Free Republic

President Joe Biden, 79, his 59-year-old Secretary of State Antony Blinken and 45-year-old National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan have deliberately camouflaged the Ukraine War as a war between Ukraine and the Russian Federation. While 44-year-old Ukrainian President Volodymer Zelensky and his 40-year-old Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba publicly admit the U.S. is funding and supplying weapons to Ukraine, they all deny the obvious: That the U.S. is at war with the Russian Federation.

The relatives of the doomed crew of Russia's Black Sea flagship Moskva defied Russian censors to hold an unofficial memorial today, as Ukraine claimed that all 510 servicemen onboard died - including the ship's captain. -snip- As a result 'all the crew of the cruiser Moskva died'. This included the ship's captain, Anton Kuprin, Gerashchenko said. The battleship had a usual crew number of 510 sailors. He claimed: 'The leadership of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation have deliberately hidden the truth from relatives and friends of the crew members.' His account contradicts other earlier versions, including that...

The prime ministers of Sweden and Finland, Magdalena Andersson and Sanna Marin, both signaled Wednesday that they will likely be applying for membership in NATO. The “prospect” is most “welcome,” says The Washington Post: “Finland and Sweden Should Join NATO.” The editorial was titled “A Way to Punish Putin.” Before joining the rejoicing in NATO capitals, we might inspect what NATO membership for these two Nordic nations would mean for the United States. Finland is a nation the size of Germany, but with a population only 4% of that of Russia and a border with Russia that is 830 miles...

Activists from the western Russian city of Smolensk have petitioned the country's parliament, the Duma, to demolish a symbolic memorial site to the Katyn massacre and a cemetery for its victims, Russian daily Kommersant has reported. Images posted online showed heavy machinery, bearing the pro-war 'Z' and 'V' symbols, approaching the Katyn monument in an apparent bid to destroy it. The memorial site and monument commemorate the Katyn Forest Massacre in western Russia, a series of mass executions of Polish POWs, mainly military officers and policemen, carried out by the Soviet NKVD security agency in April and May 1940. The...

Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused Western banks of failing to pay for Russian gas supplies after he demanded that European Union member states and other countries pay for Russian gas in rubles. Speaking at a meeting on the current situation in the country's oil and gas sector on April 14, Putin blamed Western partners for what he called "defaults on export deliveries of Russian energy resources." "Banks from these extremely unfriendly states are withholding the transfer of payments," Putin said. Last month, Putin demanded that EU nations pay for gas supplies in rubles as crippling international sanctions slapped on...

Ukrainian officials have run more than 8,600 facial recognition searches on dead or captured Russian soldiers in the 50 days since Moscow’s invasion began, using the scans to identify bodies and contact hundreds of their families in what may be one of the most gruesome applications of the technology to date. The country’s IT Army, a volunteer force of hackers and activists that takes its direction from the Ukrainian government, says it has used those identifications to inform the families of the deaths of 582 Russians, including by sending them photos of the abandoned corpses. The Ukrainians champion the use...

Russia's communications watchdog has blocked access to the Russian language website of The Moscow Times, a newspaper that has covered Russia for three decades since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Moscow Times said Russian internet providers had already started to block its Russian-language site. It published a notice from Russia's communications watchdog which said its site was now blocked. Russia's communications watchdog did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Russia's foreign ministry on Friday warned of unspecified "consequences" should Finland and Sweden join the US-led NATO defence alliance, after Moscow sent troops into Ukraine. Moscow's military actions in Ukraine have sparked a dramatic U-turn in public and political opinion in both Finland and Sweden over long-held policies of military non-alignment. ..."The choice is up to the authorities of Sweden and Finland. But they should understand the consequences of such a step for our bilateral relations and for the architecture of European security as a whole," Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement. She added that...

The prime ministers of Sweden and Finland, Magdalena Andersson and Sanna Marin, both signaled Wednesday that they will likely be applying for membership in NATO. The "prospect" is most "welcome," says The Washington Post: "Finland and Sweden Should Join NATO." The editorial was titled "A Way to Punish Putin." Before joining the rejoicing in NATO capitals, we might inspect what NATO membership for these two Nordic nations would mean for the United States. Finland is a nation the size of Germany, but with a population only 4% of that of Russia and a border with Russia that is 830 miles...

Kyiv was hit on Friday by some of the most powerful explosions heard since Russian forces withdrew from the area two weeks ago. Moscow said it had struck a plant in capital that made and repaired Ukrainian missiles, including anti-ship missiles.

Around 400 clergymen of the Ukrainian Church under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Moscow collectively appeal to the Council of the Primates of the Ancient Eastern Churches (the highest “court” of Orthodoxy worldwide) against Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, In particular, the 400 clergymen of the Ukrainian entity of the Patriarchate of Moscow are pressing charges against Patriarch Kirill, claiming that Kirill preaches the doctrine of the “Russian world”, which deviates from Orthodox teaching and should be condemned as a heresy. They also stressed that Patriarch Kirill has committed moral crimes, blessing the war against Ukraine and fully supporting the...

A ‘sharp recession’ lies ahead for Germany should it be cut off from the Russian gas it is so badly addicted to. Germany’s energy situation does not appear to be getting any better, with a recently released report suggesting that the country would fall into a “sharp recession” should it suddenly lose access to Russian gas. While Europe as a whole appears keen to implement harsh embargos on Russian energy imports, Germany’s chronic addiction to Russian gas has put a wrench in such works, with authorities in the country having expressed disbelief as to how the addiction issue was ever...

VATICAN CITY, April 11 (Reuters) - The Vatican is studying the possibility of extending Pope Francis' trip to Lebanon in June so he can fly to Jerusalem to meet there Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, who has backed Russia's war in Ukraine, two sources told Reuters on Monday. It would be only their second meeting. Their first, in Cuba in 2016, was the first between a pope and a leader of the Russian Orthodox Church since the Great Schism that split Christianity into Eastern and Western branches in 1054. Kirill, 75, has given his full-throated blessing for Russia's invasion of Ukraine,...

Heavy fire tonight in Belgorod city, Russia as the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations stated that the situation is under control

CIA Director William Burns said Thursday the United States should not dismiss the possibility of Russia using nuclear weapons in its war with Ukraine. Following a speech at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Burns said, "Given the potential desperation of (Russian) President (Vladimir) Putin and the Russian leadership, given the setbacks that they've faced so far militarily, none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons." "While we've seen some rhetorical posturing on the part of the Kremlin about moving to higher nuclear alert levels, so far we haven't...

Russia has moved its warships away from the Ukrainian coast, a United States defence official said today, after a double missile strike is believed to slammed into the navy's Black Sea flagship and caused it to 'start sinking'. In a sign the Kremlin may be withdrawing its naval forces out of missile range, the senior official said that Moscow's vessels are now 80 nautical miles from the coast after the Moskva - a Soviet-era Slava class guided missile cruiser - was 'seriously damaged' overnight by a fire and explosion. Russia's Defence Ministry attempted to downplay the damage to the warship,...

BEIJING -- China on Thursday said it would reject “any pressure or coercion” over its relationship with Russia, in response to a call from U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen for Beijing to use its “special relationship with Russia” to persuade Moscow to end the war in Ukraine. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian defended China’s position on the war, saying it had “made considerable efforts to de-escalate the situation, defuse the crisis and rebuild peace." “China is playing a constructive role in the Ukraine issue," Zhao told reporters at a daily briefing. “We oppose unfounded accusations and suspicions against China, nor...

Six weeks into Russia's invasion of Ukraine it can be argued that the full array of issues affecting the Russian military and its operational planning have been laid bare. Setting out to first seize Kyiv within days in order to have a strong position in negotiations with the West about the future status of Ukraine in exchange for a reduction of sanctions, it suddenly finds itself a month past that deadline with meagre territorial gains, an army in tatters and severe reputational damage, not to mention an economy buckling under some of the heaviest sanctions ever instated on a nation....

Russia has warned NATO that if Sweden and Finland joined the military alliance then the Kremlin would have to bolster its nuclear defences in the Baltic. 'There can be no more talk of any nuclear-free status for the Baltic - the balance must be restored,' said Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council. 'Naturally, we will have to reinforce these borders. Until today, Russia has not taken such measures and was not going to. If our hand is forced well... take note it wasn't us who proposed this.' The former president added Russia would 'seriously reinforce its group of...

Ukraine Sinks Battlecruiser Moskva in the black sea today with 2 Direct hits from Neptune Anti Ship Missiles. This is a huge defeat for the Russian navy, as the loss of the Black Sea Fleet's flagship can only be a serious loss to morale....