Thread by @khodorkovsky_en

3.5 million people went to sleep in Ukraine and may wake up in Russia, depending on what happens in Alaska today.

Those who resisted may face prosecution. Those who fled lose everything.

🧵 What Putin brings to Alaska (read on)

Another 200,000 people live directly along the contact line, their homes straddling what might become a permanent border. Their families are already split between two worlds.

Some relatives made it to Ukrainian-controlled territory. Others stayed behind under occupation. If Trump and Putin fix these lines today, these separations become permanent. Brothers become foreigners. Parents lose children to citizenship laws they never chose.

Putin's forces broke through Ukrainian defenses at Pokrovsk last week, right after he met with Trump's envoy Witkoff. The military facts on the ground change faster than diplomatic deliberations.

The Kremlin stopped saying "denazification" and "demilitarization" in June. For three years, these words justified the invasion to the Russian people. Now they've vanished from official speeches.

Putin no longer needs ideological cover because he's shifted to a simpler message: we're keeping what we've taken. The abstract has become concrete. The ideology has become geography.

Russian public opinion follows whatever the government says. Two-thirds of Russians now support negotiations, but thirty percent demand total victory. Putin can satisfy both groups by simply declaring that keeping occupied territory equals victory.

The "aerial truce" Putin will propose sounds balanced but it's a trap. Both sides stop aerial attacks, except Russia keeps advancing on the ground where it has overwhelming advantage.

Ukraine loses its drone capabilities that have been hitting Russian infrastructure and airfields.

Trump consulted Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom before Alaska.

This wasn't supposed to happen. Moscow expected to deal with an American looking for a quick victory he could sell at home.

If Trump's team ends up taking European concerns seriously, Putin will have to factor in voices he planned to ignore completely. It changes the Putin's calculation.

Russia bleeds economically despite keeping a brave face. Putin needs sanctions relief desperately, which should strengthen Trump's position.

Whether he understands this or believes Putin's show of strength determines the course of history.

Full breakdown from @nestcentreorg on what Putin brings to Alaska: nestcentre.org/what-will-puti…