Free Republic

Vladimir Putin has had to cancel multiple Victory Day parades over ‘security risks’. This year – amid Ukraine’s long-range drone attacks targeting oil refineries inside the country – several events have been axed. Celebrated every year on May 9, the Victory Parade will take place online in some regions, Elena Tsunaeva, the first deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Labour, Social Policy and Veterans’ Affairs, announced. Portraits of veterans will be placed on public transport instead of the procession...

The U.S. ambassador to NATO, Julianne Smith, doesn’t expect the alliance to offer membership to Ukraine during its 75th anniversary summit in Washington in July. But, she added, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy won’t go away empty-handed. Speaking to the Atlantic Council from NATO headquarters in Brussels, Ms. Smith on Monday said the 32 NATO allies are working on an “actual deliverable” that will demonstrate the alliance’s loyalty their commitment to ensuring Ukraine’s sovereignty. Last year, NATO formally said Ukraine’s future lies with the alliance. “I am expecting allies to construct a bridge to membership by offering Ukraine a ‘deliverable’ that...

Ukrainian troops have made a tactical retreat from three more villages as Russian forces press forward across the eastern front line and take advantage of Kyiv’s exhausted military, which is desperately awaiting the arrival of new U.S. assistance. Ukraine’s commander in chief, Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, said in a Telegram post Sunday that the “situation at the front has worsened” and described some of the toughest fighting west of Avdiivka, the city that fell to Russian forces in February. In that direction, Ukrainian troops withdrew from the villages of Berdychi, Semenivka and Novomykhailivka. “Trying to seize the strategic initiative and...

Ukraine last week got a vital $61 billion lifeline from the United States. But it still needs a medium-term funding plan to withstand Russia’s onslaught. A multi-year funding plan would have several benefits. For a start, it would provide some insurance against U.S. political swings. It would also boost Ukrainian morale and give Western arms manufacturers greater confidence to ramp up production. Ukraine is straining every sinew to hold the line against Russia, an adversary whose $2 trillion, opens new tab economy was 11 times bigger than its own last year. How much Kyiv needs in future depends on what...

🎥 Russian troops have evacuated the first US-made M1 Abrams tank from the front line near Avdeyevka, Chief Press Officer of Russia’s Battlegroup Tsentr Alexander Savchuk told Sputnik. According to him, soon everyone will be able to see the trophy at an exhibition of NATO equipment captured in the special military operation zone on Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow. VIDEO AT LINK......................

Vladimir Putin’s forces have made further gains in at least three locations along the eastern front in Ukraine – including for the first time in several months an advance in the northern Kharkiv region – highlighting again Kyiv’s need for ammunition and weapons from the United States and other allies. Russia’s tactical advances are now daily and reflect the new tempo on the battlefield since the fall of the industrial town of Avdiivka in February. The gains are generally modest -– from a few hundred meters of territory to perhaps a kilometer at most – but they are usually taking...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that military aid to Ukraine was not charity, adding that it created jobs in the United States. Host Kristen Welker said, “I want to ask you about your legacy. You said just this week that you often feel like the only Reagan Republican left. As you prepare to step down from your leadership position this year, what are your greatest concerns about the future of the Republican Party?”

Fifteen miles east of the garrison town of Lyman, a desperate fight has been taking place on Ukraine’s eastern front for months. The once verdant Serebryansky pine forest has been reduced to burnt-out stumps, reminiscent of images from the Somme, destroyed amid Russian attacks aimed at eliminating Ukrainian foxholes. Fearful that the frontline could crack last summer, Ukraine’s commanders deployed the Azov infantry brigade to the sector. Their task was and is to repel what “Maslo”, a 29-year-old staff sergeant with the unit’s first battalion, described as “constant assaults, every day, sometimes for 24 hours”. Occasionally the brigade makes dangerous...

The idea triggered a full-scale revolt on the Google campus. Six years ago, the Silicon Valley giant signed a small, $9 million contract to put the skills of a few of its most innovative developers to the task of building an artificial intelligence tool that would help the military detect potential targets on the battlefield using drone footage. Engineers and other Google employees argued that the company should have nothing to do with Project Maven, even if it was designed to help the military discern between civilians and militants. The uproar forced the company to back out, but Project Maven...

The Ukrainian army has come under rare criticism from military analysts for allegedly bungling up a troops rotation that allowed Russia to capture 5km of land, highlighting the strains Kyiv’s forces are under as they await the arrival of fresh US aid. Deep State, a Ukrainian analytical group with ties to the defence ministry, on Wednesday said the Russian advance late last week in the southern part of the village of Ocheretyne had been caused by a rotation that left the area unprotected. The criticism comes a day after the US Senate approved a $61bn aid package for Kyiv which...

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced Friday that the US is sending Ukraine its largest aid package to date — worth $6 billion — that will include munitions for Patriot missile defense systems that Kyiv has said could change the course of the war, but not the systems themselves. The massive package comes just two days after a separate $1 billion tranche for Ukraine was announced upon President Biden signing a $95 billion foreign aid supplemental funding bill into law. “The announcements this week underscore America’s enduring commitment to Ukraine’s defense,” Austin said after a meeting of the Ukraine...

Ukraine has sidelined U.S.-provided Abrams M1A1 battle tanks for now in its fight against Russia, in part because Russian drone warfare has made it too difficult for them to operate without detection or coming under attack, two U.S. military officials told The Associated Press. The U.S. agreed to send 31 Abrams to Ukraine in January 2023 after an aggressive monthslong campaign by Kyiv arguing that the tanks, which cost about $10 million apiece, were vital to its ability to breach Russian lines. But the battlefield has changed substantially since then, notably by the ubiquitous use of Russian surveillance drones and...

Ukraine has sidelined U.S.-provided Abrams M1A1 battle tanks for now in its fight against Russia, in part because Russian drone warfare has made it too difficult for them to operate without detection or coming under attack, two U.S. military officials told The Associated Press. The U.S. agreed to send 31 Abrams to Ukraine in January 2023 after an aggressive monthslong campaign by Kyiv arguing that the tanks, which cost about $10 million apiece, were vital to its ability to breach Russian lines. But the battlefield has changed substantially since then, notably by the ubiquitous use of Russian surveillance drones and...

Conservative skeptics of funding the war in Ukraine predict the bill signed into law this week will be the last major U.S. aid package for Kyiv that passes. The GOP critics of the package acknowledge that Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) won this round of the debate by pushing $61 billion for Ukraine through Congress. But they argue that if President Biden comes back with another request, he’ll go away empty-handed. “If Ukraine thinks that it’s getting another $60 billion supplemental out of the United States Congress, there’s no way,” said Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), who led the opposition...

The British government said on Tuesday it would commit its largest-ever tranche of military aid to Ukraine as part of a package worth £500 million ($622 million). The assistance will include further deliveries of Storm Shadow air-launched, precision-guided missiles, as well as vessels and vehicles. The Paveway IV—the latest in the Paveway series of bombs—converts unguided munitions, also known as "dumb bombs," into precision-guided weapons. They can use laser guidance or satellites to find their way to a target. "The Paveway IV will enable Ukraine to strike back" at Russian forces and target high-value assets such as command centers and...

George Will, a conservative columnist for The Washington Post, went after House Republicans who recently voted against more aid to Ukraine in a Wednesday opinion piece in the Post. In the opinion, highlighted by Mediaite, Will said the 112 Republicans House Republicans who voted against Ukraine aid “voted last Saturday to endanger civilization,” calling them “ignoble.” “Hoping to enhance their political security in their mostly safe seats, and for the infantile satisfaction of populist naughtiness (insulting a mostly fictitious ‘establishment’), they voted to assure [Russian President Vladimir Putin’s] attempt to erase a European nation,” Will wrote in his column. Opponents...

George Will, a conservative columnist for The Washington Post, went after House Republicans who recently voted against more aid to Ukraine in a Wednesday opinion piece in the Post. In the opinion, highlighted by Mediaite, Will said the 112 Republicans House Republicans who voted against Ukraine aid “voted last Saturday to endanger civilization,” calling them “ignoble.” “Hoping to enhance their political security in their mostly safe seats, and for the infantile satisfaction of populist naughtiness (insulting a mostly fictitious ‘establishment’), they voted to assure [Russian President Vladimir Putin’s] attempt to erase a European nation,” Will wrote in his column. Opponents...

Ukraine for the first time has begun using long-range ballistic missiles provided secretly by the United States, bombing a Russian military airfield in Crimea last week and Russian forces in another occupied area overnight, American officials said Wednesday.

Russian troops have reportedly pushed through Ukrainian lines to take the strategic town of Ocheretyne in Donetsk - the latest scoop for Vladimir Putin's forces amid a recent string of gains on the battlefield. Videos shared on the Telegram messaging app by Russian military bloggers appeared to show the Russian tricolour flying atop a damaged building in the town that once was home to 30,000 Ukrainians. The town was lost after Ukrainian units fled their positions under heavy fire, Msocow's defence ministry claimed, as a Ukrainian army spokesperson said the invaders were 'using the entire arsenal of weapons available... including...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday blamed Tucker Carlson for turning some Republicans against the idea of providing military aid for Ukraine by demonizing the war-torn country. The top Republican in the Senate argued that Carlson’s outspoken stance against US support for Ukraine was one of the primary reasons why approving more than $60 billion in emergency spending for the former Soviet state took so long to achieve. “I think the demonization of Ukraine began by Tucker Carlson, who in my opinion ended up where he should have been all along, which was interviewing Vladimir Putin,” McConnell said during...