Posted on 04/18/2025 4:20:37 AM PDT by marcusmaximus
The Trump administration's informal end-of-April deadline for Russia to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine is drawing near without any commitments from the Kremlin.
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U.S.-Russia talks have shown little clear progress and President Trump's promise of a swift peace deal appears nowhere near fruition. Still, he insisted Thursday that a ceasefire was getting closer and that he'd be "hearing from Russia this week."
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Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Friday that Trump was prepared to abandon peace talks altogether within a "matter of days."
"We're not going to continue to fly all over the world and do meeting after meeting after meeting if no progress is being made," Rubio said.
He did not blame either side or say whether the U.S. would impose any costs before walking away.
In response, the Kremlin argued that progress had already been made but said no further contacts with the U.S. were planned for this week.
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White House envoy Steve Witkoff met Russian President Vladimir Putin for more than four hours last Friday in St. Petersburg.
Witkoff said he emerged with a clearer idea of Putin's demands for a peace settlement.
But he didn't get Putin's approval for a 30-day ceasefire plan Trump has been pushing for six weeks as a first step toward longer-term peace, and which Ukraine has signed off on.
(Excerpt) Read more at axios.com ...
Putin doesn’t appear smart enough to realize this slow walking is destroying him on the world stage; of whatever opinion is left of him.
This will be seen as a huge failure.
President Trump was very clear with Putin that he wasn’t joking about the Easter ceasefire deadline.
Putin is running out of time. Tomorrow is President Trump’s deadline to Putin. The clock is ticking.
I don’t think Putin is concerned about what the world thinks. He is concerned about staying alive. He gambled and he lost. He might, arguably be “winning,” for whatever that means in this context, on the ground. It doesn’t matter. He has to sell whatever happens as a victory. Right now, he has control of what the Russian’s see. But when he has to demobilize part of the army, he’ll lose that control and all hell will break lose. Among his other problems, the economy is artificial and once the war is over, he won’t be able to keep up the illusion. Before you say, “everything is fine in Russia,” wars cause inflation and when they end there’s an instant and sharp recession. Think WWI and the bonus riots or WWII, which was much softer because we exported out recession to the world.
Can Putin, as opposed to Russia, survive the chaos of an uncontrolled reentry to normalcy? And what would normal look like? It’s unlikely Europe will ever buy Russian energy. Few companies will venture into the political and social chaos of the hyper corrupt business scene where the Silovicky (Those authorized to used force) can walk into your office with guns and take your company.
Putin has to keep the war going for his personal survival. On the good side, he’s in his seventies and it probably won’t be that long.
They need to work on a long-term deal.
As I have stated many times here, Putin is not going to give Trump and Hegseth 30 extra days to rearm Ukraine.
As in Reagan’s eight years as President, the Russian Military-Industrial Complex cannot outproduce the American MIC.
If I needed money, and all I needed to do was attack the country next to me of course I’d attack the country next to me. Who is going to stop me? Putin isn’t going to stop until he takes Ukraine. It’s a waste of time to even discuss it.
Right but the optics will be very bad...
Is it sarcasm? Zelensky cried that his power grid gets bombed, Putin offered a partial ceasefire regarding energy infrastructure as a test run for a general ceasefire. Russia abides, Kiev doesn’t. Trump failed to influence Zelensky to comply. The more it continues the more Putin is justified and the weaker Trump’s hand is.
“Putin doesn’t appear smart enough to realize this slow walking is destroying him on the world stage; of whatever opinion is left of him.”
BREAKING NEWS: The ‘World Stage’ is far bigger than Brussels, which is evidenced by the fact that countries representing 80 PERCENT of the world’s population have NOT imposed ‘sanctions’ on Russia.
Sometimes I wonder why Trump puts up with all this crap...
Putin has to keep the war going for his personal survival. On the good side, he’s in his seventies and it probably won’t be that long.
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yup, so does Zelinsky.
that’s what makes this so difficult. Both people who can stop this don’t want to stop this. So now what? Biden turned foreign affairs into one big stink’n cluster fck.
The invasion continues ONLY because Putin refuses to stop the war.
Zelinsky refuses to accept reality. He can’t win sh*t without standing on the shoulders of the U.S. He is neither a hero or a warrior, quite the opposite as long as thousands of his young countrymen continue to march to the slaughter house.
clusterfck indeed.
Right, so he should immediately surrender the 80% of Ukraine that is free? Okay
My opinion about Ukraine and Putin is definitely evolving. I was one who bought into Russia’s narrative regarding the war but now it looks like Putin is exactly what many believed him to be, an enemy of The United States. He appears to be taking advantage of President Trump’s good nature and desire for peace. He will come to regret this decision.
We may have to fight Russia after all. Not ideal but if we are not moving toward peace we will have to get on with the business of war especially after Russia has rejected peace. We’ll see.
Putin will only declare a cease fire when he has reestablished the borders of the USSR and made a buffer of the surrounding countries.
The lack of progress will be laid squarely at the feet of Ukraine for not surrendering in the first place.
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