What’s happened in the Ukraine negotiations so far, and what’s next?
The MSM says “Trump got played!” in his meeting with Putin. But that’s meaningless, because it’s their kneejerk reaction.
Secretary of State Rubio called some of the recent coverage a “stupid media narrative”:
Secretary of State Marco Rubio didn’t hold back Sunday when CBS’s Face the Nation host Margaret Brennan tried to push the tired media line that President Donald Trump is “bullying” Ukraine into a bad peace deal with Russia. …
“This is such a stupid media narrative that [European leaders] are coming here tomorrow because Trump is going to bully Zelensky into a bad deal,” Rubio shot back. “We’ve been working with these people for weeks… We invited them to come.”
The truth is that we don’t know where this is heading. Even the participants probably don’t know, although they know more than we do (at least, I hope they do). My opinion? Trump is a good negotiator, but the situation seems intractable to me. If he can pull off something that is realistic and doesn’t badly hurt Ukraine I would consider that an impressive accomplishment.
Yesterday Zelensky said the following:
Speaking ahead of his meeting with President Trump on Monday, Zelensky told reporters in Brussels that while Kyiv would be open to “land swaps” in exchange for peace, Putin’s demands to cede the entirety of the Donetsk region — including parts under Ukrainian control — is off the table.
“We need real negotiations, which means they can start where the front line is now,” Zelensky said.
In other words, he’s willing to give up something, just not as much of Russia wants. This is no surprise.
More from Zelensky:
“Since the territorial issue is so important, it should be discussed only by the leaders of Ukraine and Russia at the trilateral Ukraine-United States-Russia,” Zelensky added.
“So far, Russia gives no sign that trilateral will happen, and if Russia refuses, then new sanctions must follow,” he added.
Trump and Zelensky are meeting in bilateral talks today.
The following seems important, or at least potentially important:
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said Sunday that Putin agreed to allow the US and Europe to provide Ukraine with assurances that it will never again be invaded by Russia, similar to NATO’s “Article 5” agreement that allows member nations to defend each other if one is ever attacked.
Right now, searching for what’s presently going on with that meeting, I see headlines such as this from the WaPo: “Live updates: Trump pledges ‘a lot of help’ to Ukraine in congenial Oval Office meeting,” and this from Newsweek: “Trump Refuses To Rule Out Sending US Troops to Ukraine: Live Updates.” Those are certainly more pro-Ukraine than the dire predictions from the MSM. And then there’s this:
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived at the White House on Monday wearing an all-black suit without a tie, a change of style after months of criticism over his usual military-inspired outfits. Trump greeted him warmly, placing an arm around his shoulder and praising the choice of clothing. “I can’t believe it, I love it,” the US president said as they entered the Oval Office.
.
Optics.
Time will tell. The meeting with the European leaders is going on right now. Will there be a trilateral meeting? Unknown.
If I were Putin, I would remember Trump’s negotiations with Iran.
Just when you think you’ve got Trump rope-a-doped, you find you’re out of time.
Many-to-most of us at this point came of age in the realm of the thirty-minute tee vee sitcom, in which sticky circumstances all get resolved within thirty minutes, all neatly wrapped and tied with a bow. At least the legacy media often seem to act as though they want something like that to happen in real life war/peace negotiating.
Of course, there’s (always and forever) the TDS angle, and candidate Trump didn’t exactly help at the outset when he promised a *very* short time in which the Ukraine-Russia impasse would be resolved (tied-with-a-bow optional) if he were elected.
We’ve collectively got to exhale, because it may get very protracted. And cheers for Secretary of State Marco Rubio when he pushed back on those addled talking head interviewers, pointing out that we’re not going to disclose specifics of what was discussed, since the negotiations are *not* a pay-per-view tee vee spectacle.
War is normal, Peace is unusual!
when he promised a *very* short time
Remember, take Trump seriously, but not literally.
There’s been at least a 20 of these in my lifetime ( I remember very well 1 or 2). My bitch is these media people act like it’s the first. I agree with Neo, no one, including participants know where this will go, but they gotta try!
So this happened exactly like I predicted last week: Trump met with Putin and the two of them agreed to give more Ukrainian land to Russia, and now he is browbeating Zelensky to accept the agreement that he and Putin made.
Meanwhile the Russian troops are so thrilled that America now supports their genocide of Ukraine that they are riding into battle in vehicles flying large American flags.
What a humiliating day for America.
Apart from the issue of which president is evil and beyond contempt, the fact remains that ‘Ukraine’ is a country made up out of a piece of the Soviet Union which has no history before its creation. And it includes population groups which depise each other, somewhat like Yankees and Rebels. And they can’t live together in a peaceable way.
A divorce is in order.
‘Ukraine’ is a country made up out of a piece of the Soviet Union which has no history before its creation.
==
Not true.
==
And it includes population groups which depise each other,
==
Not true in any extraordinary way.
@David:‘Ukraine’ is a country made up out of a piece of the Soviet Union which has no history before its creation
That’s false. What is true, is that in ancient times Russia was ruled from Kiev, then Ukraine was part of the Poland-Lithuania commonwealth, and then from the 1680s Ukraine was part of Russia for hundreds of years, and what is now Ukraine includes a large part of Poland stolen by Stalin when he was allied with Hitler, who ethnically cleaned most of the Poles who’d survived Hitler.
The Ukraine SSR under the Soviet Union did have a fake seat in the UN General Assembly, which did not become real until Ukrainian independence in 1991. Ukraine had not been independent for almost 700 years, but it had at one time been so, before there was ever a distinct Ukrainian identity.
I’ve been following the various arguments here over Ukraine and it’s interesting to me that they all take a certain form. They’ve been all about legitimacy, some good reason why Ukraine should or should not be independent, whether Ukraine really is or really isn’t a democracy, whether it should or should not have the Donbass or the Crimea, whether NATO promised or promised not to expand into Ukraine or defend it from Russia and in exchange for what.
But that’s not how the world works. Big bad nuclear-armed nations get to have a sphere of influence and bully their immediate neighbors. Not because it’s fair or right or legitimate, but because they have that power. If you don’t want them to have that sphere of influence, then you have to fight them for it. Nobody wants to get nuked, so the fighting results in a slow series of mutual escalations, each side betting that the next iteration doesn’t result in a nuking. This is maximally bad for the people of Russia and Ukraine, the only thing it’s better than is actually getting nuked.
Ukraine is either worth getting America nuked for, or it isn’t. Folks should make up their minds. (Europe has already signaled it’s not worth even giving up cheap fossil fuels over; Ukraine has signaled it’s not worth conscripting young people over.) If it’s worth getting nuked over, great, let’s get it on, and us old folks need to get ready for our kids and grandkids to come home in flag-draped coffins and brush up on our duck-and-cover and fallout drills from our childhood. If not, let’s leave it alone. Else we’re on to the worst of both worlds, many more years of killing and possibly a miscalculated escalation that kills everyone, making the entire exercise completely pointless.
I doubt it’s going to come to that. No one wants to get nuked, and Russia doesn’t want to bleed over the territory it’s taken forever, and Ukraine doesn’t want to fight to the last Ukrainian, and Europe doesn’t want to fight at all. Russia is going to get to keep some of what it took. Not because it’s right or because it’s fair, but because it’s a fallen world and the bad guys are just strong enough to sometimes get some of their way.
Once that gets settled the legacy media will set us up with some new squirrels to chase and I’m sure some shiny new regional conflict will be placed in front of us to flame each other over while our tax money flows into the pockets of those providing the weapons.
and what is now Ukraine includes a large part of Poland stolen by Stalin when he was allied with Hitler, who ethnically cleaned most of the Poles who’d survived Hitler.
==
Interwar Poland included a large population of White Russians and Ukrainians. About six million out of a population of 32 million.
Big bad nuclear-armed nations get to have a sphere of influence and bully their immediate neighbors. Not because it’s fair or right or legitimate, but because they have that power.
==
I think Canada, Mexico, the Irish Republic, and Belgium make out OK. We’ll see how China treats its neighbors going forward.
==
What’s been notable about Russia’s conduct over twenty years is their inability to catch their flies with honey.
@Art Deco:Interwar Poland included a large population of White Russians and Ukrainians. About six million out of a population of 32 million.
As did interwar Ukraine and White Russia (now Belarus). The saying popular in those times was “Why should I be a national minority in your country, why don’t you be a national minority in mine”?
Hitler and Stalin did a lot, in their way, to simplify the geographic distribution of national minorities, but we don’t endorse their methods these days. Mostly.
@Art Deco:I think Canada, Mexico, the Irish Republic, and Belgium make out OK.
Today they do. What country is currently sitting on 40% of Mexico’s former territory? What did the Irish have to do to get the British to leave after 600 years? And what happened to Belgium twice in the last century, and what countries was it part of before that?
before there was ever a distinct Ukrainian identity.
==
The Ukrainian language and institutes of cultural development were the subject of efforts at suppression by the Russian government for more than a century. The Byzantine-Rite Ukrainian Catholic Church emerged at the end of the 16th century.
==
Note the secessionist movements on the periphery of the Russian state emerging in 1917. Only Finland and the Baltic states managed to break free. Pilsudski’s forces managed to grab some territory east of the Curzon line. Among the secessionist movements was one in the Ukraine.
What country is currently sitting on 40% of Mexico’s former territory? What did the Irish have to do to get the British to leave after 600 years? And what happened to Belgium twice in the last century, and what countries was it part of before that?
==
A. No country. There population of Mexican peninsulares, criollos, mestizos, and mission Indians in that territory in 1846 was about 70,000. The like population in Texas in 1835 was about 3,000. (We did not have nuclear weapons in 1846, btw).
==
B. The English conquest of Ireland was completed in 1603, though there was an English presence there in prior centuries. Irish and Welsh society were both too refractory to sustain supralocal political authority. Not the case in Scotland, which was a consolidated kingdom by the 11th century and which was incorporated into Britain via a union of crowns. Britain repealed the abusive legislation applicable to Ireland in 1829 and enacted a home rule law in 1912. As for ‘what they had to do’, that depends on what your objects are. (Britain did not have nuclear weapons in 1603 or in 1922).
==
C. Belgium was conquered by Germany twice in the last century. Germany was not a nuclear power at the time. Belgium was prior to 1795 a set of territories in the Hapsburg portfolio. (IIRC, the Hapsburgs acquired those territories via a dynastic marriage). Revolutionary France was not a nuclear power, either.
==
D. Russia’s behavior is actually quite deviant in regard to the general practice of the postwar period.
@Art Deco: No country
Thanks for the laugh, but I doubt Mexicans see much humor in it. Because I’m sure you’re not really trying to say that it’s ok to first invade a country, then declare war on it, and finally take 40% of it, just because not very many people live there.
Spheres of influence predate nuclear weapons of course. As does the Melian Dialogue. Your joke about the Mexican War reveals that you understand perfectly well that the relation between states is based on power, and that any sort of justification after the fact can be put forth, but doesn’t really matter. It’s not like either Russia or Ukraine are going to give back Crimea to the Tartars Stalin deported, but I guess if there’s less than 70,000 no biggie.
Vlad threatening to nuke anyone and everyone for whatever seems to have worked on Nick. By the short hairs he has him.
What was that phrase? I’ll grab your vitals?
Nick covered a lot of history in a “mile wide, two inches deep manner.” I’ll pass.
Pingback:Déjà Vu All Over Again: Trump's Security Assurances Echo Budapest Memorandum's Security Assurances
FWIW, whenever someone claims that Texas was historically part of Mexico, I say that the Commanche would beg to differ.
Jeffrey Sachs has one of the best commentaries I have seen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpv1mjTedow
Russiaphobia is a creation of the worst people in our Deep State. It is time to end it.
:
Russiaphobia is a creation of the worst people in our Deep State. It is time to end it.
==
Russophobia is not anyone’s problem. Putin and his camarilla are the problem. If succeeding cohorts in Russia’s political class have scant interest in re-assembling the Soviet Union (or, perhaps, the Soviet Union less Central Asia) and scant interest in re-assembling the East Bloc, Russia will cease to be a problem for the West.
Thanks for the laugh, but I doubt Mexicans see much humor in it
==
I don’t give a damn. There was little or nothing in the way of a Mexican society in the southwest and the notion that it was ‘their’ land was a diplomatic fiction. You’ve got north of 40 million people in the Ukraine and they’re not interested in co-operating with VP’s imperial projects. Get back to me when you can construct a proper analogy.
Seems there has been a rule established over the last several millennia. You should claim no more land than you can defend.
Sachs is terribly wrong in many ways, largely the economic policies he promoted, that created the oligarchs, his penance was lipsynching to Xi, and the al Thanis
now one should have some Russia gnosis, knowledge of culture and history, that seems to be a rare thing,
like for example the Robert Massie series, starting with Peter the Great, and following to Catherine the Great, it puts a little perspective on events, he proably had ono on Alexander 11, I haven’t gotten this far,
Richard Pipes had one of the best insights into the Soviet mind, pity Fiona Hill didn’t learn anything from him in fact her protege, Danchenko was the enabler ofthe Steele Dossier,
Seems there has been a rule established over the last several millennia. You should claim no more land than you can defend.
==
This is a stupefying remark.