonable person. He is not. And he is a Russian asset.
Europe should stop acting like Trump is a reasonable person.
I’m pretty sure they are aware.
I suspect they’re hoping there are still some sane heads in Washington.
I don’t know if “sane” is the right way to describe the historical MO of the US Government with or without Trump, but I know what you mean. I think.
Maybe predictable or somewhat reliable would be better choices of wording?
The ue has no power regarding the usa sadly. Look at how nato was push with the “u need to pay us more” and how the negociation regarding tarrfi went. Europe has no powe in the matter regarding ukraine and arent involve in the peace discussion. Most of european leader will say something along the line ukraine good good russia bad but further than that ? not sure
When a home invader breaks in, just let him keep the living room, as long as he stays out of the kitchen and bedrooms. It’s a reasonable compromise.
This reads better in the original Navajo
Isnt this how russia took crimea. What makes anyone believe this’ll be the last time.
And wasn’t Trump bitching about how Obama allowed Russia to take over Crimea? Yet he’s doing the same, even worse right now. But of course it’s hardly news to any sane person that he is a two faced lying hypocritical bitch.
Don’t forget that 20% of Georgias internationally recognized borders are held by Russia as well, taken when Bush was President.
Ukraine still officially contests Crimea. It hasn’t been surrendered.
But there’s also no real expectation Ukraine can retake the territory in their current position. And the longer the war drags on, the more territory they’re in a position to lose.
The war is currently seeing a very very slow Russian advance, but Ukraine seems to finally be able to strike the Russian economy. The drone attacks against the Russian oil industry are certainly new and increase the cost of war for Russia. Germany lost WW1 without a hostile soldier on its original territory for example.
Ukraine seems to finally be able to strike the Russian economy.
I’ve been hearing this line since 2022. For all the sanctions and sabotage, Russia still seems pegged to the Petrodollar and continues to chug along as well as any OPEC state.
Meanwhile, there’s no introspection on the Ukrainian economy or how another year of war will affect them.
Germany lost WW1 without a hostile soldier on its original territory for example.
And famously never recovered, leaving the UK and France to command Europe uncontested for the next century.
:-/
Listen, I want a Winter Palace Coup as much as any NAFO-head, but you can only claim you’re winning at the Somme for so long before people start learning to count the body bags.
As an American I stand with Ukraine.
What if the vast majority of Ukrainians had an interest in ending the war via negotiations, or even to cede land? Would you still stand with Ukrainians?
What if you let an HIV infected man-gorilla fuck your mom, just once in a while though, so he’ll stop beating her every day. Seems like it’d be in everyone’s best interest yeah?
Yes. But they don’t seem to.
zelenskyy is making the right call. good. seriously!
Good.
Meanwhile, I’m eagerly waiting for the local Tankie to, once again, explain how so much death is justified by the dire threat Ukraine poses to a 17 million square kilometer country with 5,459 nuclear warheads. And, apparently, to their own people. I’m sure NATO is still making them do it, yep.
Meanwhile, I’m eagerly waiting for the local Tankie to, once again, explain how so much death is justified by the dire threat Ukraine
Great, now they’ve turned up.
This is an oversimplification. When the Berlin wall fell and Germany was unified there were assurances made that NATO would not expand eastward which obviously did not pan out.
The West has pushed forward with NATO inclusion of several eastern European nations including Ukraine since that time. During the 2008 NATO summit in Bucharest, George W. Bush insisted on raising the topic of Ukraine’s potential NATO membership, despite opposition from Angela Merkel, who was concerned about the implications for relations with Russia.
The concern from a Russian standpoint was an expanding Western sphere of influence, not fear of Ukrainian military action specifically.
NATO is such a big threat to Russia, that as soon as Finland had joined NATO, Russia moved it’s troops away from that area. Russia’s problem with NATO is not that it sees a defensive alliance like NATO as a threat, the problem for them is that they can’t bully and invade NATO countries should they feel like it. Which is also why all the formerly occupied countries that are next to Russia, want to join NATO. Who doesn’t want their country to be safe from invasion by a fascist state? Tankies apparently.
Fair bit of speculation on Russia’s behalf.
The most important point to keep in mine is that most of the world (ie countries outside of NATO) do not see NATO as a defensive alliance.
We can argue back and forth about whether Russia was justified to start a war over perceived expansion (I don’t believe so) but historical context is important and I don’t think it’s hard to see how they perceived a threat from their geopolitical perspective, especially if even Merkel recognized that.
We can argue back and forth about whether Russia was justified to start a war over perceived expansion
Well, not really. Russia was not justified in the full-scale unprovoked invasion of a sovereign country.
Putin pretends there’s a threat to expand Russia territory/influence. Russia isn’t existentially threatened, they want to control neighboring regions.
That’s fair, what was meant was whether Russia could feel justified in doing so (from their perspective) in a similar way that America felt justified in its war on Iraq or its posturing for war in Venezuela. All of which are not justified from an objective perspective.
What offensive war has NATO started?
NATO has not started a war but that is not mutually exclusive from it being perceived as an arm of American imperialism. The general perception is that due to its astronomical defense spending the US has disproportionate influence within the group. There is precedent for NATO countries joining America in unjustified wars. This contributes to the perception that, if the US conjures up a reason to go to war with your country, there is a whole club of countries which America may have coercive leverage over (due to defense investment) that may join in seeking to anhilate you.
NATO countries are (or perhaps were) America’s sphere of influence.
Well said.
There was also an agreement when Ukraine gave up its nukes that Russia would never invade. So fuck Russia.
So what?
What if Canada joined CSTO and signed some pact with China. Does that give the US justification to invade and annex them? Because it violates some handshake from 36 years ago?
If Russia doesn’t like all this NATO expansion, they can drag someone controversial into an alliance or do some other controversial thing. Have at it. A war is not a rational response, unless you’re a tankie.
It’s interesting to invoke the US as it typically has a low threshold for military action.
I don’t think it justifies war but I would understand if the US perceived that as a national security threat (though it appears everything is a national security threat in the US today). It would be naive to assume a great power would sit by idly and watch that occur.
I definitely understand that many percieve this through a cultural ‘us vs them’ lens but I would advise against oversimplified conceptualizations. Global geopolitics is complex and a positive outcome in this war is dependent on deeper understanding of historical contexts and how they play into motivation and strategy today.
Ah yes, the three year old debunked propaganda. You should ask your daddy Putin to update your scripts.
2008, that’s when Russia invaded Georgia unprovoked, right? I’m sure Dubya forced them to do that too
Slava ukraini
If a prolific murderer and a felon rapist pedophile were pressuring me to give up what my fellow countrymen were dying for, I’d say no too.
Thegoalis to beat us down and make us feel defeated. Christ are they good at it
Some of those countrymen are conscripts. 2/3rds? Which makes continuation of battle far less justifiable IMO.
Some people will choose to fight in Ukraine, to possibly die in Ukraine. Conscripts face punishment for refusal.
How many of those fighting would refuse the peace deal?
If anyone in the Trump administration had any brains at all, this would have been obvious from the outset.
The only people who can see advantage to Ukraine seeding territory to Russia, is Russia. Everyone else involved can see what a monumental tactical error that would be. Especially since everybody knows the only reason Russia is even at the negotiating table is because they are desperate, given that is the case, there is zero reason to capitulate.
The point is to say Ukraine won’t accept Trump’s plan so they’re at fault.
I even think the headline is a little offensive, acting as if ceding land is even an option. They ceded land to Russia a decade ago and they’re still getting attacked. WW2 should have taught us that you can’t appease guys like Putin and Hitler.
They didn’t cede land back then either, it got taken over.
Slava mother fucking Ukraini
I think that’s the wrong narrative.
I don’t think anyone really cares much about that land. It’s s mixture of mud, plastic drone remains and unexploded munitions. It’s important because the defence line is there. Many people say it’s rich in minerals… a lot of land is in a lot of places. Nobody is going to use this land for mining, not at any time soon.
The narrative should be security guarantees.
Because when the news says: Zelensky doesn’t want to ceed land, it implies some kind of pride and stubbornness. But in reality Ukraine wants security guarantees and they would be willing to not militarily contest Crimea and even Donbas. There is no point in ceeding anything were there no guarantees. But if you get them, then a lot is on the table.
The point is it the news and everyone goes with security guarantees narrative it is a much stronger narrative: you want to exist, the enemy doesn’t want you to exist. Instead of taking about land where it can all sound like it bickering about who gets what. Perception matters. A lot of Europeans don’t know any the details of this war and most Americans have no clue. The narrative is important.
I got deleted from another channel “Ukraine” for this view and got called a lot of bad words and I don’t know why. It’s not an extreme view and I think Ukrainian government sees it like that as well.
I see it as a world litmus test for law versus force. If you get invaded and you let them take your land, no matter what it’s “worth”, you have been conquered.
It’s not even that philosophical. It really is just the simple fact that Ukraine has nothing to gain by forfeiting it’s most reinforced defensive line. It took Russian 2 years to advance 30 kilometers, and tens of thousands of fatalities, to capture the relatively small town of Pokrovsk. It’s incredibly expensive for Russia to make even small advancements, and now they want the most reinforced territory in the country for free?
It’s a crazy demand that depends on Ukraine TRUSTING the US to come to its defence after Russia breaks the treaty, after forfeiting their defensive lines.
That is obvious, but it’s not the land, is just the defence line. Hypotheticaly if they get NATO membership in exchange for Donbas, I think Ukraine would be all for that.
People aren’t giving their lives there for some fields in Donbas, but to protect the rest of their country and nation.
There are people there that just want a normal life. Conquered or not, that doesn’t mean anything compared to not being bombed while they are playing with their kids.
Elbows up brother. We got you. 🇨🇦
I’m a long way from fully versed in the intricate power plays involved here etc etc, but I’m amazed Russia didnt roll over them, and I’m pretty appalled that the world didnt rally behind Ukraine.
Thanks Trump
I think certain Russians were afraid to tell Putin that the military wasn’t ready. They also didn’t seem to anticipate Javelin missiles or unified Western support. The US learned a few times that invading a country with the goal of taking over the government isn’t always so easy.
Didn’t seem like the Russians were adequately trained. Unsupported tanks rolling down urban streets with hundreds of windows overheard from which should-fired missiles could rain down. Putin has sent hundreds of thousands of his own people to the slaughter. Dude fucked up.
Perun has pretty good videos explaining why, and a big reason is that Ukraine had a very good amount of AA as a former Soviet state and it was enough to keep planes out and they didn’t want to send conscripts for political reasons so they sent armored vehicles without a full infantry complement which led to them being easy to pick off with the flood of atgms NATO sent.
Everyone in any position of authority in Russia is on the take. This means that the capabilities of the Russian military is purely theoretical, on paper Russia is a formidable force, on paper.
They sent troops in without equipment, without ammunition, and without supplies. Not because they didn’t think they would need ammunition and food but because someone nicked them all back in 08 and everyone in the military is too scared of Putin to tell him this. Probably because they were the ones that took some of it.
We stand with Ukraine!
