Free Republic

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his generals have an artful knack for keeping the Russian military bear off-balance. On Sunday, they renewed their offensive in the Russian Kursk Oblast, once again catching the Russian high command, Kremlin, and many pundits by surprise. Reports of a demoralized Ukrainian army fighting to retain terrain captured during the August Kursk offensive — of which at least 40 percent has been lost — have circulated among western media and Russian milbloggers since November. So too reports that Ukraine’s 155th Mechanized Brigade — trained and equipped by France — was under-resourced in “first person view...

I will never forget New Year's Eve 1999. I was working as a producer in the BBC's Moscow bureau. Suddenly there was breaking news: Russia's President Boris Yeltsin had stepped down. His decision to resign took everyone by surprise, including the British press corps in Moscow. When the news broke there was no correspondent in the office. That meant I had to step in to write and broadcast my first BBC dispatch. "Boris Yeltsin always said he would see out his full term in office," I wrote. "Today he told Russians he'd changed his mind." It was the start of...

Terrorism -- i.e., the use of violence on civilians and civilian targets for a political purpose -- is an act of weakness, not strength. A couple of incidents -- the crash of an Azerbaijani airplane in Aktau, Kazakhstan, and the sinking of the Oboronlogistica, a Russian state-controlled company that operated the Ursa Major freighter, in the Mediterranean Sea between Spain and Algeria -- are characterized as terrorist attacks. Maybe.While Western media immediately blamed the plane crash on Russian air defense-missile, the video and the wreckage do not support that claim. Yes, the fuselage was peppered with shrapnel holes, but those...

The country’s prime minister said the incident, the latest in a series of disruptions to undersea infrastructure, underscored the danger of a so-called Russian shadow fleet.The Finnish police on Thursday boarded an oil tanker that the authorities said they suspected was involved in damaging vital undersea cables. They suggested the tanker was part of a shadow fleet used by Russia to avoid Western sanctions.The Estlink 2 submarine cable, which carries electricity between Finland and Estonia, was cut on Wednesday, Finland’s police said in a statement, the latest in a slew of disruptions to undersea infrastructure that are being investigated as...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that North Korea could be planning to send more troops and weapons to aid Russia’s army after more than 3,000 soldiers from the hermit kingdom have been killed and wounded while fighting in Ukraine. “There are risks of North Korea sending additional troops and military equipment to the Russian army,” Zelensky said Monday after receiving a report from his top military commander. “We will have tangible responses to this.”

This list only includes destroyed vehicles and equipment of which photo or videographic evidence is available. Therefore, the amount of equipment destroyed is significantly higher than recorded here. Loitering munitions, drones used as unmanned bait, civilian vehicles and derelict equipment are not included in this list. All possible effort has gone into avoiding duplicate entries and discerning the status of equipment between captured or abandoned. Many of the entries listed as 'abandoned' will likely end up captured or destroyed. Similarly, some of the captured equipment might be destroyed if it can't be recovered. When a vehicle is captured and then...

A Russian cargo ship that Ukraine claims was sent to Syria to collect weapons has sunk in the Mediterranean Sea, according to officials in Moscow. Two crew members are missing after an engine room explosion sank the Ursa Major between Spain and Algeria, the foreign ministry said. Fourteen other crew were rescued and taken to Spain. Ukraine's military intelligence claimed yesterday that the ship, previously called Sparta III, had been sent to Syria to remove weapons and military equipment after the fall of Bashar al Assad.

If I had the opportunity to go back in time, knowing what I know now, I would reconsider the decision regarding the "special operation" in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin said during his annual press conference, APA's Moscow correspondent reports. that this was stated by Russian President Vladimir Putin during his annual press conference. He emphasized that preparation was needed before launching the "special operation": "But we began the operations without any special preparation.

The first significant Russian strategic defeat as a direct consequence of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine is the loss of its Mediterranean outpost. Vladimir Putin’s obsession with Ukraine has led Russia to channel virtually all its military forces and resources into the Ukrainian conflict. Russia has suffered massive losses, stretching its military thin and making it increasingly difficult to defend the country’s geopolitical interests elsewhere. Not only has the Kremlin pulled its military forces from vast stretches of Russia’s enormous territory and thrown them into the Ukrainian meat and metal grinder, but Moscow has also neglected other areas where the...

Ten months after Tucker Carlson's interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the American journalist returned to Moscow to talk with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The conversation is devoted to the most pressing issues, including the possible dialogue between Russia and the West. Read the full text of the interview below.Tucker Carlson: Minister Lavrov, thank you for doing this. Do you believe the United States and Russia are at war with each other right now?Sergey Lavrov: I wouldn't say so. And in any case, this is not what we want. We would like to have normal relations with all our...

The West should cooperate with Russia “for the sake of the universe” because the Kremlin will use “any means” to defend itself, the Russian foreign minister has said.Sergey Lavrov made the warning in a 90-minute interview in Moscow with US talk show host Tucker Carlson that has been criticised as a gift for the Kremlin’s propaganda machine.“They must understand that we would be ready to use any means not to allow them to succeed in what they call a strategic defeat of Russia,” Mr Lavrov said.Mr Lavrov was talking two weeks after the Kremlin unveiled a new intermediate-range missile called...

The proposals by three key advisers, including Trump's incoming Russia-Ukraine envoy, retired Army Lieutenant-General Keith Kellogg, share some elements, including taking NATO membership for Ukraine off the table. Trump's advisers would try forcing Moscow and Kyiv into negotiations with carrots and sticks, including halting military aid to Kyiv unless it agrees to talk but boosting assistance if the Russian President refuses. When asked about his view of Donald Trump, who is set to return to the White House next month, Lavrov described him as 'a very strong person, a person who wants results, who doesn't like procrastination on anything.' But...

A fire at a synagogue in Melbourne, Australia early Friday morning... NASA pushing back plans to send astronauts to the Moon again... In New York authorities continue to probe the murder of United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson... A strong magnitude 7 earthquake off the northern coast of California... Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov...interviewed by Tucker Carlson...calling President-Elect Donald Trump a "strong" and "friendly" man but not "Pro-Russian"... The anti-government protests continuing in Georgia's capital Tbilisi... France's political turmoil...tonight President Emmanuel Macron speaking...saying he will exercise his mandate as president until it ends in 2027...did not propose a new government...but the...

(0:00) Is the US at War With Russia? (12:56) Russia's Message to the West Through Hypersonic Weapons (17:47) Is There Conversation Happening Between Russia and the US? (23:18) How Many Have Died in the Ukraine/ Russia War? (28:21) What Would It Take To End the War?

White House National Security Council spokesperson says US had nothing to do with Hayat Tahir Al Shams (HTS) offensive; Russia vows support for Damascus regime. News agencies|12.1.24 The United States on Saturday said Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad lost control of Aleppo because of his reliance on Russia and Iran. Syria's "reliance on Russia and Iran," along with its refusal to move forward with a 2015 peace process outlined by the UN Security Council, "created the conditions now unfolding," National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said in a statement. "At the same time, the United States has nothing to do with...

A top Russian general, along with 500 North Korean soldiers, have allegedly been killed by British Storm Shadow missiles in a devastating attack. The strike launched by Ukraine on November 20 wiped out Lt-Gen Valery Solodchuk and also resulted with 18 Putin officers reported lost, with a further 18 wounded, it has been claimed. Earlier reports suggested that a Kim Jong-un general had also been left injured in the attack as he commanded troops backing Vladimir Putin's Ukraine invasion. The strike carried out by Ukraine was the first time UK Storm Shadow missiles had been used blast targets deep inside...

DONALD Trump could "face a JFK-style assassination" if he tries to end the brutal war in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin's crackpot crony has warned. -snip- Mad Vlad's puppet Dmitry Medvedev on Sunday claimed Trump may face the same fate as John F Kennedy in 1963 should he win the presidential race. On his Russian Telegram Channel, the ex-Russian president and longest-serving Prime Minister, said: “A tired Trump, issuing platitudes like ‘I'll offer a deal’ and 'I have a great relationship with…’ will also be forced to follow all the system's rules. “He won't be able to stop the war. “Not in...

Russia went to war in Ukraine two years ago with twice as many artillery pieces as Ukraine had. But it isn’t the advantage in howitzers that really matters – it’s the advantage in shells. The Czechs found, for Ukraine, nearly a million shells precisely when Ukraine needed those million shells the most: at the peak of Russia’s winter offensive. It’s not an exaggeration to say that the Czech artillery initiative probably saved entire Ukrainian cities, by giving the Ukrainian army the firepower to resist a much bigger Russian army. It’s no secret how Ukraine got into an artillery bind late...

An Israeli missile attack that killed a senior commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force in Syria last week has sparked criticism of the military partnership between Russia and Iran. On 25 December, Seyyed Reza Mousavi, a key figure in shaping Iran's military presence in Syria, was killed in a missile strike on his residence in the Zainabiyah neighbourhood of Damascus. Although it wasn't the first time that Israel had targeted Iranian forces in Syria, this incident has drawn attention to Russia's failure to deploy its advanced S-300 anti-missile defence system in support of Iran, its primary...

Turkey has vowed to block two British Royal Navy ships intended for Ukraine to pass through its waters. Last month, Britain said it would transfer the two minehunter ships to the Ukrainian navy to help bolster its sea operations in its war with Russia. However, the Turkish presidency's communications directorate has now said it will not let the vessels through its Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits. When Russia first waged war on Ukraine in 2022, Turkey sparked an international agreement that blocks the passage of military ships through the passages for those at war. Today (Tuesday, January 2), the NATO member...