Putin is 'putting out feelers' to see if America is ready for talks on ENDING war in Ukraine with the president 'prepared to drop opposition to Kyiv joining NATO', report claims

Daily Mail ^ | 1/26/2024 | Miriam Kuepper

[marcusmaximus]

Vladimir Putin is allegedly putting out feelers to see if America is ready for talks on ending the war in Ukraine.

The Russian president is also 'prepared to drop opposition to Kyiv joining Nato', according to a new Bloomberg report.

[marcusmaximus]

Biden gave Putin the green light to invade Ukraine in a “minor incursion” and Putin and his crappy army screwed up the entire deal. Russian flags were supposed to fly over Kyiv within 3 days after the start of the invasion.

[UMCRevMom@aol.com]

VIDEO

Ukraine frontline village unites to rebuild
Reuters
January 22, 2024
1:57 Minutes
https://www.reuters.com/world/kremlin-denies-report-that-putin-reaching-out-us-might-drop-key-demands-ukraine-2024-01-26/

[gleeaikin]

“NATO wants the US to shoulder the whole cost...”

That is so NOT true. NATO has already given almost as many $billions as we have. The EU wants to give another multi$billion package. The hold-up is Putin’s buddy Orban in Hungary. Now another recently elected far right leader in a small country (Slovakia?) is joining Orban in the hold-up. Several countries, I think Poland at 4% GDP, have increased their contributions above the 2% stated goal which more of the NATO countries are now paying than before.

As to our contribution, a lot of it is arms which are obsolete and approaching their use or decomission date. The latter are being used for their original purpose, keeping Russia in check. Several countries have ordered our newer equipment. Poland wanting 500 Abrams tanks I believe. We have a shipping cost rather than a dismantling cost, and are freeing up space for new equipment rather than buying/renting more space. Also, what we are actually recording as spent is the brand new replacement cost with upgrades, rather than the old, obsolete merchandize value. It is only around 5 or 6% of our total military budget. to keep a territory hungry dictator in check.

[BroJoeK]

Husker24: "An agreement where Ukraine joins NATO would be a defeat for Russia. No way they agree to that."

traderrob6: "My thought exactly when I read the headline."

armourenthusiast: "I would assume this is CIA fake news."

SomeCallMeTim: "Seems more likely he wants assurance that Ukraine will NOT become part of NATO"

hardspunned : "Total, complete BS.
This is the most ridiculous hope porn western disinfo that you’ve ever come up with.
Not BS? Let’s revisit your post in month and enjoy the laughter."

This comes from the linked article:

"US officials said they were not aware of any overtures by Russia and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied the claims today saying: 'No, this is a wrong report. It absolutely does not correspond to reality.' "

The idea makes no sense that I can see, apparently it's just somebody floating ideas to see the reactions.

[BroJoeK]

aynrandfreak: "Then there’s no need for huge new funding to Ukraine!"

So, does this mean that you agree, assuming the report here is 100% fake news, that huge new funding for Ukraine is now needed?

[aynrandfreak]

I’m against the open-ended funding they want now. I think we need to have publicly-stated war aims as the next order of business. What is the goal; regime change in Russia? Back to the 2022 border?

[BroJoeK]

faithhopecharity: "russia will never permit nato military in ukraine"

marcusmaximus: "Russia said the same thing about Finland and Sweden."

Vlad the Invader, whatever delusional fantasies he has relating himself to Peter the Great and Old Uncle Joe Stalin, Vlad still has no authority -- zero, zip, nada authority -- to dictate which countries will or will not join NATO.

Indeed, Russia itself in the 1990s was informally invited to join NATO and signed several agreements of friendship and cooperation with NATO.
Even Vlad himself discussed it with NATO leaders and US Pres. Clinton in 2000.
However, within just a few years Vlad started down a very different path, which lead to his 2008 invasion of Georgia, 2014 "annexing" Crimea, plus invading the Donbas, and now since 2022 fully into Ukraine, with three more oblasts "annexed".

Map showing NATO members in blue with related allies in other colors. See link for color keys:

[BroJoeK]

desertsolitaire: "What do they ultimately get out of having done this that is better for them than they were before the invasion?
Do they stay and occupy what Uke territory they currently control?
Are there rewards to them for doing that that pay for the cost of occupying?"

hardspunned #37: "They will complete the conquest of the traditional Russian areas (300 years) which means Odessa and Kharkiv will be lost to Russia permanently. "

Here is the truth of it:

"Russkiy Mir" is the key to understanding Vlad the Invader's actions and motives.
"Russkiy Mir" means: if you live close to Russia then you are Russian and must obey directions from Moscow.
If you live further from Russia and claim not to be Russians, then you must still "Kowtow", to use the Chinese term for it, to Moscow and honor Vlad's demands.

hardspunned #37: "Had the West actually negotiated the Minsk Agreements in good faith, perhaps the eastern part of what was Ukraine wouldn’t have been transformed back to Russian."

Once you understand "Russkiy Mir", you know that this is all just lies & nonsense and that Vlad the Invader was going to do what he has to do regardless of what pretexts he has to concoct for it.

The real reasons for Vlad's invasions of foreign countries had nothing to do with alleged provocations and everything to do with Vlad's perceptions of Western, especially American, weaknesses.
Our manifest weakness after Afghanistan in 2021 was the primary driver behind Vlad's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine and everything else is just a smokescreen of nonsense meaning nothing.

hardspunned #37: "Putin will also ensure that NATO Ukraine will NEVER happen.
These are the goals originally set and when they are accomplished the Russians will consider ending this if NATO GTFO of Ukraine. "

Despite the best efforts of Vlad the Invader's spokesmen here on Free Republic, in fact, Vlad will have no say -- zero, zip, nada, zilch say -- in which countries join NATO and which don't.
Indeed, some current NATO countries (i.e., Hungary, Slovakia) may eventually decide they'd rather belong to the "Russkiy Mir" than to NATO, but that will be their choice, not Vlad's.

This outdated 2014 map is still Vlad the Invader's "Russkiy Mir" vision of Europe:

[BroJoeK]

aynrandfreak: "I’m against the open-ended funding they want now.
I think we need to have publicly-stated war aims as the next order of business.
What is the goal; regime change in Russia?
Back to the 2022 border?"

It sounds to me like you are exactly right.
Sadly, our Democrats are all too quick to jump into wars, often without a plan for victory, then they fight until "war weariness" sets in before disgracefully abandoning our allies as we did in, for examples, Vietnam and Afghanistan.

Such American fecklessness only encourages the world's bad actors to behave their worst, as we now see in Ukraine and elsewhere.

Your words here reflect my opinion and those of House Speaker Johnson just last month.
A plan for victory was his first demand and strict accountability for aid sent to Ukraine was his second.

So far as I know today, neither concern has been seriously address by the Biden administration.

This could lead us to the worst possible of outcomes, though I sincerely hope not.

[UMCRevMom@aol.com]

Defense spending portion of the federal budget INFO GRAPHICS

[linMcHlp]

bttt

[Gaffer]

Seems to me the predictor winds should consider that Ukraine has formally applied to NATO, but has NATO actually voted upon and given Ukraine NATO Official Aspirant status?

[BroJoeK]

US defense spending has fallen steadily since 1945.
In round numbers, here are the peak spending levels since:

1. 1944 World War II peak ~40+% of GDP
2. 1952 Korean War peaked at 15% of GDP
3. 1968 Vietnam War peaked at 10% of GDP
4. 1986 Cold War Reagan peaked at 7% of GDP
5. 2008 War on Terror peaked at 5% of GDP
6. 2020 Trump military buildup peaked at 4% of GDP
7. Today circa 3% of GDP.

This graph goes all the way back to 1792.
Note previous wars, 1812, 1846, 1860s, 1918 and 1940s.

[BroJoeK]

gaffer: "Seems to me the predictor winds should consider that Ukraine has formally applied to NATO, but has NATO actually voted upon and given Ukraine NATO Official Aspirant status?"

This map shows NATO members in blue with various categories of other partners in different colors.
Ukraine shows here among "Enhanced Opportunities Partners" along with Georgia, Sweden & others.

Note that Australia, Japan and SoKo, among others, are shown as "Global Partners".

For full key on different colors, see this link.

What all these terms mean in practice is anybody's guess.

This map lists Ukraine & Georgia as "Countries seeking membership", as opposed to Sweden and Bosnia which are said to be "in process of accession"

[Gaffer]

Good feelings and intentions are two different things. As of July 2023, the Ukraine had a three-step - two step process to get by before being formally asked by NATO to join NATO. I don't expect that to happen until the war is resolved, frankly.

https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3455199/leaders-agree-to-expedite-ukraines-nato-membership/

[gleeaikin]

Your comment #73 has very interesting graphs for relevant current events. In WW2 we were spending 40% of GDP on the military. Putin is currently spending a similar amount of Russia’s GDP on something he makes it illegal to call a WAR. No wonder Russians are getting upset with him.

Currently we are spending 3% of GDP on our military. We have asked NATO members to provide 2% to NATO. but some members are spending as much as 4%. Since our 3% is divided between both European AND Asian commitments, it would appear European NATO members are doing their share. Since we are only spending around 5% of our military budget for Ukraine, our worry warts need to understand only 0.6% of our GDP has currently been spent to help keep greedy Putin from invading and destroying an independent country. Both we and Russia agreed to protect Ukraine when they returned all their nuclear weapons back to Russia when the soviet Union split up. Putin’s behavior is exactly the same as when Hitler violated a nonaggression agreement with the Soviet Union at the beginning of WW2. Alas, leopards don’t change their spots over time.

[MalPearce]

For crying out loud. Russia had that assurance from Ukraine before they even launched the SMO.

There were two attempts to negotiate peace before the March talks. The first was led by Putin’s ghostwriter.

The second was by Russia’s former deputy PM, Dmitry Kozak, who secured concessions from Ukraine on exactly this point... but Kozak was then told that Putin had decided to extend his war aims to annexing the entire south of Ukraine therefore assurances from Kyiv that Ukraine would not apply to join NATO weren’t good enough. (https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/09/14/putin-rejected-early-ukraine-peace-deal-to-pursue-expanded-annexation-goals-reuters-a78787)

On March 15th 2022, during the third attempt at peace negotiations, the Ukrainian negotiators pitched that concession again and the Russian negotiators actually agreed to it. And just to make sure the regime in Russia couldn’t deny that they’d already made these assurances, Zelenskyy went on national television and explained that Ukraine would not apply to join NATO.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_eDyZfJh84

Putin’s intransigent “nyet!” even when Ukraine agrees to the condition he publicly insists Ukraine must accept, is not just unfathomable, it’s completely pointless... because even if Ukraine applied to join NATO, it falls too far short of satisfying the qualifying criteria. Even Biden’s told that to Putin, directly.

So... count the assurances. (1) Ukraine wasn’t going to apply to join NATO, (2) if it reneged on that promise and did apply it wouldn’t qualify any time this side of 2040, (3) even if Ukraine bent over backwards to satisfy all possible preconditions for membership before 2030, the chances of all existing members of NATO unanimously approving it were zilch because Hungary and France have already said they would veto it.

If you read the 2021 demands Moscow sent to NATO, they are clear that the NATO open door policy must be completely rescinded... and every time Putin insists on slapping that back on the negotiating table as if UKRAINE can sign that off, or the USA can unilaterally rewrite the NATO charter against the wishes of EU-NATO, Putin kills whatever progress has been made toward a peace agreement.

The assurances Putin demands are utterly impossible for Ukraine to say yes to, because they’re demands to NATO. But they’re also impossible for NATO to agree to, because even if the USA did put a motion on the NATO table to take the Article 5 umbrella away from the Baltic states, EU-NATO would never agree to it.

But Putin keeps insisting on the NATO charter rewrite. If Putin watered down his demands to telling NATO to end its open door policy from 1st April 2024, NATO might vote for that. But vote to do that retrospectively, and effectively expel every NATO accession state that joined after 1997? It’s for the birds, and what I’d really like to hear from the “Boris killed the peace deal” crowd is how on earth they think Ukraine, the USA, the UK, and 30 other countries including the Baltic States, could’ve UNANIMOUSLY agreed to those terms.

[BroJoeK]

MalPearce: "But Putin keeps insisting on the NATO charter rewrite.
If Putin watered down his demands to telling NATO to end its open door policy from 1st April 2024, NATO might vote for that.
But vote to do that retrospectively, and effectively expel every NATO accession state that joined after 1997?
It’s for the birds, and what I’d really like to hear from the “Boris killed the peace deal” crowd is how on earth they think Ukraine, the USA, the UK, and 30 other countries including the Baltic States, could’ve UNANIMOUSLY agreed to those terms."

Thanks for a coherent discussion of those negotiations.
NATO will never vote to end its open-door policy, meaning Russia itself can still apply for membership if it ever cleans up its act and forgets about "Russkiy Mir".

Regarding the negotiations you discussed, I've seen our Putinistas claim it was Ukraine which killed the deal at Istanbul in 2022 because Americans insisted, with some combination of Victoria Nuland and George Soros pulling strings behind the scenes??

Anyway, I doubt if Ukraine will become a full member of NATO until long after some resolution is reached on the current war.
Until then, Ukraine will enjoy a status as some level of "partner", meaning continued major NATO countries' support short of direct warfare against Vlad the Invader's SMO there.

[MalPearce]

It’s selective amnesia on their part... To put it charitably.

Boris did indeed tell Ukraine that we wouldn’t support the deal on the table... So they are fixated on him saying it.

What they studiously avoid mentioning is, Boris didn’t say anything against the negotiated deal until after Putin intervened to insist the Russian negotiators include the unattainable NATO charter rewrite as a non negotiable part of it.

It’s like the cobblers over Nuland picking the INTERIM leadership of Ukraine. Which was not a coup.

Ukraine wouldn’t have needed an interim prime minister AND an interim president AND an interim government all at the same time, if Russia hadn’t provoked Maidan.

It’s basic cause and effect; because of Putin’s blackmail over summer and fall 2013 the Azarov government folded; because of Yanukovych’s “biggest act of betrayal of his own country since Benedict Arnold” deal with Moscow in December 2013 even Yanukovych’s own party voted to impeach him; because Yanukovych couldn’t face impeachment he went AWOL.

So, Putin didn’t want the USA to meddle in Ukrainian affairs. But he could’ve spent all of 2013 sitting with his thumb up his ass instead of propelling Ukraine into civil unrest and a collapse of a regime that wasn’t remotely hostile to Russia.

Putin is a retard. It’s his own retarded fault Nuland had an open goal to kick at.

[BroJoeK]

MalPearce: "It’s like the cobblers over Nuland picking the INTERIM leadership of Ukraine. Which was not a coup."

Pro-Putin conspiracy theories notwithstanding, nothing I've seen suggests that Nuland did anything during the crisis of 2013-14 other than engage in random conversations with other American diplomats.

That Nuland may have mentioned some Ukrainians favorably in some of those conversations does not in any way constitute a "coup" or anything remotely resembling.
It was simply diplomats doing what diplomats naturally do.

Even if, somehow, Nuland's opinions became known to Ukrainians who then used her words like a campaign political endorsement, that still in no way constitutes a "coup".

At most it would be the equivalent of... take your pick... somebody in Canada's foreign ministry expressing their preference for, say, Biden over Trump.
That might sway a few votes, but it's still not a "coup".

Which is not for a moment to defend Nuland or anything she may, or may not, have actually done, I'm simply saying that Ukrainians themselves are in charge of their fate, not some US State Department underling.

Euromaidan Revolution in Ukraine, 2013 to 2014: