Free Republic

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, an opposition leader in Belarus, hadn’t heard from her husband Siarhei in more than two years. Not since Belarusian authorities placed him in “incommunicado” detention, in full isolation. And then he called her. “My dear wife,” he said. “I’m free.” He had been released from prison after negotiations between authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko and Trump administration officials, and was at the border between Belarus and Lithuania. He and 13 other political prisoners were heading to the American embassy in Vilnius. Tsikhanouskaya and Siarhei have since reintroduced him to their children, traveled to a solidarity rally in Poland and...

President Zelensky has an unlikely ally in the White House: Melania Trump. The first lady, who grew up in the former Yugoslavia, has been reminding her husband of the deadly toll of Russian airstrikes on Ukrainian cities and is thought to have played a role in convincing the president to sign off the delivery of Patriot air defence missiles to Kyiv this week. -snip- Her interest in the Ukraine war can be explained by her background. Born behind the Iron Curtain in 1970, in the former Yugoslavia, Melania has previously described her admiration for Ronald Reagan, the president who helped...

VLADIMIR Putin has defied Donald Trump's ultimatum and unleashed a fresh blitz on Ukraine. The bombing came just hours after the US president warned the Russian tyrant of devastating sanctions and a flood of Nato weaponry unless Moscow agrees to peace in 50 days. -snip- Meanwhile, Kyiv launched its own counterstrikes. Ukraine staged attacks on military facilities deep inside Russia with a new drone strike on Energiya enterprise at Yelets in Liuptsk region - which makes the chemical-based power sources for multiple Russian weapons including Iskander-M ballistic missiles. -snip- "In the last 18 months Russia has gained about one per...

Donald Trump has claimed Russian President Vladimir Putin sabotaged a Ukraine peace deal four times. But the US President also said he was pleased with the progress made to increase NATO defence spending. Speaking in a frank interview with the BBC’s Gary O’Donoghue, Mr Trump said he had been close to brokering a ceasefire on multiple occasions, only for fresh Russian attacks to derail progress each time. The White House had contacted the BBC minutes before the conversation to say Mr Trump was ready to speak - underscoring the urgency he appeared to attach to the issue. Mr Trump said:...

Prominent Russian propagandists have warned Donald Trump of severe consequences following his approval of weapons to Ukraine and threat of sanctions. -snip- The move was met with fury in Moscow state TV propagandist and war pundit Aleksandr Sladkov accusing the United States of attempting to intimidate Russia into agreeing to peace. He said: “Trump is trying to scare us with missiles, but this is difficult to do, Trump should be scared. “Everyone is trying to push us to turn Kyiv and Lviv into Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” Sladkov continued his threat of nuclear war, telling the audience that Russia’s strategic nuclear...

President Donald Trump has finally lost patience with Vladimir Putin. Having promised a “major” announcement on Russia, Trump has now confirmed that the US will dramatically increase weapons supplies to Europe for use in Ukraine and threatened 100 per cent secondary tariffs on Russia’s trade partners. Trump would only provide Russia with an off-ramp if Putin agreed to a ceasefire in Ukraine within 50 days.

President Trump suggested Monday that first lady Melania may have helped convince him to ramp up military aid to Ukraine. As he explained his decision to get tough on Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump said his wife was one of the people who directly pointed out to him that Putin always backs out of his promises following their phone calls over a peace deal. “I go home, I tell the first lady, ‘You know, I spoke to Vladimir today. We had a wonderful conversation.’ She said, ‘Oh, really? another city was just hit,'” he said, recounting one of their recent...

President Trump announced Monday the US will send “billions of dollars” worth of weapons to Ukraine via Washington’s NATO allies — and threatened to impose 100% tariffs on Moscow in 50 days if no peace is struck to end the 40-month-old war. During his press conference with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, the President mentioned that when he would tell his wife about his positive calls with Vladimir Putin, she would react skeptically. "I go home, I tell the first lady, you know, I spoke to Vladimir today. We had a wonderful conversation." She said, "Oh, really? another city was...

-snip- I go home, I tell the First Lady, "I spoke to Vladimir today. We had a wonderful conversation." She said, "Oh really? Another city was just hit." So it's like, look, he's— I don't want to say he's an assassin, but he's a tough guy. It's been proven over the years. He's fooled a lot of people. He fooled Bush. He fooled a lot of people. He fooled Clinton, Bush, Obama, Biden. He didn't fool me. But what I do say is that at a certain point, you know, ultimately talk—talk doesn't—it's got to be action. It's got to...

President Donald Trump was reportedly caught “flat-footed” when the Pentagon abruptly announced it was freezing shipments of critical weapons to Ukraine, including Patriot missile interceptors, precision-guided GMLRS, and artillery rounds.The rationale for halting shipments of defensive weapons to Ukraine stems from a review that found that the U.S. only has about 25 percent of the Patriot interceptors needed for all Defense Department military plans.Yet just days later, Trump reversed course. “They’re getting hit very hard now,” he said. “We’re going to send some more weapons — defensive weapons primarily.”The rapid pivot back to arms transfers to Ukraine illustrates just how...

President Donald Trump said Monday the United States will send top-of-the-line weapons to NATO to support Ukraine in its war against Russia. "We're going to make top-of-the-line weapons, and they'll be sent to NATO," Trump said. Trump also said NATO members, not American taxpayers, would cover the cost of the weapons. Trump also said the U.S. will impose "very severe tariffs" on Russia in 50 days if there is no deal to stop the war in Ukraine. Sitting side by side with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte in the Oval Office, Trump told reporters that he is disappointed in Russian President...

After years of embarrassing failures, including fires and a sinking dry-dock, Russia might scrap its only aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov. According to the Russian newspaper Izvestia, the decision to end the carrier’s long-stalled overhaul seems certain. A retired Russian admiral even stated that classic aircraft carriers are “a thing of the past,” vulnerable to modern missiles.

President Volodymyr Zelensky met with U.S. Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg on July 14 in Kyiv, marking their third official meeting. "We discussed the path to peace and what we can practically do together to bring it closer," Zelensky wrote on X. "This includes strengthening Ukraine's air defense, joint production, and procurement of defense weapons in collaboration with Europe. And of course, sanctions against Russia and those who help it." Kellogg's arrival follows U.S. President Donald Trump's pledge to send additional Patriot air-defense systems to Ukraine. If approved, a new transfer would mark his first military package to Ukraine...

When asked on July 7 whether the United States would be sending more weapons to Ukraine, President Donald Trump responded in the affirmative. “We have to, they have to be able to defend themselves,” Trump told reporters, referring to the Ukrainians. “They’re getting hit very hard. Now they’re getting hit very hard. We’re gonna have to send more weapons.” Many foreign policy analysts in Washington and Europe greeted the remarks with a sigh of relief. Six days earlier, the Trump administration suspended some U.S. arms shipments to Ukraine in a move American defense officials at the time said was part...

President Donald Trump on Monday confirmed that the U.S. has agreed to sell arms to NATO just moments after he said Russian President Vladimir Putin has 50 days to secure a peace deal with Ukraine or face "100%" tariffs. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said Trump called him on Thursday to confirm he wanted to enter into a deal with NATO allies to sell them arms for aid to Ukraine. Trump said billions of dollars worth of U.S. arms would be purchased from allies like Germany, Finland and Denmark that will be "quickly distributed" to Ukraine. "This is really big," Rutte...

... Or face 100% secondary tariffs BREAKING News. Trump speaking now.

As the prospect of a broader NATO-Russia war grows, remember what we’ve already lost. As Peter Schweizer noted in a short report for the Hoover Institution on Christmas Day 2000, twenty-five years ago the United States was “spending less on defense as a percentage of GNP than anytime since the Great Depression.” That all changed nine months later when the so-called “peace dividend” from the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War was reinvested in a “Global War on Terrorism.” Eight trillion dollars later, and what do Americans have to show for their sacrifices in...

U.S. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said during an interview today with CBS News that people should “stay tuned” for tomorrow’s announcement from President Trump regarding Russia, with him adding, “The game, regarding Putin's invasion of Russia, is about to change. I expect, in the coming days, you will see weapons flowing at a record level to help Ukraine defend themselves. I expect, in the coming days, that there will be tariffs and sanctions available to President Trump he has never had before. I expect, in the coming days, more support from Europe regarding the efforts to help Ukraine. Putin made...

European Union envoys are on the verge of agreeing an 18th package of sanctions against Russia for its full-scale invasion of Ukraine that would include a lower price cap on Russian oil, four EU sources said after a Sunday meeting. -snip- The sources said they had also agreed to a dynamic price mechanism for the price cap. On Friday, the European Commission proposed a floating price cap on Russian oil of 15% below the average market price of crude in the previous three months. One of the sources said the initial price would be around $47 a barrel based on...

President Donald Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, arrived in Kyiv on Monday to discuss security and sanctions against Russia with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump has said he will make a “major statement” regarding Russia on Monday, as he’s set to welcome NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte to the White House.