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Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

May 9

Nice story in @DelfiEE on how Russia paid young "protestors" 1,000 rubles (10 euros) each to stand outside eleven embassies of EU nations in Moscow before the May 9th parade: delfi.ee/artikkel/12037…

Payments were likely made with mobile app transfer on-site after the event. A list of those who responded to calls in chat groups was compiled so that the police would know whom not to detain. Screenshots not in the article below but shown to me demonstrate this fee-for-service arrangement:

Despite many central streets in Moscow being closed due to preparations for May 9th, participants were able to move freely from one embassy to another. How do you like that?

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Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

Apr 21

I've been emphasizing lately the unintended consequences of Trump's headlong embrace of Russia -- consequences not wholly undesirable for Russia. While it's wonderful for Moscow to see an American president so eager to realign with Russia's strategic interests, and so keen to denigrate and alienate American allies in that re-alignment, smarter figures in the Kremlin realize the hazards of such an embarrassment of riches. A helpful constant in this administration's rush to give Putin everything all at once is that the worst capitulationist ideas are being stress-tested in the media and in the GOP almost as soon as they're invented -- and often *before* the Trump administration has agreed on whether or not they're feasible. One of ideas these is that the U.S. will recognize Crimea as Russian territory.

As you might expect, this was Steve Witkoff's proposal, which is to say it was Vladimir Putin's. Dim Philby isn't so much an envoy as an unblinking relay of Putin's maximalist demands, all of which he presents to Trump as eminently reasonable, if not accomplished facts. (Recall Witkoff's lie that Russia was in full control of the Ukrainian regions it "annexed," regions Witkoff doesn't know the names of, when it is in full control of none of them.) The "Krym Nash" brain fart, I'm told, happened without any inter-agency coordination or buy-in from the principals, least of all Marco Rubio, who is at odds with Witkoff on this and on much else, regardless of the flattering tweets he is obliged to post about his scandalous colleague. Now notice this little nuance in the WSJ story cited above:

"Senior State Department official," indeed. You can almost hear the whirr of the backpedal in that paragraph. Giving up Crimea in a de facto or de jure capacity is a non-starter for Ukraine, as any junior State Department official can tell you. Zelensky could never sell it domestically even if he wanted to (and he doesn't) because the the political blowback would be severe and almost certainly unite opposition to both the policy and his presidency in a way that would make the resistance he experienced over the Steinmeier Formula look coy. (This might even result in a far more nationalistic and hawkish political figure to emerge as frontrunner for the Ukrainian presidency; exactly the opposite of what the Putin-Vance-Carlson triumvirate has been angling for.)

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Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

Apr 18

America's "washing its hands" of Ukraine-Russia talks can mean several things. First and foremost, it would mean ending this Witkoff/Rubio fandango to attain (or impose) a Russia-favorable peace deal of some kind, which reportedly would include de facto ceding occupied territory to Moscow. But what else does an American walk-away entail? Some unresolved questions below:

1. It is a near certainty that no additional military aid packages will come from this administration once the Biden-era ones run out. But does that mean Trump will refuse to sell weapons and ammunition directly or indirectly to Ukraine? Does it mean he will actively slap end user restrictions on European countries from buying American kit for the express purpose of donating it to Ukraine? (Even Rubio alluded to Ukraine's right to bilateral agreements with other countries.)

Right now, Germany continues to supply Kyiv with Patriot missiles. Long-range air defense is one of three critical areas in security assistance where Europe cannot yet compensate for the absence of American platforms, the other two being rocket artillery and howitzer ammunition. So new European aid packages featuring U.S.-made hardware seriously matter. Does Trump's pivot to Moscow include his limiting U.S. arms exports to Europe, something that would grievously harm the American arms industry beyond the harm Trump already inflicted on it with his attacks on transatlanticism, NATO, etc.? Between 2020 and 2024, Europe overtook the Middle East as the largest region for U.S. arms exports for the first time in two decades. Now, this government is clearly not above economic own goals, but it'll nonetheless be interesting to see how it sells a new dawn with Russia -- one without a concomitant peace -- as the price worth paying for crippling the American military-industrial complex.

2. Does Trump lift some or most sanctions on Russia in the absence of a peace deal? He might in pursuit of rapprochement, but even here he'll find it difficult to give Putin everything he wants with the stroke of a pen. Some of the toughest sanctions, including those on Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas, are tied to Congressional notification/approval, thanks to Biden. Trump would also face some headwinds from Republicans on the Hill, who would not be happy with sanctions relief in exchange for nothing.

Moreover, Europe gets a vote.

SWIFT, which Moscow wanted its agricultural bank reconnected to as a precondition for a ceasefire, is based in Brussels. EU sanctions legislation is by consent. So far, there has been *no* indication the EU is considering lifting sanctions on Russia, whatever D.C. says, does or agrees to. The opposite, in fact, is the case: the EU has been discussing ways to increase sanctions on Russia in coordination with the UK: archive.ph/qsVfc

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Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

Mar 26

There is zero fucking chance this was "unclassified." theatlantic.com/politics/archi…

"This is when the first bombs will definitely drop."

LOL.

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Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

Mar 21

Excellent analysis by Kiel Institute. Some conclusions track with what @JimmySecUK wrote for @newlinesmag here: newlinesmag.com/argument/can-e…

“To replace US aid flows and keep total support at the same level: Europe needs to double its yearly support to an average level of 0.21% of GDP. This is less than half of what Denmark and the Baltics are already doing and on a level of what Poland and the Netherlands do.”

“Currently, European governments contribute about €44 billion annually to Ukraine’s defense, or roughly 0.1% of their
combined GDP, a relatively modest fiscal commitment. To replace total US aid, Europe would need to increase its annual support to approximately €82 billion per year, or 0.21% of GDP —essentially
doubling its current financial effort.
the United States allocated just 0.15% of their GDP per year to Ukraine, European states the 0.13%, and the EU institutions just below the 0.1%.”

Read 7 tweets

Michael Weiss

@michaeldweiss

Feb 22

This is an excellent and timely factsheet on Ukraine, U.S. v. European security assistance, and other misunderstood or lied about aspects of the war, by our friends at @TheStudyofWar. I'll summarize a few main points below, with additional sources of my own: understandingwar.org/backgrounder/u…

Russia's advances have slowed considerably in the last few months. It was taking, on average, 28 sq km per day in November; it took 16 sq km in January. Why is this? Russians are suffering severe manpower and equipment losses and Ukraine is causing them greater pain with its fleet of domestically sourced FPV drones, which now include fiber-optic wire-guided drones to evade electronic warfare. (Drones increasingly compensate for artillery shortages on the Ukrainian side.) Such is the state of Russia's army, its soldiers are now using donkeys to transport ammunition to the frontlines: independent.co.uk/news/world/eur…

Of course, Russia still has its own formidable capabilities and advantages on the battlefield, especially in glide bombs and drones: it, too, deploys fiber-optic wire-guided FPVs. But, as @Jack_Watling, one of the best military analysts of the war has noted, the "Russian military is massively underperforming, largely because of the poor quality of its [third big advantage] infantry and a lack of lower-level command and control." theguardian.com/world/2025/feb…

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