Posted on 05/24/2024 9:42:37 AM PDT by Kazan
Long gone are the days when Ukraine was at least winning the war on the western news sites’ headlines.
Now, slowly but surely, the MSM has had to face the fact that the outmanned, outgunned and outmaneuvered Ukrainian forces will not win this war on the battlefield, will not get back to pre-war borders, much less reincorporate the Crimean peninsula.
And up until a minute ago, to state the obvious fact that Ukraine will have to cede territory during peace negotiations with Russia got you branded as a ‘Kremlin stooge’ or worse, and only the most courageous politicians, such as Hungarian Viktor Orbán, Slovak Robert Fico as well as American Donald Trump, dared utter these words.
But now, that exact same unavoidable fact has been splashed on ABC News, and voiced by a frontline leader from the Ukrainian army – someone who can’t be shaded as a ‘Vladimir Putin’s shill’.
We are talking about the leader of Ukraine’s 57th Motorized Brigade, an infantry unit battling the new Russian offensive North of Kharkov.
Colonel Oleksandr Bakulin was interviewed by ABC News in the presence of a ‘senior Army leader’ at a secret location.
I’m stressing this fact because I believe it shows that Bakulin has not ‘gone rogue’ in the surprising thing he said.
The situation in the Northern Kharkiv region is ‘quite difficult’, Bakulin says, but Ukrainians ‘managed to slow down the enemy’.
(Of course, as reinforcements for North, Kleesheva, Andreevka and other localities further south are falling prey to Russian advances – which was always Moscow’s plan.)
Furthermore, Bakulin said that the Russians still have reserves [in Belgorod near Kharkov] and are poised to bring these reserves into the battle when the time is ripe.
ABC News reported:
“’We do understand how crucial this [US] aid is’, Bakulin said. ‘The whole the world understands. Yes, our soldiers are brave and courageous, but without this aid, these weapons, shells, everything, without this we would not be able to keep fighting in a war against Russia, just because we are way smaller than Russia‘.”Bakulin called the Ukrainian army retreating ‘a normal part of the ebb and flow of warfare’. But he introduces the ‘novel’ idea that ‘Ukraine has already won’.
“Despite the advances made but the Russians, he pushed back at the idea that Ukraine is losing the war, saying, ‘I personally think that we have already won this war. The question is at what point it is going to end, and at what stage’.
Bakulin said he predicts that in the end this war will be ended by a deal, saying, ‘Every war ends in peace talks and deals’.”
This is unprecedented, and introduces the new narrative: by merely surviving the war, Ukraine wins.
But Bakulin wasn’t done: he accepted that territory will need to be given up during negotiations, citing the experience of nearby Finland.
“’Little Finland once fought against big USSR’, Bakulin said. ‘Yes, it lost some territories. But it still does exist as a country and Russia doesn’t even look in that direction. We are in a similar position, but I hope we will not lose our land’.”
Now, let me reming you that a ‘senior Army leader’ was present at the interview, showing that this line of narrative ‘Ukraine wins the war merely by surviving’, has authorization to be floated.
“The war is far from over and the lack of heavy weaponry is still operationally critical. He put it succinctly when asked about the casualties caused by the lack of armaments, saying ‘The sweat of the artillery soldiers saves the blood of the infantry soldiers. But if there is only sweat without the shells, then infantry soldiers pay it with their blood’.”
Bakulin’s interview it’s just a cope, but also introduces a new ‘objective’ that is actually perfectly obtainable.
Let’s see if this will become the new mantra: ‘Ukraine already won’.
Any updates on the high Russian egg prices?
We’re well past the point of just “ceding territory”
Calls it a victory, that’s some “They’re lucky we stopped when we did or I’d REALLY show ‘em” while sitting strapped to a backboard energy.
Even if Russia takes “only” half of Ukraine, it is still a “win” for Ukraine, considering the original goal was to take all of The Ukraine proper and then absorb Transnistria in Moldova.
If Putin is willing to make a peace deal by not conquering all of Ukraine (and agrees to annex only the Donbass) then this is a very generous deal indeed. I’m sure Russia will also demand that Ukraine can never be part of NATO, else the deal is off.
If Zelinskyy is smart, he will take the deal without hesitation. This give them time to rebuild and live for another day.
“I’m sure Russia will also demand that Ukraine can never be part of NATO, else the deal is off.”
NATO would have to agree to this condition and NATO never will. Russia does not get a vote in who does or does not join NATO.
You'll have to ask Marcus Maximus about that. He's the expert on that topic.
That might well be true, despite Putin's noises about peace talks. If I were looking at it from Putin's point of view, Merkel's comments re: Minsk would not engender any trust with respect to "the West" honoring agreements. Any peace agreement would carry the suspicion that a Ukraine rump state would serve as a further staging area for future hostilities, ala a 'Muslim Peace'.
That may be the reality we're looking at.
That was never the Russian goal.
The Russians wanted to liberate ethnic Russian part of Ukraine. They have been perfectly happy if the Minsk Accords or the deal worked out in Turkey in March of 2022 had been implemented.
The Biden regime and neocons wanted this proxy war with Russia and did everything they could to keep it going.
Almost 2 1/2yrs-of nothing but constantly wrong- and $220,000,000,000 later.
Currency off almost 50% and he is paying 16.875% to borrow money.
Winning!!!!
Putin will die of cancer for the 14th time and Ukraine will run out of men and munitions for the 12th time and the always wrong crowd will be wrong.
its not Zelensky's decision to make
for all the criticism he receives, the man was first elected overwhelmingly on a platform of implementing the Minsk accords, peace in Donbas and stability with Russia. Either he was completely lying, or (as we have seen) forces in the West made sure that peace was never an option.
Zelensky, like Biden himself, is pretty much a figurehead.
The borders will end up where they would have been had Biden and the EU been willing to negotiate before the shooting started.
But Biden and the EU refused to talk and got the war they wanted.
They managed to end the lives of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and Russians so they could end up right back where they started.
All of this was avoidable.
“Even if Russia takes “only” half of Ukraine, it is still a “win” for Ukraine, considering the original goal was to take all of The Ukraine proper and then absorb Transnistria in Moldova.”
False. NATO’s original goal was regime change in RUssia - by overthrowing the Ukraine in 2014 and building a 600K army to get the job done. Putin’s original goal was to drive Zelensky to the negotiating table to discuss biowarfare labs and infringements on NATO agreements. Even Biden refused to let Zelensky negotiate. NATO is using the Ukraine as its proxy in a war to remove Putin and install a NATO puppet.
Then, will cease to exist.
What don't you understand about that?
We're, thankfully, NOT putting troops on the ground. Europe isn't going to if we don't. Ukraine can't stop the Russians from ultimately taking all of Ukraine it wants.
But, it's painfully obvious, you don't give a damn about Ukraine or Ukrainians. All you care about is killing Russians. That's what makes twisted, sick freeps like you so dangerous to national and world security.
You said: “I’m sure Russia will also demand that Ukraine can never be part of NATO, else the deal is off.”
I don’t see how Putin would believe what they say because NATO previously agreed never to make Ukraine part of NATO, and here we are. NATO lied last time, I don’t know how Putin expects to get the them to do as they promise this time.
“All you care about is killing Russians.”
If they’re occupying someone else’s country.
Let them go home from the occupied territories of Ukraine, Moldova, Finland, Japan, and Georgia and I’ll go back to not giving a rip about them.
“If they’re occupying someone else’s country.”
Return Ottoman Property then.
This will be the deal that President Trump works out, with peacekeepers somehow involved.
And the Ottoman’s should return property to the Byzantine Greeks. Who should return property .. this could go on and on!
Exactly.
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