Free Republic

US President-elect Donald Trump said that a meeting was being set up between him and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday. "He wants to meet, and we are setting it up," Trump said in remarks before a meeting with Republican governors at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his generals have an artful knack for keeping the Russian military bear off-balance. On Sunday, they renewed their offensive in the Russian Kursk Oblast, once again catching the Russian high command, Kremlin, and many pundits by surprise. Reports of a demoralized Ukrainian army fighting to retain terrain captured during the August Kursk offensive — of which at least 40 percent has been lost — have circulated among western media and Russian milbloggers since November. So too reports that Ukraine’s 155th Mechanized Brigade — trained and equipped by France — was under-resourced in “first person view...

A top Iranian general has accused Russia of lying to Tehran by saying its jets were attacking Syrian rebels while they were instead bombing the open desert. In a rare break from Iran's diplomatic line on Syria, Brig. Gen. Behrouz Esbati partially blamed Moscow for the fall of Bashar Assad's government during a speech at a mosque in Tehran. An audio recording of the speech was published on Tuesday by Abdullah Abdi, a journalist in Geneva who reports on Iran. "We were defeated, and defeated very badly. We took a very big blow, and it's been very difficult," Esbati said...

Furious Russians have been shown bitterly complaining about the soaring cost of groceries in a revealing clip which underlines the parlous state of the nation’s economy almost three years in Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine. And the clip, uploaded to X by a Russian blogger and shared by among others former Ukrainian Interior Ministerial adviser Anton Geraschenko, demonstrated that ordinary Russians are feeling the pinch. In it, the narrator says: “Oh my God! Shaving foam costs 570 rubles [£4.39] already. What a horror. A couple of months ago I bought it for only 250 rubles [£1.77].” He then asks one...

Russian TV host Vladimir Solovyov, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, recently called for Alaska's return to Russia during a recent Russian-state media program. -snip- During the recent program, Solovyov said Finland, Warsaw, the Baltics, Moldova, and Alaska should be "returned to the Russian Empire." "Do you think I'm joking when I mention Finland, Warsaw, the Baltics, Moldova? Everything returned to the Russian Empire. And Alaska too, while you're at it," Solovyov said in a translated video.

Russia has released a chilling propaganda video in which Moscow's defence systems blow up Santa Claus and his reindeer, as the Kremlin remains silent on accusations it killed 38 people after it shot down an Azerbaijani passenger plane. The propaganda video, released on pro-Russian Telegram channels, shows a 'Western' Santa flying over a snowy Moscow while carrying a can of Coca Cola while wishing Russian citizens a merry Christmas. He can be seen carrying missiles in his sleigh that resemble a NATO Trident or Minuteman III ICBM and others. But within seconds, he is blown up with a festive missile...

Russian commanders are reportedly refusing to send their troops to join a planned offensive to storm the Dnipro river. Putin's army is building up its forces on the left bank of the Dnipro river, as it prepares to force a crossing. Intelligence reports suggest 2,000 assault troops have been assembled in the Kherson region, along with some 300 speedboats. However, many senior officers believe the planned assault to be a suicidal mission and are reluctant to commit their troops and equipment to the fight, according to the ATESH partisan group. In a post to their Telegram channel, they wrote: "Russian...

Zelensky defiantly stood his ground in Kyiv as Russia invaded - despite reports that Russia would claim it in days. UKRAINE drafted a secret plan to move its government to London before tyrant Vladimir Putin invaded in February 2022. But when Russian forces launched their illegal assault Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky famously refused Western pleas to seek safe haven. "The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride," he told the US, according to the Ukrainian embassy in Britain. The embassy said Ukrainians were "proud of their President" as he stood strong in the face of danger when Putin...

The Moscow Exchange dropped by 1.7% to 2,424 points as of 1400 GMT, marking its lowest level in 20 months, because of ongoing geopolitical tensions in Russia and uncertainty surrounding the Russian Central Bank’s monetary policy decisions. Tensions between Russia and Western countries, along with sanctions, continue to weigh heavily on the nation’s markets as E.U. imposed new sanctions on Russia following the U.S. While the Russian Central Bank’s tight monetary policies have yet to yield results in combating inflation, uncertainties regarding decisions to be made during the bank’s December 20 meeting have negatively impacted financial indicators. -snip- On Oct....

Wars are often chaotic, but the introduction of foreign troops can add another layer of confusion. In the Kursk region of Russia, that confusion appears to have turned deadly. According to Ukraine’s defense intelligence (GUR) and Hotnews, North Korean soldiers accidentally killed eight Chechen fighters from the Akhmat battalion. The incident, GUR claims, was caused by a language barrier between the North Korean troops and their Russian allies. The Chechens, loyal to Ramzan Kadyrov, were reportedly mistaken for enemy forces. The North Koreans fired on their vehicles, leading to the deaths. This is part of a larger development. Ukraine says...

AT least one person has died after a Russian oil tanker split in two, with a second ship damaged in the Black Sea. Footage shows one of the tankers split completely in half, with its bow vertically in the water, upturned and rapidly sinking. An emergency rescue operation is currently underway to desperately evacuate both crews in yet another blow to Putin. The Volgoneft-212 and Volgoneft-239 are wrecked in the Kerch Strait amid fears for at least 27 sailors, with the damage reportedly resulting in a devastating oil spill. Russian investigators say they have opened two criminal cases to look...

This is the dramatic moment a Ukrainian aircraft-style drone explodes after flying into a Russian special forces base more than 700 miles from the front line. Several drones reportedly struck the OMON police unit in Grozny, and a base from where troops are sent to fight against Ukraine. Loud explosions were reported in the city, which is the capital of Chechnya, a region headed by Putin warlord Ramzan Kadyrov, who has sent tens of thousands of troops to the war. Shooting was heard in attempts to down the pilotless plane loaded with explosives, but there appeared a lack of air...

FOOTAGE from Syria shows hordes of Vladimir Putin's troops fleeing the country in military trucks after a decade of bloodshed. And satellite pics from a Russian airbase on the west coast reveals how Vlad's men have been forced to take apart their attack helicopters and air defence units before leaving hot on Assad's tail.

The Kremlin has appointed Lieutenant General Andrei Ivanayev as commander of the Vostok Battalion group of forces, which is leading the assault in Ukraine's eastern Donbas region, according to state affiliated media. The popular Ukrainian military Telegram channel Country Politics, which has more than 290,000 followers, reported Ivanayev's appointment on Friday suggesting it was tied to a visit by Russian Defense Minister Andrey Belousov to the region. Over the past year, Russian forces have made grueling but steady advances in the Donbas, which President Putin formally annexed as part of Russia in September 2022 though his troops only partially control...

Vladimir Putin has been alerted that Russian military personnel and equipment are now "stranded" in Syria following the dramatic downfall of Bashar al-Assad's regime. The dictator escaped Damascus over the weekend and was flown to Moscow at Putin's personal request. However, Anastasia Kashevarova, a Russian blogger known for her criticism of her country's military leadership - but not Putin himself - warned the President about the precarious situation left behind. In a post on Telegram, she detailed: "Bashar al-Assad is in Moscow, and our military is stuck and blocked in Syria, Libya, Africa." She added: "Our bases have been completely...

A leading Putin missile scientist has reportedly been gunned down in a Moscow park by a Ukrainian military assassin. Mikhail Shatsky, the Deputy Chief Designer at the Mars Design Bureau, which develops and manufactures onboard guidance systems for the Russian military and space industry, was allegedly eliminated by an unknown assassin in Kuzminsky forest park, at Kotelniki, eight miles southeast of the Kremlin. Reports say the scientist, an associate professor, was working actively on upgrading the Russian Kh-59 cruise missile to the Kh-69 level, which Russian troops use to strike Ukraine. There was immediate speculation that he was assassinated by...

Ukrainian long-range missiles have struck a major military centre inside Russia which is home to Vladimir Putin's 'Flying Kremlin' doomsday plane. The strikes hit Taganrog, a city of about a quarter of a million people in the Rostov region, causing ten loud explosions and bright flashes. Initial reports said there were two possible targets - the Beriev Aircraft Company, which maintains some of Putin's most important planes, and the Krasny Hydropress plant, which makes key missile elements and is part of Russia's Tactical Missile Weapons Corporation. Putin's Ilyushin Il-80 Maxdome plane - for use in nuclear war - is maintained...

The first significant Russian strategic defeat as a direct consequence of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine is the loss of its Mediterranean outpost. Vladimir Putin’s obsession with Ukraine has led Russia to channel virtually all its military forces and resources into the Ukrainian conflict. Russia has suffered massive losses, stretching its military thin and making it increasingly difficult to defend the country’s geopolitical interests elsewhere. Not only has the Kremlin pulled its military forces from vast stretches of Russia’s enormous territory and thrown them into the Ukrainian meat and metal grinder, but Moscow has also neglected other areas where the...

DRAMATIC new footage shows Ukraine’s “Sea Baby” marine drones using on-board machine guns to pound and damage Russian military helicopters in a ferocious battle. Watch as the armed drones also shoot at Russia's Su-30SM warplanes during the battle in Kerch Bay, close to Vladimir Putin's £3 billion Crimean Bridge. Footage from the view of the unmanned Ukrainian attack boats - first deployed in 2022 - shows the scopes being trained on airborne Russian helicopters and planes. The video shakes violently as Ukrainian soldiers remotely spray rounds of bullets at the aircraft swooping in the skies above. The Ukrainian SBU security...

When Vladimir Putin took the reins of power in a post-Soviet Russia in shambles a quarter-century ago, he immediately set about restoring Moscow's status as a global power. It took 15 years, but Russia heralded its military intervention in the Syrian civil war as proof of its return as a force to be reckoned with on the international stage. Moscow leveraged that image to expand its influence throughout the Middle East and beyond as a counterweight to the West. Now, the fall of the government of President Bashar al-Assad, a key ally of Moscow, has dealt a serious blow to...