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While the raid was happening, a tweet appeared on Bolton’s X page. Interestingly, the post did not concern the raid at all but focused on the Ukraine-Russia war. The tweet was sent at 7:32 AM ET. As TGP readers know, the FBI entered Bolton’s Maryland home about half an hour earlier at 7 A.M ET. Bolton stated that Russia’s ultimate goal was to make Ukraine entirely a part of Russia and said the peace talks would prove futile. Moreover, he said that Trump would only hold further meetings because he wants the Nobel Peace Prize rather than a sincere desire...

Russell Bentley, a self-described “Donbass Cowboy,” joined Russian forces soon after they created a proxy state in eastern Ukraine in 2014. He quickly became one of Russian propaganda’s favorite Americans, receiving a Russian passport and a gig with state-run Sputnik TV. On April 8, the 64-year-old Austin native better known under his call sign “Texas” was detained by Russian soldiers in the city of Donetsk, occupied by Russia for the past decade, according to his wife. Eleven days later, he turned up dead. He is the latest in a string of figures involved in Russia’s 2014 takeover of parts of...

Ukraine’s most heavily fortified region has become the center-point for peace talks to end the war with Russian leader Vladimir Putin reportedly demanding that Kyiv cede the entire territory to Moscow. But the Donestk oblast — which is smaller than Massachusetts and home to about 4 million people — has been at the center of some of the most brutal fighting of the war, and the Kremlin has not been able to take the entire region after more than three and a half years. A source familiar with Friday’s meeting between Putin and President Trump described negotiations over the fate...

Ukraine hit two Russian cities with drone attacks the day before President Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin were set to meet in Alaska.Ukraine hit the cities of Rostov-on-Don and Belgorod. Reuters reported:Thirteen people were wounded, two seriously, when a drone struck an apartment building in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, the acting regional governor said. Three civilians were wounded in the city of Belgorod near the border with Ukraine, according to the governor of that region, who posted video appearing to show a drone striking a car in the centre of the city.Meanwhile, Russian troops have been making significant...

Until today, there have been no confirmed reports of Storm Shadows being deployed since November last year. VLADIMIR Putin's officers have been killed in droves in the first British-made Storm Shadow strike in months, reports claim. Bombshell footage showed the damage in Donetsk amid claims of “massive casualties among Russian officers” and the “crippling” of a mad Vlad fighting force. If confirmed, it would be the first use of the British-supplied missiles in months. Red-faced Russian authorities admitted only that a woman had died and three people were wounded, including a teenager. A building collapsed in the combined missile and...

Russia seems to be preparing a significant offensive in Ukraine as it is moving troops toward key positions on the front, the Financial Times reported on May 13, citing undisclosed Ukrainian intelligence officials. These reported preparations indicate Moscow's efforts to escalate the war despite expected ceasefire talks this week and calls by Kyiv and its partners for an unconditional 30-day truce. Russia has rejected ceasefire proposals unless accompanied by a halt on military aid for Ukraine and continues ground assaults along the front and long-range strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure. Some 163 clashes were recorded at the front over the past...

The head of Russia's mercenary outfit Wagner said it could take months to capture the embattled Ukraine city of Bakhmut and slammed Moscow's "monstrous bureaucracy" for slowing military gains. Russia has been trying to encircle the battered industrial city and wrest it ahead of Feb. 24, the first anniversary of what it terms its "special military operation" in Ukraine. "I think it's (going to be in) March or in April," Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin said in one of several messages posted online overnight. "To take Bakhmut you have to cut all supply routes. It's a significant task," he said, adding:...

While Moscow hails him for being an efficient mediator, Kyiv insists that Lukin sent the order to militiamen in Sloviansk from their Russian bosses. Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) released a transcript of an intercepted telephone conversation between Lukin and Igor Strelkov, head of the pro-Russian self-defense of Sloviansk. According to the SBU, Strelkov’s real name is Igor Girkin, a Russian national and colonel of Russian Military Intelligence. “I’m in Donetsk right now, in good company… You do sort of have a general idea about the task that I’ve been given, don’t you?” Lukin said. “Yes, I know, I’ve been warned…...

Russia does not seek to absorb all of Ukraine, as the Russians have "returned" five regions and Crimea, obtaining what they need, states the US Special Envoy for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff. The Special Envoy emphasized the importance of reaching a fair agreement for Ukraine, but stressed that the US and Western countries cannot allow this country to drag them into a Third World War. He added that this is not his personal opinion, but the policy of President Donald Trump. When asked by the journalist about the plans of the UK and several other European countries to send...

Ukraine accused Moscow on Thursday of forcibly relocating hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians from their besieged homes to Russia, where officials believe many will be held as “hostages” to negotiate a surrender from Kyiv. Lyudmyla Denisova, Ukraine’s ombudsperson, said 402,000 people – including 84,000 children – have been deported against their will. Russia gave nearly identical figures of those that have been relocated, though claimed that the people wanted to leave. Russian Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev on Thursday said that the roughly 400,000 people evacuated to Russia since the invasion began were from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern...

Belarus foreign minister dies suddenly - one day after meeting Pope's envoy Ante Jozić amid speculation they were discussing a secret peace plan in Ukraine. CAREER SPY Makei had been foreign minister for a decade and was due tomorrow and Monday to host Vladimir Putin's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov in Minsk. Lavrov's spokeswoman said Russia was 'shocked' at his passing. No cause of death was given - but several sources speculated that his demise could be suspicious. Makei was described as 'healthy'. He had been trained in the Soviet GRU and had a reputation as Lukashenko's 'grey cardinal'. While Lukashenko...

US President Donald Trump has decided to extend sanctions against Russia for at least another year, according to the relevant document in the Federal Register. The document emphasizes that the United States first imposed sanctions on Russia in 2014 when Russian soldiers invaded Ukrainian territory, occupying Crimea and parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Since then, the initial executive order on sanctions, #13660 from 2014, has been repeatedly expanded by US presidents through other orders as Russia continued and escalated its aggression.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the Izvestia newspaper in an interview published Wednesday that Russia sees "no grounds for negotiations yet" to end Moscow's war on Ukraine. President-elect Donald Trump's imminent return to the White House has revived speculation as to a possible deal to end Russia's full-scale invasion of its neighbor, which by the time Trump takes office again will be nearly three years old. Russia still occupies around 20% of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four entire regions -- Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia -- though it only partially occupies the areas it claims.

Russia has removed a senior commander from his post for making false claims about the progress of the war in parts of eastern Ukraine, according to military bloggers and Russian media. Colonel General Gennady Anashkin, the commander of the South Forces Group, was dismissed after providing misleading information about Russia’s progress near the Siversk settlement in the eastern region of Donetsk, according to the bloggers. Russian media RBC reported Anashkin’s removal, citing unnamed sources within the Russian Ministry of Defense who said he was removed as part of a planned rotation. There has been no official confirmation from Russian officials....

Fighting on the ground is gaining momentum both in the Donetsk region, where Russian Federation forces advance in multiple areas of the front, and also on the Kursk region, where the Ukrainian incursion is getting squeezed from the flanks, as Moscow endeavors to expel Kiev’s troops. In the battle for the strategic city of Toretsk, the Ukrainian defenders now only control less than half the city as they try to stave off the Russian assault, according to the city’s local authorities.

A U.S. citizen known to have fought with pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine between 2014 and 2017 has been killed in Moscow-occupied Donetsk, Russian media reported Friday. Russia-installed authorities in eastern Ukraine had earlier this month reported the American — 64-year-old Russell Bentley — as missing. "Russell Bentley, known as 'Texas,' a real American, truly from Texas, was killed in Donetsk," the head of the pro-Kremlin RT network Margarita Simonyan said on social media. "He was fighting for our guys," she said. Simonyan gave no details on how he died. The Vostok battalion with which he fought confirmed his death, calling...

Russell Bentley, 64, who fought alongside pro-Putin rebels in eastern Ukraine, was tortured and murdered by Russian servicemen, Kremlin investigators said on Friday. Bentley, a self-described communist from Dallas, Texas, went missing in the Russian-occupied city of Donetsk in April and was later found dead. Nicknamed “Texas”, he regularly appeared on pro-Kremlin social media channels, backing Moscow’s full-scale military offensive.

The missing American who’d traveled to Ukraine years ago to aid Russian separatists in Donbas was found dead in the country’s war-torn eastern region. The body of Russell Bentley, a 64-year-old U.S. Army vet, was recovered in the Russian-controlled region of Donetsk Oblast, Reuters reported. -snip- The former pothead, who used “Texas” as his military call-sign, left behind a yoga instructor girlfriend to travel to Ukraine. He utilized crowdfunding sites to finance his trip, and had since become a Russian citizen. He also got married after moving to Ukraine, where he began working as a reporter for the state-owned Sputnik...

Denis Pushilin, the head of the Donetsk region, wrote on Telegram that the city of Donetsk was subjected to heavy strikes on New Year's Eve, while a statement from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs called the assault on the city a "terrorist act" and alleged Kyiv's forces had targeted civilian infrastructure. Meanwhile, Ukrainian journalist Andriy Tsaplienko reported in a Telegram post that members of the Russian "elite" based in occupied Donetsk were attending a New Year's dinner with guests from Moscow at the time of the attack... Pro-Ukrainian X user (((Tendar))) wrote that "accurate readings on what the casualties...

For people who don’t know, Christmas in Russia/Ukraine is a more traditional advent thing, and it’s not commercialized like in the West. It’s also on the 7th of January, because the Eastern Church uses the Julian (solar) calendar. So, New Year’s is the bigger celebration day of the period. They’ve even started with the Western-style gifts, but they do it on New Year’s, not on Christmas.