Free Republic

The video explores the alarming demographic trends affecting Russia, leading to a potential population collapse. Using census data and population statistics, it draws parallels to the decline of the USSR and examines the current birth rate crisis.

Shocking Statements From Putin🗣️😮New Massive Strike On Energy Sector💥⚡️Military Summary 2025.10.03

A Ukrainian FPV drone costing just £500 destroyed a Russian Mi-28N attack helicopter worth £14 million near Kotlyarivka in Donetsk Oblast on Monday, according to Ukraine’s 59th Separate Mechanised Brigade. The strike, carried out by the brigade’s Unmanned Systems Forces (SBS), targeted the helicopter during a reconnaissance mission, with no Ukrainian casualties reported. The Mi-28N, equipped for night operations, was hit mid-flight by the small first-person-view drone carrying explosives. Footage released by the brigade shows the drone approaching over open fields, striking the helicopter’s tail rotor, and sending it spiralling to the ground in flames. The 30-second clip, recorded from...

Putin Prepares A New Proposal For Ukraine🕊️The Frontline Situation Is Catastrophic💥MS For 2025.09.27

Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said Ukrainian forces have trapped and are destroying Russian units that advanced near Pokrovsk, after weeks of heavy fighting that shifted the front line northward. He shared this at a briefing with journalists on September 26, according to a UNITED24 Media correspondent. Syrskyi said Moscow’s original spring and summer objectives—creating buffer zones in Kharkiv and Sumy regions, seizing the Pokrovsk agglomeration, reaching the Donetsk border, and advancing in Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Kherson—“were not realized thanks to the skillful actions of our warriors, smart decisions by commanders, timely reforms, and effective strikes on the enemy rear.” He...

After three and a half years, President Vladimir Putin is having to lean more and more on ordinary Russians to pay for his war in Ukraine. The Russian Finance Ministry on Wednesday said it intends to raise value added tax by two percentage points to 22 percent, part of a three-year plan that aims to plug a rapidly expanding hole in public finances. VAT accounted for more than 15 percent of total government revenue last year. After raising personal income taxes sharply at the start of the year, Putin had pledged there would be no more big changes to the...

Russia plans to raise value-added tax (VAT) to help finance its war on Ukraine, the Finance Ministry said on Wednesday. Under the draft 2026 budget proposal, the VAT rate would increase to 22% from the current 20%. The government said it would continue to meet all social policy commitments, but listed defence, security and support for soldiers and their families as "strategic priorities." Military and security spending already accounts for about 40% of total government expenditure in the 2025 budget, according to government estimates. Large state orders for the defence industry and hefty payments to soldiers and their families have...

Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev responded on Wednesday to United States President Donald Trump's comments about the Ukraine conflict by stating that he "has once again fallen into an alternate reality." The US president "issued a series of political incantations on the theme of 'How weak Russia is'" Medvedev wrote on Telegram. "After meeting with the clowns in Kiev and Paris, he published a colorful post. It mentions Kiev's final victory, a return to the former borders, Russia's failed military economy, queues for gasoline, and a 'paper tiger.'" Moreover, Medvedev went on to suggest that Trump "will return....

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Fox News anchor Bret Baier in an exclusive interview with "Special Report" that his relationship with President Donald Trump has grown closer, with more frequent communication and stronger alignment on how to handle the ongoing war with Russia. Asked directly by Baier if his ties with Trump had improved, Zelenskyy said, "I think we have better relations than before. It’s good that we have often [had] phone calls and meetings, and the fact that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin was lying to President Trump so many times also made a difference between us." Zelenskyy also said...

After getting to know and fully understand the Ukraine/Russia Military and Economic situation and, after seeing the Economic trouble it is causing Russia, I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form. With time, patience, and the financial support of Europe and, in particular, NATO, the original Borders from where this War started, is very much an option. Why not? Russia has been fighting aimlessly for three and a half years a War that should have taken a Real Military Power less than...

Kim Jong-un’s rare decision to blame Russia for battlefield failures in Ukraine is less about Moscow and more about the fragility of his own regime, according to an expert. The North Korean leader has publicly wept for fallen soldiers and aired documents acknowledging heavy losses. North Korea is thought to have contributed around 10,000 soldiers to Vladimir Putin’s war, of which, according to intelligence sources in South Korea, more than 1,000 troops have been killed in action and some 4,000 wounded. Footage shown on Korean Central Television displayed internal military reports signed by Kim. One document stated that “Russian army...

Vladimir Putin’s blundering chief TV propagandist has given away the top secret location of Russia’s most elite drone unit. An unburied toilet sign in a report by Vladimir Solovyov led to the Rubicon HQ being geolocated. The trail leads to Hall D and part of Hall C at the Patriot Exhibition Centre, near Moscow. The site has been already targeted by Ukrainian attack drones, and could be again. Solovyov is a highly-paid state TV propagandist for Putin and the war - and the careless blunder failing to mask the toilet signs in a report about Rubicon is a huge embarrassment....

President Donald Trump said he was ready to sanction Russia after Moscow launched its largest air attack against Ukraine since the start of the war on Sunday, setting Kyiv’s government headquarters on fire and killing at least five, including one infant.Forty-four more were injured in the attack that the Ukrainian Defense Department said included over 800 Shahed-type strike drones, 9 Iskander-K cruise missiles, and 4 Iskander-M ballistic missiles, which hit residential apartments and set ablaze the main government building where ministers meet.It was the second mass Russian drone and missile attack to target Kyiv in as many weeks, and comes...

By nature’s curious design, I was born an optimist — though in some obscure recess of my soul a cynic curls and whispers his dry, inconvenient truths. I believe neither in immaculate conceptions nor second comings, and certainly not in the benevolence of Russian rulers. The fragile hope entertained by some, that they might one day act with reason, springs from a naïve faith in miracles, and miracles stand at odds with both nature and common sense. At all times, under all tsars, commissars, and the latest Kremlin grotesques, Russian rulers, with rare exceptions, have acted not for the benefit...

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Secretary-General Mark Rutte said on Tuesday that the peace process regarding the war in Ukraine is still in its early stages. "The bad news is that we are still at the early stage of all of this. You would, of course, love for the whole peace process to be much further along. The good news is that [United States] President [Donald] Trump is absolutely committed to this," Rutte shared at a joint press conference with Prime Minister of Luxembourg Luc Fieden and Defense Minister of Luxembourg Yuriko Backes. Additionally, Rutte stressed that NATO "is taking...

Speaking in China at the end of a visit there, Putin said that he perceived "a certain light at the end of the tunnel" given what he said were sincere efforts by the United States to find a settlement to Europe's biggest land war since World War Two. "It seems to me that if common sense prevails, it will be possible to agree on an acceptable solution to end this conflict. That is my assumption," he told reporters in Beijing. "Especially since we can see the mood of the current U.S. administration under President Trump, and we see not just...

Donald Trump has - not for the first time - said he's "very disappointed" in Vladimir Putin over ongoing strikes in Ukraine. Putin is in China, along with North Korea's Kim Jong Un, being hosted by Xi Jinping - ahead of a military parade in Beijing.

China kicked off its largest-ever military parade on Wednesday, a show of its growing firepower and geopolitical clout as President Xi Jinping seeks to cast Beijing as the custodian of a post-U.S. international order. Flanked by Russia's Vladimir Putin and North Korea's Kim Jong Un, a smiling Xi strolled up a red carpet to take his seat for the lavish event at Tiananmen Square to mark 80 years since Japan's defeat at the end of World War Two. More than 50,000 spectators packed into stands joined a vast choir singing patriotic songs as the dignitaries took their seats on the...

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday he was grateful to Chinese President Xi Jinping, his "dear friend", for the warm welcome he has received during his trip to China. "Dear friend, both I and the entire Russian delegation are pleased to meet once again with our Chinese friends and colleagues," Putin told Xi at a meeting, according to a video published on the Kremlin's official Telegram messaging app. "Our close communication reflects the strategic nature of Russia-China relations, which are at an unprecedentedly high level."

THIS is the bizarre moment Vladimir Putin is seen holding hands with India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi at an "anti-Nato" summit. The inseparable pair were seen giggling and smiling at one another as they met up with Chinese despot Xi Jinping for crunch talks in Tianjin.