Free Republic

Aug 14, 2025

The summit between Russian and US Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump will begin at 11:30 local time (Alaska Daylight Time), and will kick off with a one-on-one conversation in which only interpreters will be present, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov announced on Thursday in a briefing. After the initial meeting, the parties will continue negotiations in the format of a working breakfast. "It is expected that everything will begin tomorrow, August 15, at approximately 11:30 local time (22:30 Moscow time/ 21:30 CET/ 15:30 ET) with a conversation between Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and Donald Trump," the diplomat said. "This conversation...

Slowly but surely, Kiev seems to be adjusting its territorial demands to reality.In the runup to the Donald J. Trump-Vladimir Putin peace talks in Alaska on Friday 15, Kiev regime leader Volodymyr Zelensky was featured in dozens of news outlets repeating the same line, as we reported yesterday:The Washington Post: “Ukraine will reject any proposal that involves ceding territory to Russia, Zelensky says”; BBC News: “Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine will not give up land as Donald Trump suggests idea ahead of meeting Vladimir Putin in Alaska”; Reuters: “‘Ukrainians will not give their land to occupiers,’ President Zelenskiy said”; The Straits...

US President Donald Trump on Thursday took a sharp jab at India and Russia -snip- Russia and the USA do almost no business together." He added, "Let’s keep it that way, and tell Medvedev, the failed former President of Russia who thinks he’s still President, to watch his words. He’s entering very dangerous territory!”

President Donald Trump on Monday reduced to less than two weeks his deadline for Russian President Vladimir Putin to either reach a peace deal with Ukraine or face massive "secondary tariffs" on Moscow's trade partners. Trump previously gave Putin a 50-day deadline, which was set to expire in early September. But he signaled Monday that things were taking too long, saying "I'm going to make a new deadline of about ...10 or 12 days from today." "I'm disappointed in President Putin," Trump said in Scotland alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. "Russia and Ukraine — I would have said five...

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wants to see the war between Ukraine and Russia come to a close following their meeting at the NATO Summit. Trump was asked about the meeting during his press conference at the summit in the Hague, Netherlands. “He couldn’t have been nicer. I think he’d like to see an end to this, I do. What I took from the meeting — couldn’t have been nicer, actually — but I took from the meeting he’d like to see it end,” Trump said. “I think it’s a great time to end it....

Vladimir Putin has lost four warplanes worth £37 million each despite stepping up their defences after Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb. A pair of Su-34 fighters were destroyed and two more damaged after an attack on on Marinovka military airfield in Volgograd. Ukraine used long range drones to fly more than 200 miles to inflict the latest £148 million blow to Putin’s aerial firepower. It came less than a month after Russia supposedly tightened its military air base security after 40-plus strategic bombers and spy planes were hit in Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb. Russia responded by hitting Ukrainian civilians with a strike on...

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea will send thousands of military construction workers and deminers to support reconstruction work in Russia’s Kursk region, a top Russian official said Tuesday, the latest sign of expanding cooperation between the nations. North Korea has already supplied thousands of combat troops and a vast amount of conventional weapons to back Russia’s war against Ukraine. In April, Pyongyang and Moscow said that their soldiers fought together to repel a Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk border region, though Ukraine has insisted it still has troops present there. Wrapping up a one-day visit to Pyongyang, Russian Security...

President Trump, angrily, to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office, February 28: “You don’t have the cards! You’re buried there! Your people are dying! You’re running low on soldiers!” Since that time . . . In March alone, the Russians suffered an estimated 41,000 combined killed or wounded in action, with 272 Russian tanks, 1,644 artillery systems, and 607 combat armored vehicles destroyed or disabled. (Since the start of the war, Russia has lost an estimated 12,835 tanks and armored vehicles, 305 aircraft, and 22 naval vessels.) Without anything resembling a manned navy, Ukraine has largely nullified the...

During the Istanbul talks between Russia and Ukraine, when presented with Moscow’s demand that Kiev’s troops must withdraw from territory of the four regions that they have partially conquered (Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporozhie and Kherson), the Ukrainian delegation reacted with a strong rejection of this point. It’s been widely reported that, at this point, Russian negotiators warned their foes: ‘Next time, it won’t be four regions, but six or eight’. That could, of course, be nothing but bragging, except that today the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that units of the 90th Tank Division have reached & crossed the western border...

What needs to happen is simple, but, at least for now, looks pretty suspect if you ask me. Russia would need to get so exhausted from the war that its lines collapse. After losing 1 million casualties, thousands of tanks and artillery pieces, and billions of dollars in bombers and drones, Moscow would one day see its war effort collapse in a mix of exhaustion, anger about the overall direction of the conflict, and a society that had had enough. This would allow Ukraine to reclaim the initiative and retake large swaths of territory. But from here, things get even...

President Trump thought Ukraine's surprise drone attack over the weekend was "strong" and "badass," sources who discussed it with him tell Axios, but he's also concerned it will make his ceasefire mission even harder. -snip- He has been surprisingly mum in public when it comes to his personal feelings about Ukraine's attack. In private, though, he marveled at the operation. Behind the scenes: "Pretty strong," Trump told one confidant, who relayed his remarks to Axios. "He thought it was badass," a second source said of Trump's reaction. One Trump adviser said: "From an international perspective, you've got a chihuahua inflicting...

While Spiderweb played out on Telegram and television, Russian forces continued to advance – slowly, methodically, and without spectacle. Around Chasiv Yar, in the ruins of Avdiivka, and along the land bridge to Crimea, Moscow is doing the work that wins wars. It’s pushing lines. It’s holding ground. It’s breaking down Ukrainian defenses by weight of numbers, firepower, and time. That kind of warfare doesn’t trend on social media, but it changes maps.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has revealed that a devastating drone strike which obliterated more than 40 Russian aircraft, including "irreplaceable" nuclear-capable warplanes, was orchestrated from within Russia—right under the nose of the Kremlin’s feared security service. The dramatic operation, which reportedly caused a staggering $7 billion in damage, was launched using 117 drones and struck at the heart of Russia’s air capabilities, hitting 34 percent of its strategic cruise missile carriers. In a remarkable statement on his official X account, President Zelensky shared details of the operation, describing it as a major success that had been in the works for...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday hailed the Security Service of Ukraine's operation, in which Ukrainian drones targeted over 40 Russian warplanes at several airbases in Russia, stressing that it achieved an "absolutely brilliant result." "One year, six months, and nine days from the start of planning to effective execution," Zelensky said in a post on X, emphasizing that it was Kiev's longest-range operation. He went on to say that such Ukrainian actions "will undoubtedly be in history books." "We are doing everything to make Russia feel the need to end this war. Russia started this war, Russia must end...

RussiaNews 🇷🇺 @mog_russEN 🚨⚡️ President Vladimir Putin: “In case of massive use, Oreshnik missiles will deliver a strike equal in power to a nuclear weapon.” No nukes needed — just Russian engineering. One launch... and it’s over. From الموجز الروسي | Russia news 🇷🇺 1:32 AM · Jun 2, 2025

More than 200 settlements in Sumy region under evacuation orders after Russia takes control of two villages. Ukrainian officials issued evacuation orders on Saturday for 11 more villages in the northern Sumy region after continued Russian gains led to fears that Moscow could be gearing up for a fresh ground offensive. Russia advanced deeper into Ukrainian territory on Saturday, taking control of two more villages in Sumy and killing two people in a missile and drone barrage. More than 200 settlements in the region were already under evacuation orders. The attacks came as Ukrainian diplomats continue to discuss participating in...

TWO Russian airfields housing Putin's nuke bombers have reportedly been blitzed in an extraordinary drone strike - wiping out at least 40 aircraft. A Ukrainian security official told Reuters that the SBU conducted a large drone attack on Tu-95 and Tu-22 strategic bombers - which Russia uses to fire long-range missiles at Ukraine. The source did not specify where the drone attack took place, but Ukrainian media said that Olenya airbase - home to Russia’s Tu-95 strategic bombers - had been targeted. The second base under fire is understood to be the Belaya nuclear airbase in eastern Siberia’s Irkutsk region...

FOUR Russian airfields housing Putin's nuke bombers have reportedly been blitzed in an extraordinary drone strike - wiping out at least 40 aircraft. Ukrainian drones - reportedly launched from lorries inside Russia - targeted airbases in Belaya, Diaghilevo, Olenya and Ivanovo as part of a daring operation codenamed "Spiderweb".

President Donald Trump has had a simple and bold plan to win the peace in the brutal war between Russia and Ukraine. In my opinion, Trump knew getting President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians to negotiate was never going to be the problem. But Russian President Vladimir Putin would be. So Trump seemingly castigated the Ukrainians at the very same time he extended a very welcoming hand to Putin, a nonthreatening and nonjudgmental one at that. Trump's maneuver was a brilliant one, including a peace deal that would start with both sides agreeing to an immediate ceasefire. As expected, Zelenskyy...