"The Office of the Ukrainian President Explained Why Putin Doesn't Want a Ceasefire Now
Russian dictator and war initiator Vladimir Putin intends to attack the front in the summer rather than negotiate a ceasefire, adviser to the head of the President's Office Sergei Leshchenko reported...
"It is clear that Russia has an appetite for war. For them, war is a national idea that has united society and allowed Putin to either kill all opponents, or expel them from the country, or put them in prison, and suppress the oligarchs, and completely concentrate all power. It is clear that this is comfortable, and it is clear that he does not want to lose the summer, because the summer period is always an opportunity to attack more actively at the front than in winter," Leshchenko emphasized.
At the same time, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s intention to continue waging war is completely at odds with all the efforts made by US President Donald Trump and his administration, European partners and Ukraine to achieve a ceasefire.
"Russia does not want this. And Istanbul was important precisely as a moment to record this result. Everyone can see who wants to continue fighting and killing, and who does not," Leshchenko added.
He noted that he expects decisive action now from the United States.
In particular, the adviser noted that in the US Congress, Senator Lindsey Graham has prepared a bill on sanctions, which provides for a 500% duty for those who trade with Russia, and the Europeans are ready to accept this vision and record such a decision at the EU level.
"This time has come. It is time to act. I hope that our partners will hear us and act as they should. And there will be no such attempts to flirt with the aggressor," Leshchenko noted.
He also expressed the opinion that Ukrainians have already developed immunity to statements about "the most difficult days" and "the most difficult weeks."
"It will be difficult for Ukraine, because we must convince our partners that it is time to act. And partners, you see, sometimes prefer to hold another round of negotiations, to meet personally with Putin, as we are now hearing from Washington - to hold a telephone conversation and, perhaps, this will influence something. If it does, then we are all for it. But so that this is not just a gain in time, because during the summer campaign Putin wants to destroy several more Ukrainian cities and kill several tens of thousands of his own citizens, and, unfortunately, Ukrainians too," Leshchenko emphasized."
Translating the opinion of Ukrainian journalist Vitaly Portnikov in the Dialog, May 16:
"Portnikov told about Putin's cunning plan: to offer Trump something in exchange for Ukraine that he will not be able to resist
Vitaly Portnikov warned Ukrainians that the situation for us could worsen after Trump's meeting with Putin.
Vitaly Portnikov explained why there is no point in expecting positive results for Ukraine from the talks in Istanbul: "It turns out that Trump will now insist that he wants to meet with Putin. Let me remind you that the idea of his advisers was that Trump should not meet with Putin until Putin agrees to at least some proposal from Trump, at least some kind of ceasefire."...
"Putin calmly waited out all this and now, as I understand it, will meet with Trump against the backdrop of the ongoing war in Ukraine, and I also think that there will be serious shelling of Ukrainian territory on the day of this meeting in order to finally stain the American president's hands with the blood of peaceful Ukrainians. That's all for you. Now the question is, will Trump achieve anything by negotiating with Putin? He will achieve nothing, because if Putin defied him during telephone conversations when he offered him a ceasefire, then it is obvious that the Russian dictator will have the courage to say "no" to him when Trump asks him for a ceasefire during a personal meeting," the publicist shared his conclusions.
Then Vitaly Portnikov suggested how the head of the Kremlin could use the meeting with Trump to his advantage: "Putin will again tell the US President about the root cause of the conflict. I think he will be frank with him: "Donald, do you want to make money with us?There is one problem: the existence of Ukraine.Without Ukraine, there will be no problem.How can we make it so that it does not exist?Please, do not interfere.Just get out." I think that Putin will calmly, harshly and cold-bloodedly tell Trump if Trump meets with him. What Trump will do after that, I cannot say, because he always reacts to events inadequately.""
KYIV
— Russia has struck 25 hotels near Ukraine’s front lines from the
beginning of the war in 2022 through March in what appears to be a
campaign to discourage journalism in the area, according to a report by
the media rights group Reporters Without Borders and a Ukrainian
organization, Truth Hounds.
The attacks on hotels were initially sporadic but have escalated over
the past year, indicating a “shift from isolated events to a sustained
threat” for media personnel working on the front lines, the report
states. It found that 24 journalists had been injured and one killed in
hotel strikes since the war began.
“These
attacks are part of a larger strategy to sow terror and seek to reduce
coverage of the war,” said Pauline Maufrais, regional officer for
Ukraine at Reporters Without Borders, which goes by its French acronym,
RSF. “The targeted buildings are not ‘Ukrainian military bases,’ and the
journalists inside are not ‘mercenaries,’ contrary to the
disinformation narrative relentlessly pushed by all levels of the
Russian state and pro-Kremlin outlets.”
Russia’s
use of precision munitions such as ballistic and cruise missiles in the
attacks showed that the hotels were targeted and the attacks were “part
of a broader strategy aimed at discouraging independent reporting from
the front line,” the report said.
Russia
has often said hotels are legitimate targets because Ukrainian military
guests or foreign mercenaries stay there, but the report found no
correlation between the targeted hotels and a military presence. Rather,
the investigation found that the common thread in the attacks was that
the hotels were known for housing journalists.
Tourism
ceased in front-line areas, and staying the night is off limits for
most international workers from nongovernmental organizations, leaving
journalists the main customers for the remaining hotels.
The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment about the report.
A
survey by the two organizations found that 64 percent of journalists
considered that Russia’s increased strikes on hotels had complicated
their ability to work in the war zone.
In
some cases, military personnel on leave were staying at the hotels, but
only one targeted hotel had hosted members of the armed forces on
military business, according to the report.
Violetta
Pedorych, a producer for French TV and other Western outlets, survived
when the Park Hotel in Kharkiv was hit by two Russian missiles on Jan.
10, 2024, although she sustained injuries.
Pedorych
told The Washington Post that she and her team had always stayed at the
hotel because they considered it safe. The Park is a small hotel
outside the city center, and they had never seen members of the military
stay there, she said.
Pedorych said she still travels to front-line areas but now stays in rented apartments instead of hotels.
“Many
journalists now avoid hotels near the front, some suspend fieldwork,
and most face logistical challenges. This hampers reporting,” Maufrais
said.
Poor
road quality in the front-line areas and the large distances between
battlefield hot spots previously meant journalists tried to stay in the
nearest, safest town in the front-line region.
But
because there now are few hotels operating, journalists either stay in
apartments in front-line towns or make eight-to-10-hour trips from
places such as Dnipro, the southern Ukrainian city that lies between the
front-line regions of Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia.
The
report found that 13 percent of media organizations had stopped or
reduced front-line travel in light of the hotel attacks, deeming it too
dangerous and logistically complicated.
Another
issue, said Oksana Romaniuk, head of Ukraine’s Institute of Mass
Information, a media rights group, is that security decisions are often
made by managers abroad whose experience is drawn from conflicts in
other regions, such as the Middle East, and who don’t realize the safety
problems with hotels in Ukraine.
Romaniuk
cited the example of the attack on a team staying in hotel in
Kramatorsk in August, which left two members injured and killed their
security adviser.
She
said that the group had not wanted to stay there because there had been
attacks on hotels in the area in the preceding months, but the media
outlet’s security protocol insisted the team be housed in a hotel.
“Let field teams make the final decision what is best for them,” Romaniuk said."
"...Sitting down under pressure from the US president, Donald Trump, Ukraine
had pushed for a 30-day ceasefire before the talks. Moscow rejected
this, appearing to stick to its maximalist demands, including sweeping
restrictions on Ukrainian sovereignty...
While the meeting appeared to achieve little
toward ending the conflict, it represents a symbolic win for Putin, who
refused to accept the 30-day ceasefire that Ukraine and its European
allies had demanded as a prerequisite for talks.
The
Russian leader has been engaged in a delicate balancing act with the US
president, appearing to support peace talks to stay in Trump’s favour,
while pushing for terms that in effect amount to Ukraine’s capitulation.
The outcome is likely to be seen as a setback for Zelenskyy, coming after his bold gamble of challenging Putin to a direct meeting
in the hope of winning favour with Washington and exposing what Ukraine
describes as the Russian leader’s hollow promises to end the war.
Vladimir
Medinsky, the ultra-conservative head of Russia’s delegation, said
Moscow was satisfied with the results of the talks and was prepared to
keep talking to Kyiv...
The stalemate appears to pave the way for a
US-Russia summit, after Trump undercut the talks on Thursday by saying
that “nothing is going to happen” until he meets Putin personally. On
Friday, the US president, who had grown increasingly impatient with the
slow pace of negotiations, said he would meet his Russian counterpart
“as soon as we can set it up”, raising fears in Kyiv that they could be
sidelined while others decide their fate.
Zelenskyy
has spent the last few weeks accommodating various US demands to
demonstrate his willingness to pursue peace. But Trump’s latest remarks –
framing a US-Russia summit as the only path to resolving the conflict –
underscored his failure to influence the US president’s thinking...
Hopes in Kyiv and among its European allies that Trump would impose
tough sanctions after the failed talks were dampened by the US president
indicating he wanted to meet Putin – leaving Moscow with little
incentive to compromise in Turkey."
"Medinsky commented on the negotiations with fake quotes from Napoleon and Bismarck
...Medinsky cited several quotes attributed to various historical figures.The Russian opposition publication "Important Stories" noted that some of these quotes are fake.
"As Napoleon said, war and negotiations are conducted simultaneously," Medinsky said, explaining the Kremlin's reluctance to conclude a temporary truce.
Where he got these words from is unclear.No historical documents record such a quote from Napoleon.
In addition, in arguing Moscow's demands to hand over Ukrainian territories to it, Medinsky referred to the German Chancellor of the time of German unification in the second half of the 19th century, Otto von Bismarck.
"He [Bismarck] always said: "Never try to deceive the Russians and steal anything from them, because time will pass, and sooner or later the Russians always come for their own." This "Russians always come for their own" seems to me to be a very important lesson of history," Medinsky said.
The source of this quote is also unknown.Similar statements by Bismarck do not exist in open sources in German.It is noteworthy that the authenticity of this quote is denied even by the website of the Russian Military Historical Society, which Medinsky himself created and heads."
Vladimir Putin seems to be on the cusp of getting what he has always wanted.
European leaders had hoped the Russian president’s failure to attend peace talks with Ukraine in Istanbul
– the very negotiations that he himself had demanded in lieu of a
ceasefire – would finally cause Donald Trump’s patience to snap.
Far from it. Instead of signalling his desire to join Europe in imposing far tougher sanctions
on Moscow, the US president has chosen to reward his Russian
counterpart with the one-on-one meeting he has desired for so long.
“Nothing’s going to happen until Putin and I get together,” Mr Trump said, thereby effectively scotching the talks in Istanbul before they had even begun.
In Putin’s eyes, face-to-face talks with the US president – a meeting to which Volodymyr Zelensky,
the Ukrainian president, would not be invited – would cement Russia’s
great power status. It would recall the superpower summits of the Cold
War when Moscow and Washington would meet as equals to discuss the fate
of the planet.
It is
also the outcome Ukrainian officials most lose sleep over. At such a
meeting, Putin would have Mr Trump’s undivided attention with no
go-between to plead their cause.
The upshot, they fear, is that the susceptible Mr Trump, whose instincts often seem more sympathetic to Russia, would agree to a stitch-up that would then be presented to Ukraine as a fait accompli.
“Putin has snubbed President Trump,” said one Ukrainian politician. “We
very much hope that he will not reward Putin’s intransigence by agreeing
to meet him.”
Mr Trump would
presumably reject such characterisations. In his logic, the only way to
understand what Putin wants and how far he is prepared to go in making
concessions is to talk to him face-to-face.
“He and I will meet, and I think we’ll solve it or maybe not,” Mr Trump said. “At least we’ll know.”
Putin
is no doubt delighted by the development. Not only is it another sign
of Mr Trump’s indulgence towards him, it also represents a further
humiliation for the European leaders who expected the US president to
react to the no-show by approving tougher sanctions.
The hope had been that
Mr Trump would have given the go-ahead for Lindsey Graham, the US
senator, to introduce a Bill in Congress that would impose 500 per cent tariffs on any country buying Russian oil, a move that could cripple its economy.
That looks unlikely to happen, certainly not until the US president meets Putin.
Face-to-face meeting ‘necessary for breakthrough’
While
Mr Trump said he would meet his counterpart “as soon as we can set it
up,” the Kremlin has made it very clear it is in no hurry to arrange.
Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s
urbane spokesman, welcomed the suggestion of what he was quick to
characterise as a “summit”. “The importance of this cannot be
overstated,” he said.
But
Mr Peskov also warned against expecting a meeting any time soon, adding
that “long and intense preparations” would be needed before the two men
could get together.
Meanwhile, the most immediate consequence of Mr Trump’s offer is that the peace talks in Istanbul, which should have been a moment of history, have been reduced to an almost irrelevant sideshow.
Marco
Rubio, the US secretary of state, had already foreshadowed their
failure. He said before the negotiations began that he did not think
“anything productive [was] actually going to happen.”
“I think it’s
abundantly clear that the only way we’re going to have a breakthrough
here is [in talks] between President Trump and President Putin,” he
said.
In the absence of pressure to make any concessions, the Russian delegation, led by former culture minister Vladimir Medinsky, enraged his Ukrainian counterparts by making demands that crossed all of Kyiv’s red lines.
Mr Medinsky led negotiations with Ukraine early in the war in 2022
that swiftly collapsed after Russia demanded Mr Zelensky abandon his
Nato ambitions, disband most of his armed forces and accept conditions
that, in Kyiv’s view, would have reduced the country to vassalage.
At Friday’s talks, not only did the Russian negotiators insist on the
same terms, they went one step further by demanding Ukraine withdraw its
forces entirely from the four eastern provinces that Russia claims it
has annexed.
Russian troops occupy
large swathes of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, but do not
have uncontested control in any of the four regions. Russia does have
full control of Crimea, the fifth region it has claimed as its own.
Moscow
also brushed off Mr Zelensky’s accusations that its negotiators had not
come to Istanbul in good faith. Maria Zakharova, the Russian foreign
ministry spokesman, responded by calling the Ukrainian leader “a clown”,
“a loser” and a “person with no education”."
"Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 16, 2025
Ukrainian and Russian delegations met in Istanbul on May 16 but
made little progress towards agreeing to a full ceasefire or a peace
settlement to Russia's war against Ukraine. The Russian delegation
reportedly formally demanded that Ukraine cede territory to which Russia
has informally been laying claim, while asserting that Russia is ready
to continue the war for years. Russia may again formalize previously
informal territorial claims in the future as part of Russia's effort to
secure full Ukrainian capitulation...
Medinsky highlighted that Russia is prepared to continue its war in Ukraine for years to come.
Medinsky claimed that those "who do not know history" say that there
should be a ceasefire first, then negotiations to achieve peace.[7]
Medinsky claimed that war and negotiations should be conducted
simultaneously, and Carroll reported that Medinsky stated that Russia is
"ready to fight for a year, two, three – however long it takes."[8]
Medinsky reportedly referenced the Great Northern War (1700-1721) when
asking "how long [is Ukraine] ready to fight?" and claimed that "Russia
is prepared to fight forever."[9] Russia state media confirmed that
Medinsky spoke about the 18th-century war with Sweden during the
meeting.[10]
Ukrainian diplomatic sources told various Western and Ukrainian
outlets that the Russian delegation made "unrealistic" and
"unacceptable" demands that went "far beyond" any demands Russia has
previously discussed.[11] The delegation reportedly repeated the
Kremlin's demand that Ukrainian forces withdraw from the entirety of the
illegally annexed Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson oblasts
before the start of a ceasefire. The Economist foreign
correspondent Oliver Carroll reported that a source stated that the
Russian delegation additionally threatened to seize Kharkiv and Sumy
oblasts, and Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada Deputy Oleksiy Goncharenko
similarly reported that the Russian delegation threatened to annex Sumy
Oblast in order to create a "security zone."[12]
The Kremlin has repeatedly publicly demanded that Ukraine
cede all of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson oblasts – even the
territory that Russian forces currently do not occupy – but had not
formally demanded that Ukraine cede all of Kharkiv and Sumy oblasts
before the May 16 Istanbul meeting.[13] Russian officials have
informally claimed all of Kharkiv Oblast as part of Russia and launched
offensive operations to create buffer zones in Kharkiv and Sumy Oblasts
in May 2024 and March 2025, respectively, that are likely part of
Russian territorial expansion efforts, however. Kharkiv Oblast
occupation governor Vitaly Ganchev claimed in early February 2025 that
Kharkiv Oblast is "strategically" and politically significant for Russia
and that he was "certain" that Russian forces would seize all of
Kharkiv Oblast because Russia needed a "sanitary zone" to protect itself
from Ukrainian shelling.[14] Ganchev further claimed that Kharkiv
Oblast would have held a "referendum" to become the "fifth oblast to
join Russia" in September 2022 had it not been for the successful
Ukrainian counteroffensive in Kharkiv Oblast at that time. Russian
forces launched attacks across the Sumy-Kursk Oblast border in April
2025 to create a buffer zone and possibly press further toward Sumy City
in order to expand Russian territorial demands in Ukraine.[15] Russian
forces similarly launched offensive operations in May 2024 to create a
buffer zone in northern Kharkiv Oblast, and Russian Security Council
Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev stated at that time that Russia's
envisioned "buffer zone" should encompass all of Ukraine, suggesting
that the Kremlin's concept of the buffer zone is a thinly veiled
justification for Russia's intent to subsume larger portions of
Ukraine.[16]
Russian officials have long been informally laying claim to
additional territories in Ukraine beyond Sumy, Kharkiv, Luhansk,
Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson oblasts. Russian officials, including
Russian President Vladimir Putin, have consistently claimed that
"Novorossiya" – an invented region of Ukraine that Kremlin officials
have claimed includes all southern and eastern Ukraine – is an
"integral" part of Russia and that Odesa City is a "Russian" city."[17]
Novorossiya geographically encompasses Kharkiv Oblast. Kherson Oblast
occupation head Vladimir Saldo stated in April 2025 that the "return" of
the west (right) bank of the Dnipro River to Russia is "fundamentally
important" and an "absolute priority."[18] Saldo called for Russia to
completely control the areas of the Dnipro River that pass through
Kherson, Zaporizhia, and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts – a call for Russia to
not only gain control over parts of Kherson and Zaporizhia oblasts that
Russian forces do not currently occupy but to control parts of
Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, which Russia has not formally claimed or
illegally annexed. The Kremlin may increasingly adopt this
pattern of informally discussing additional Russian territorial claims
and then formally introducing these claims as demands in peace
negotiations in the future.
ISW has consistently assessed that Russian President Vladimir
Putin will not compromise in peace negotiations unless Ukraine and the
West inflict significant battlefield and economic losses on Russia and
force Putin to rethink his theory of victory. Putin articulated
his theory of victory for his war in Ukraine in June 2024, which posits
that Russia will be able to win a war of attrition against Ukraine by
continuing gradual, creeping advances indefinitely and preventing
Ukraine from conducting successful, operationally significant
counteroffensive operations, assuming Russia’s war effort outlasts
Western support for Ukraine.[19]..."
"Ukraine can still win, but not if Trump keeps chasing a cease-fire Russia doesn’t want
by Jonathan Sweet and Mark Toth, Opinion Contributors - 05/15/25
Contrary to what many analysts, journalists and politicians are
saying, Ukraine can still defeat the Russian army and drive it out of
their country — not just “hold out for an indefinite period,” as retired
U.S. Navy Admiral James Stavridis put it in March.
But victory will not come from the close fight alone.
Ukraine simply does not have the manpower or weapons necessary to
dislodge Russian defenders from their fighting positions in a direct
fire engagement.
Linear thinking will only result in needless loss of life, playing
right into Russian President Vladimir Putin’s desire for a war of
attrition. To defeat Russia, Ukraine must first secure its skies, then
win the deep fight, interdict Russia’s supply lines and isolate Russian forces in Ukraine from their lifeline.
Ukraine has demonstrated over the last three years that it can make Russia’s invasion costly — 968,130 Russian casualties is proof enough. But capability must be supported and sustained to accomplish the mission. To date, the “just enough” strategy implemented by former President Joe Biden and carried on so far by Trump has not been enough to win.
Winning begins with a clearly defined end state — namely, the defeat of Russian forces in Ukraine.
Equally as important, though, the West cannot submit to Russian
threats of nuclear escalation or pundits bemoaning World War III
scenarios. These Russian narratives are exactly what the Kremlin wants
the West to repeat and believe.
Mutual assured destruction provides the offset for threats of nuclear
escalation — but only if the Kremlin believes the West would
retaliate.
Short of any direct attack against NATO, we have likely reached the
top of Russia’s escalation ladder. The last thing Putin wants from his
quest to conquer Ukraine is to have it bring down upon him a multi-front
war against NATO.
Washington and Brussels need to embrace the fact that we are already fighting World War III.
Although conventional combat has been restricted to Ukraine and Russia,
the weapons and munitions used to fight the war come from NATO
partners, Belarus, North Korea, Iran, and China. Combatants fighting
alongside their Russian counterparts come from North Korea, Chechnya,
and now even China.
Furthermore, Russia has been waging a shadow war against the West for
years, including sabotage, assassinations, cyber-attacks, forced
migration, election interference, ethnic unrest, revolutions, and more.
The last 100 days should have demonstrated to Team Trump that playing
along with Russian negotiators’ games will not bring about an end to
the war. Kremlin cease-fire talk is just deliberate misdirection. Putin’s conditions have not changed — he is simply buying time.
But as retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg has stated, “Russia’s not winning this war. Russia has not made any major advances in the last year and a half.”
So, how exactly does Ukraine defeat Russia? Isolate and destroy
Russian ground forces in Ukraine by attacking their ability to sustain
their army and their ability to wage war. This will create siege
warfare-like conditions for Russian ground forces in the close fight.
They will be left eventually to wither on the vine, vulnerable to defeat
by a decisive combined arms offensive.
This would involve three phases. First comes the destruction of Russia’s
deep strike capability. A no-fly zone over Ukraine would protect
civilians being targeted by Russian ballistic missiles and drones.
European countries have already put forth an initiative called Sky Shield, the deployment of 120 fighter jets as part of a European air force to protect Kyiv and western Ukraine...
Then enable Ukraine to defeat the weapon systems Putin employs to
target civilians — ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones —
along with their crews, radars, command and control centers, and missile
storage facilities, from wherever they fire. Give them the same
authorizations provided to U.S. Central Command to defeat the Houthi threat in Yemen.
Phase two starts with turning back on the flow of weapons, munitions
and intelligence to Ukraine, reactivating the logistical throughput of
military aid from the Rzeszów-Jasionka airport in Poland is mission critical.
Precision deep-strike munitions to conduct interdiction and deep strikes are essential during this phase — cruise missiles
and jet fighters. Ukraine must be able to defeat Russian mass —
infantry and artillery. The interdiction of troops, weapons, ammunition
and supplies on the Russian side of the border is essential to isolate
forces currently engaged in the close fight. Defeating Russia’s ability
to continue feeding the Ukrainian meat grinder sets the conditions
for Zelensky and his generals to isolate and defeat Russian forces in
Ukraine. That requires locating and destroying troop assembly areas,
equipment staging areas, logistics bases, refueling points, and
ammunition holding areas — at airports, seaports, railheads, and along
highway networks.
The task and purpose of the deep fight is to defeat Russia’s ability
to wage war by attacking its revenue sources (refineries), wartime
production and munitions storage facilities (drones, munitions,
weapons), and its deep strike capability (airfields from which Russian
bombers are launched).
Ukraine has demonstrated an uncanny ability to execute this mission
with their own internally manufactured weapons; however, they will need
precise intelligence to deliver the ordnance.
Phase three is the decisive push of Russian forces out of Ukraine.
Once the conditions have been set, a combined arms offensive including
close air support can be launched, driving Russian forces from the occupied territories just when Russia is at its weakest.
Continuing to engage Putin in cease-fire talks simply affords him time to produce and purchase more weapons to build the combat power necessary to continue his relentless assaults into Ukraine.
Washington needs to rediscover the intestinal fortitude it once had
in the likes of commanding generals such as Ulysses S. Grant and George
S. Patton, for whom winning was the only acceptable outcome."
"Britain And Germany Are The Patsies of Net Zero: Paul Marshall (Transcript)
adies and gentlemen, welcome to the capital of net zero. Britain is
very big on windmills. We are, in Boris Johnson’s words, the Saudi
Arabia of wind. In some ways, this is something to be proud of.
Since 1990, the UK has cut its carbon emissions by over 50%. On this, we lead the G20.
But in our quest for renewable energy, we lost something. We lost
sight of the trade-offs involved in energy policy. We may be leading the
G20 in emissions reductions, but we are also leading the way in
sacrificing our energy security. We are leading the way in destroying
our ancient rural landscapes. We are leading the way in wrecking our
industrial base.
And we are leading the way in impoverishing our people. This is not a party political point. Net zero is indeed being pushed to its extreme limits by an ideological Labour government.
But it was passed into law by a Conservative government. Nor is this a speech about climate change. You don’t need to be a climate change denier to be very fearful about where British energy policy is leading.
And finally, this is not just a speech about Britain. What I am
describing is a European problem. And a Canadian problem. And an
Australian problem. These countries have been infected by an ideological
zeal which is leading us to sacrifice our economic prosperity and our
people’s livelihoods, all for the sake of making some fractional changes
in the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Late stage
capitalism is prone to fall for luxury beliefs.
We take for granted our prosperity. We take for granted the
foundations of liberal democracy and free markets which underpin that
prosperity. And we fall for fashions that we can’t afford. And so these
countries, which I fear are in a very late stage of capitalism, have
contracted a severe case of climate derangement syndrome. Most European
countries are committed to net zero by 2050, likewise Australia and
Canada. The Scandinavian targets are a little earlier.
But climate change policy is a classic collective action problem.
This is the mother of all collective action problems. If only some
countries make sacrifices and others don’t, then all they do is wipe out
their own prosperity. Out of a misplaced sense of guilt, we have
allowed Asian countries to set much later dates.
China is committed officially to 2060, Saudi Arabia to 2060, India to
2070. And if your net zero deadline is 35 or 45 years away, you can
pretty much ignore it for the time being. And that is exactly what is
happening. Every year Chinese coal consumption is expected to fall.
Every year it goes up.
China has 1161 coal-fired power plants. In 2023 they’ve built two plants
per week. India has a mere 285, but they too have now got the coal bug.
They’re currently opening two plants a month and their construction
plans are accelerating. China and India are about as committed to net zero as Britain is to investigating the grooming gangs.
But it is the USA who played the smartest game. It was the United
States, through Al Gore, who launched climate anxiety on the world. In
2009, Al Gore warned that the North Pole would be ice-free by the summer
of 2014.
But the US never stopped drilling. And now, just at the point where
many Western countries have swallowed the net zero ideology hook, line
and sinker, you guys, and I’m looking at the thousand Americans in the
room, are moving on, to leave the rest of us like a half-dead fish
flopping on the riverbank.
Now I’m not suggesting that this is a conspiracy...
But just like with Wokery and DEI, America launched a set of luxury
beliefs on the world. Watch as those beliefs gain traction, only to
discard them in their own land just before they reach the point of fatal
destruction. Unlike Europe in particular, the US still has the DNA to
resist ideas that are bad for your wealth. You understand the
foundations of wealth creation, and you don’t take them for granted.
Sadly, we have a much weaker immune system. So we are powering ahead in full self-destruction mode.
So how is Europe planning to reach net zero? Well, we have a
twin-track strategy. On the one hand, we are prematurely closing some of
our most reliable sources of energy, like coal and nuclear, and ceasing
our exploration for offshore oil and gas.
And on the other, we are taxing carbon emissions, driving up our
energy and electricity costs across the board, and piling costs on the
industry and the consumer. I have some bad news for our net zero
zealots. Europe may or may not reach our net zero targets, but one thing
we will most certainly do is wipe out what remains of our industrial
base. Electricity costs for industrial users in Britain are five times
the US, seven times China.
Germany is not far behind. These are acts of national economic suicide.
Now I want to talk briefly about the two standout zealots, Britain
and Germany. Germany used to rely primarily on a mix of fossil fuels and
nuclear, but Angela Merkel decided to phase out the nuclear industry,
and that left them increasingly dependent on Russian gas and German
wind. We all know what happened to Russian gas, so now Germany relies on
a mixture of imported US and Qatari gas and German wind.
But there’s a problem with German wind. It does not blow all the
time. German wind is about as reliable as British trains. The wind
problem, of course, is not unique to Germany, but Germany has the best
word for it, Dunkelflaute. During those periods when the wind don’t
blow, which may last as long as two weeks, the system has to rely on
other sources of energy, such as gas, to keep things going.
That is why some people think a better word for renewables is
unreliables. Unreliables are essentially a parasitic form of energy.
Their marginal cost can be theoretically below, but because of their
intermittency, they can only function today as part of an energy system
balanced by other providers. There are high hopes that this problem will
be solved through the development of cheap storage, but that solution
has not arrived yet.
Wind was once considered to be the best solution, now the great hope is batteries.
But the most long-life batteries in the world today only have storage
capacity for six to eight hours. Dunkelflaute may last as long as two
weeks.
So we need a huge leap forward in technology if traditional batteries
are to be the solution. Meanwhile, German electricity costs have risen
to be amongst the highest in the world, just behind Britain. This is a
disaster for Germany, as its historic strength is in industries highly
dependent on energy – cars, chemicals, steel, capital goods. German
business knows this.
Collectively, in 2023, the top 30 companies in Germany invested just
15 billion euros in Germany. They invested 115 billion euros in the
United States.
Britain is Germany’s leading competitor in the catastrophe stakes. In
the 1990s, nuclear accounted for over a quarter of our electricity, but
now Britain only has five remaining plants. Four of these are slated
for closure in the next five years. There is much talk of small modular
reactors, but for the wait for the approval of these is interminable,
held up by bureaucrats.
In the meantime, we are prematurely running down our oil and gas
capacity. According to some calculations, Britain has enough gas
reserves in the North Sea to cover 35 years of consumption. Yet since
2019, the UK has refused to grant any new oil and gas licences.
And we’ve even levied a specially designed windfall tax on the existing producers.
But Ed Miliband has a cunning plan. He wants to build lots and lots
of windmills. And don’t forget solar. He plans to build more than a
billion solar panels across the UK.
And so the English countryside, immortalised by Constable and Turner,
will soon be enhanced with large acreages of photovoltaic plates.
Now I’m not an expert, but it is not clear to me that Britain has a
comparative advantage in sunshine. In fact, according to the World Bank,
there is only one country with less sunshine than Britain, and that is
Ireland. Nor do we have a comparative advantage in building solar
panels, they are all made in China with coal. We do have an advantage in
wind, of course, but Britain’s wind is surprisingly similar to German
wind.
We also suffer from Dunkelflaute. Both Germany and Britain are hoping
and praying for a solution to the storage problem, but this is the
biggest policy gamble in history. Ed Miliband is definitely a gambler,
but he’s not gambling with his own money. He is gambling with the
British economy and with British livelihoods.
We can already see the consequences. The last British steel blast
furnaces will close this year. Britain has lost one third of its
chemical industry in the last four years. Jim Ratcliffe, the owner of
the largest independent chemical company in Britain, has warned that our
chemical industry faces extinction.
He is moving his company, INEOS, to America.
But it is the car industry where Europe wins the biggest prize for
self-immolation. The EU has set itself the target of shutting down all
sales of internal combusted engine cars by 2035.
But Brexit Britain will not be outdone. Britain may not be a world
leader in car manufacturing, but we may just be the world leader in
destroying car manufacturing. We have brought forward our target for
electric-only cars to 2030, five years ahead of the EU. The EU car
industry still employs nearly 14 million people. The UK car industry,
813,000.
The only question is how many of these will still have a job by the time
Ed Miliband loses his. In his recent Baku speech, Zakir Sharma
reassured the British people that despite his extremely aggressive
targets for emissions, people won’t have to change anything about their
lifestyles. This is nonsense. Europe’s governing elites have a bad case
of what you would call trade-off denial.
We talk as though the huge subsidies to the renewable industries or
to global climate aid have no budgetary consequences. We choose willful
blindness to the catastrophic job losses in energy-dependent industries
and we ignore the impact of energy costs on people’s standard of living.
Net zero is immiserating and its main victims are the poor.
There is a saying in poker that if you’ve been playing for half an hour
and you don’t know who the patsy is, then the patsy is you.
Britain and Germany are the patsies of net zero. Creating abundant
clean power is a great thing as long as it works and as long as it is
commercially viable.
But Britain and the EU especially have combined it with policies
deliberately designed to make energy use prohibitively expensive.
So expensive that it is driving companies out of business or overseas.
We think we’re setting an example but other countries have not followed
us. All we are doing is outsourcing our energy provision to the US and
the Gulf and outsourcing our manufacturing to the US and China. We have
exported our jobs to more polluting countries and we are re-importing
the emissions by buying their goods and we are doing all this on the
backs of the poor.
Cheap and abundant energy is the foundation that underpinned our
prosperity. Industry knows this, America knows this, nations in the Gulf
know this and China knows this. The question for Europe, Australia and
Canada is simple.
Will we choose to relay the foundations of our prosperity? If we do
not, we will simply continue down the path to unilateral economic
disarmament."
***
And how exactly can Europe in this state and with these policies hope to win a war against Russia?
Garry Kasparov at the Kyiv Security Forum, translating form the Obozrevatel, May 12:
"How the World Can Live with a Putin-Led Russia
I agree with absolutely everything that was said (at the Forum – Ed.), but the people who spoke came from European countries where Russian propaganda has a huge influence, and this influence generates political consequences.It generates and feeds the forces that support Putin and the war he unleashed in Ukraine.Putin invested huge amounts of money in this, and achieved influence at the highest levels of power – here we can recall politicians like Merkel, who built Europe's energy dependence on Russia, or Sarkozy who, during negotiations with Georgia after Russia's invasion, actually supported the latter.
So, European politics failed or failed to recognize the threat from Russia in a timely manner.My first article about the existential threat from Putin was published in 2001, and since then I have been talking about this threat constantly, but Europe was reluctant to listen.And even today, in the fourth year of a full-scale war, Europe is still only thinking about how best to help Ukraine.At the same time, North Korea has given Russia more weapons than all of Europe has given to Ukraine.It is a disgrace.
Now I will tell you how Europe should live with Russia under Putin.Russia under Putin is a military camp.And you, in Europe, need to admit that you are already today, right now, in a state of war.And I am not telling you this - Putin is telling you this.He has been openly telling you for years that his goal is revenge for losing the Cold War.You need to be consistent. Ukraine is an open battlefield where Russia uses all means, not only military, but also economic, as well as influence with money on European politicians.And Putin is winning battle after battle, precisely because Europe does not want to understand that it is in a state of war and oppose Putin with all its might.Europe's current actions are ineffective.Sanctions do not work well - business goes through third countries.And the fake "Victory Day" and the parade in Moscow became a demonstration of the union of dictators, led by Putin sitting next to Xi Jinping.This global alliance of dictators, which includes North Korea and other Asian countries, is what makes Putin strong.And the answer to the question: "how to live with Putin" becomes obvious.
You cannot live in peace with Putin's Russia, because the algorithm of its existence is war.All of Russia today is a military camp, military propaganda, military industry.The only way to live with Russia is to destroy this imperial virus that has been infecting Russians for centuries. And this can only be achieved by defeating Russia.In other words, Ukraine must win, and Russia must lose.All other talk that softens this situation, for example, that "we will stay with Ukraine as long as necessary" leads us down the wrong path.We must work together to eliminate imperial thoughts and imperial approaches in Russia - and for this, Russia must lose.There is only one way that can shock the Russian public: the Ukrainian flag must rise in Sevastopol.This will be a shock for them.
Of course, Putin is going to destroy the free world and this is a huge threat not only to Europe but to the whole world.As for Europe, it has not yet been able to overcome even the problems with Hungary and Slovakia, with the far right and the far left in Germany and France.Today, pro-Putin forces are advancing in Europe, they have more and more opportunities.This is a war that cannot be simply "stopped" without defeating Russia.If you want to win, you must realize this.You should have, for example, stopped oil exports from Russia many years ago."
"Opinion - Russia tortured a Ukrainian journalist to death — yet Trump wants to negotiate
Alexander J. Motyl, opinion contributor
The Ukrainian journalist Viktoria Roshchyna
went missing in August 2023 while pursuing a story in Ukrainian
territory occupied by Russia. She died in a Russian prison in September
2024. Her body was given to Ukraine in February 2025.
A
forensic examination determined that she had been tortured and that
several of her organs had been removed. She was 27 years old at the time
of her death.
Roshchyna
isn’t the only Ukrainian civilian to have been slaughtered by the Putin
regime. Three years ago, in March 2022, just several weeks after
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, some 500 Ukrainians were
tortured and executed in the town of Bucha, north of Kyiv. The
mutilations and massacres — of both Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of
war — have continued unabated since then.
Needless to say, the bestial Putin regime is guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide.
As
tragic as Roshchyna’s death is, it’s also profoundly political. The
Russian authorities could have kept her body or disposed of it some way.
Instead, they decided to return it to Ukraine — not in 2024, but in
2025. The timing may be accidental: never underestimate the political
incompetence of torturers.
Or
it may be — in fact, probably is — intentional. After all, it is quite
likely that Russian President Vladimir Putin knew of Roshchyna’s
incarceration and deliberately returned her body to send President Trump
a message.
Namely: Cajole, appease and threaten me as much as you like, but I won’t settle for anything less than Ukraine’s destruction.
Putin’s subsequent
decision to drop bombs on civilians, and especially children, in Kryvyi
Rih, Sumy and Kyiv — at precisely the time that the Kremlin is
supposedly negotiating with the White House — reinforces the point. Like
Roshchyna’s release, the bombings clearly state that Russia has no
interest whatsoever in peace.
This
is hardly surprising. Putin has invested his entire career and
reputation in the war. Having suffered close to one million casualties,
he can’t just settle for bits of four provinces, all the more so as
Russia officially annexed them in 2022. To accept the status quo is to
be humiliated as a loser. Putin’s got to have it all.
Which
means that there can be, and will be, no peace as long as Putin remains
in power. Only his departure, whether voluntary or not, will enable
whoever succeeds him (possibly) to pursue an end to a war that is
destroying Russia.
Do Trump and his minions understand that Putin is playing them by
assuring them he wants peace, while at the same time implicating them in
his crimes by telling them to their faces that he is a killer? That
whatever overtures Trump, Secretary of State Mario Rubio, Vice President
JD Vance or Steve Witkoff make amount to turning a blind eye to the
slaughter of innocent human beings? The military historian Phillips
O’Brien goes further and says that “Trump is helping Putin kill Ukrainians.”
In effect, Putin is challenging Trump to approve of Russia’s brutal
violation of human rights and international norms. Since the
administration has failed to endorse several United Nations resolutions
condemning the Russian aggression, Putin has reason to believe that he
can taint the White House and thereby relativize his guilt.
Thus far, Trump and friends have either fallen into Putin’s trap — Witkoff certainly has
— or have welcomed Putin’s embrace of barbarity. The first implies that
the White House consists of inexperienced amateurs who can’t tell that
they’re being suckered. The second ascribes brutality and a lack of
empathy to Trump et al.
Both versions are plausible, alas. And neither speaks highly of the White House’s moral standards or political acumen.
Trump could easily extricate himself from Putin’s bear hug by being at
least as tough with him as he’s been with Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelensky. Is the American president aware of the dilemma he confronts
and how history will judge him if he makes the wrong choice and condones
Roshchyna’s death?
The tragedy is that, although the answer is obvious, we don’t know."
But
since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the Russians have
treated Ukrainian children more like prisoners of war and pawns in
President Vladimir Putin's effort to forge a new Russian empire.
Moscow has sent some teens to Russian camps
where they’re brainwashed to forget their nationality and receive
military training. Some teens have told us that they’re encouraged to take up arms against their home country.
One boy, who was 16
when abducted, said he refused to sing the Russian national anthem,
which was required each morning, and was thrown into solitary
confinement four times. Fortunately, after nearly a year he managed to
escape the camp, aided by Save Ukraine, a group that has rescued 630 children.
The
teen, whose first name is Rostyslav ‒ we can’t use his last name for
fear of reprisals against his family ‒ tells his compelling story in our
documentary "A Faith Under Siege," which will premiere May 10 on the Christian Broadcasting Network News.
Putin accused of war crimes in kidnapping Ukrainian children
Along
with the teens, the younger children suffer from having been torn away
from their families, including some who were turned into orphans by
Russians who killed their parents.
Yet
indoctrinating children in schools isn’t enough for the Kremlin. They
want to make them Russian citizens, and Russia does so by forcing
Ukrainian orphans to get Russian passports. Once they do, returning to
Ukraine, even to their extended families, would violate Russian law
against international “adoptions.”
"Trump's Fortress World: Harari Warns of a New Dark Age of Empire, War and Collapse
April 19, 2025
...Yuval Noah Harari... in the Financial Times... dismantles the idea that Trump is erratic or musunderstood. Instead, Harari argues, "his policies are... consistent, and his vision of the world... clearly defined"... "In the Trumpian vision... the world is seen as a zero-sum game in which every transactions involves winners and losers."... So what does this vision lead to? A world of "fortresses"...
In such a world, lacking shared values of international law, "how would rival fortresses resolve their disputes?" Trump's answer, Harari explains, is brutally simple: "The way to prevent conflicts is for the weak to do whatever the strong demand." War, in this view, is not caused by aggression but by the refusal of the weak to surrender... This logic, Harari says, explains Trump's shocking blame of Ukraine for Russia's invasion... "Since Ukraine is weaker than Russia, it should have surrendered... and since Ukraine refused to surrender, the war is its fault."...
In this fortress world, Harari warns, true cooperation dies, and imperialism returns. "Trump himself is very clear about his own imperial plans," he writes. "He clearly wants vassals rather than allies." He cites Denmark..., noting that despite its loyal support of the US in conflicts like Afghanistan - where 44 Danish soldiers died - Trump offered no thanks, only demands..."
"Trump Made a Bonkers Request to Ukraine as It Battled Russia
Julia Ornedo
President Donald Trump
reportedly asked several foreign governments if they would accept U.S.
deportees who are not their citizens—including war-torn Ukraine.
Documents obtained by The Washington Post
revealed that the Trump administration asked Kyiv in late January to
take in third-country nationals deported by the U.S., all while Ukraine
was fending off Russia’s attacks.
A
Ukrainian diplomat told American counterparts that while Ukraine had a
“solid track record of accepting the return of its citizens when removed
by the United States,” it was dealing with “wartime exigencies,” the Post reported Tuesday...
The proposal to
Ukraine, relayed by a senior U.S. diplomat, was reportedly one of many
that the Trump administration sent to multiple countries around the same
time. Former U.S. officials told the Post that the proposal was unusual and outside of routine diplomatic correspondence.
A
Ukrainian diplomat reportedly told the U.S. Embassy that they would
respond once they formulated their position, but there is no indication
that Kyiv seriously weighed the proposal...
Trump had a meltdown
at Zelensky last month after the Ukrainian president rejected a
proposed peace deal that involved recognizing Crimea as Russian
territory."
This article from the Hillis almost 3 months old but, unfortunately, sounds all too actual.
"Trump’s impotent words on the Ukraine War
by Steven Pifer, opinion contributor - 05/05/25
President Trump has repeatedly cited as an asset his “very good” relationship
with Russian President Vladimir Putin. However, that “very good”
relationship has delivered nothing in terms of a more accommodating
Kremlin approach to settling the Russia-Ukraine war.
Putin has taken no serious steps in response to Trump’s calls to halt
the fighting. Trump should therefore back his words with actions.
In 2024, Trump claimed he could end the war in 24 hours. On Jan. 22,
just two days after returning to the presidency, Trump addressed the
conflict on Truth Social: “I
love the Russian people, and always had a very good relationship with
President Putin. … All of that being said, I’m going to do Russia,
whose Economy is failing, and President Putin, a very big FAVOR. Settle
now, and STOP this ridiculous War! … IT’S ONLY GOING TO GET WORSE. If we
don’t make a “deal,” and soon, I have no other choice but to put high
levels of Taxes, Tariffs, and Sanctions on anything being sold by
Russia…”
Several days later, Putin praised Trump as “clever” and “pragmatic.” The Russian president did not, however, suggest any change in approach to his war against Ukraine. Trump took no action.
On Mar. 11, the Trump administration secured Ukraine’s agreement to a 30-day ceasefire. Steve Witkoff, a businessman who leads the negotiating with Moscow, conveyed the ceasefire proposal directly to Putin three days later. Putin did not accept it... Trump took no action...
During the night of Apr. 23 to 24, the Russian military struck Kyiv with a barrage of ballistic missiles and drones, killing 12 civilians and wounding more than 90. Trump wrote that he was “not happy” and continued, “Vladimir, STOP! … Lets [sic] get the Peace Deal DONE!”
Putin’s response? Russian drones mocked Trump’s call, killing another eight Ukrainians the following night. Again, Trump took no action, not even to delay Witkoff’s fourth visit to Moscow. On Apr. 25, his envoy greeted Putin with a broad, friendly smile.
Putin has been playing Trump. Does the U.S. president now understand this? On Apr. 26, he posted on Truth Social
a rant attacking Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden for not doing
enough for Ukraine — failing to mention that, during Trump’s first term,
he did nothing to return Crimea to Ukraine or end the fighting in
Donbas.
His post went on: “With all of that being said, there was no reason
for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns,
over the last few days. It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to
stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with
differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’”
Will Trump finally take action? Putin has learned from experience to
expect no real measures, only words, from the U.S. president. And those
words look increasingly impotent and weak...
On Apr. 27, Trump told the press,
“I want him [Putin] to stop shooting, sit down and make a deal,” but if
Russian attacks continued, “I have a lot of things that I can do.”
Trump indeed has many things he could do to get the Russians to take a
more serious approach to end the war. If he wants to get Putin’s
attention, he should start doing them."
