Snyder: Trump is very much on Putin’s side. He keeps saying Russia has to win, will win, or has already won — but none of that is true.

Trump moved a lot of American power onto Russia’s side, and still Russia has not won. Russia is losing the war. 1/ Snyder: America has two negotiators, and neither is a diplomat: the president’s son-in-law and the president’s friend.

In any other country, that would look corrupt and impossible to work. It has already failed with Ukraine and Iran. 2/

The Telegraph: Macron tore up 65 years of doctrine to defend Europe with French nukes, with or without the US.

Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden, Denmark, and now the Czech Republic will host French nuclear-armed Rafales. 1/ France holds 290 warheads, Britain 225. Their combined arsenal totals 515 weapons against Russia's 5,580 and America's 5,225.
Without Washington, Russia alone outguns Europe 11-to-1 in warheads. Macron's plan makes those 515 European weapons unpredictable enough to matter. 2/

Trump launched the Iran war to force capitulation. His exit ramp now lets the regime claim victory simply by surviving.

Iran reopens the Strait of Hormuz and pledges no nukes. Trump releases frozen funds and lifts sanctions — David Ignatius, Washington Post. 1/ Iran reopens the Strait of Hormuz immediately, without tolls. Iran pledges not to seek nuclear weapons.

In exchange the US stops hostilities, releases Iran's frozen funds, and lifts sanctions gradually over 60 days. 2/

Foreman, ex-UK Attaché in Moscow: Ukraine’s strategy is to take the battle into Russia’s deep areas and bring the war home to Russians.

Directly challenging Putin’s claim that this is only a “special military operation” somewhere far away. 1/ Foreman: What we’re seeing is the fruit of years of Ukrainian investment and ingenuity.

Ukraine now has more capability: drones can fly farther, maybe up to 1,000 km, with heavier payloads, better accuracy, and more systems promised this year. 2/

Gen. Hertling: Trump keeps insulting NATO for not coming to the rescue in Hormuz, but this is not what NATO was built for.

NATO is designed mainly for collective defense in the Euro-Atlantic region — not a sudden Gulf naval operation. 1/ Hertling: If the U.S. Navy, the most capable naval force in the world, is hesitant to escalate its own direct maritime role.

Why would NATO ask European nations to rush into a more dangerous mission while they are already supporting Ukraine? 2/

Europe wants an envoy to talk to Putin. The EU still has not agreed what Europe wants to say.

Kyiv asked Europe to be present. Europe is debating red lines first. — The New York Times. 1/ Europe cut political contact with Russia after Feb 2022. Now even the idea of talks is back.

That change is not diplomacy, but a symptom of a vacuum in the process. 2/

Tugendhat, Conservative MP: "The Kremlin is at war with Europe and its allies in Beijing are helping."

Russia has been conducting warlike acts against every European democracy for years, but Britain is asleep at the wheel — The Telegraph.

1/ 2006 — Litvinenko poisoned in London.

2018 — Skripals poisoned with Novichok in Salisbury.

2024 — GRU plot to assassinate Rheinmetall CEO Papperger. Same year, incendiary devices disguised as pillows sent through DHL, nearly brought down a cargo plane over Europe.

2/

Russia wasted $40M just to destroy garage in Bila Tserkva, Kyiv region.

The city budget of Bila Tserkva is $70M

Russia fired the same system at Lviv and Dnipro with inert warheads.

Russia launches it not for physical damage, but to intimidate the West — Reuters. 1/ Oreshnik is an intermediate range hypersonic ballistic missile.

The name means Hazel Tree because of payload geometry. 2/

Czech President Pavel: if Russia's violations of NATO airspace continue, the alliance will have to shoot down unmanned, or manned , aircraft.

Russia does not understand nice language. They mostly understand the language of power. — The Guardian. 1/ Pavel proposed asymmetric responses: switching off Russia's internet or satellites, cutting Russian banks from the global financial system.

"Not killing people — but sensitive enough to make Russia understand this is not the way they should go."

2/

Putin built legitimacy on easy wars: Crimea in 2014, Syria from the air in 2015. Ukraine broke that model.

The war is in year five, the battlefield keeps expanding into Russia, and in Moscow visible failure at war becomes political poison, — The Telegraph. 1/ The war is now eating Russia’s economy. Wartime priorities squeeze civilians, and living costs rise.

Manpower is harder. Russia takes at least 30,000 killed and wounded every month. 2/

Former Ukrainian FM Dmytro Kuleba: Poroshenko already understood Normandy was really a 3+1 format: Russia, Germany and France on one side, Ukraine on the other.

Not because Berlin and Paris wanted us destroyed, but because they imagined peace through Ukrainian concessions. 1/ Kuleba: In Paris, Putin realized Zelenskyy had become president of Ukraine. He expected a show-business Zelenskyy from the post-Soviet world.

Instead, Zelenskyy came as president — and refused the Minsk algorithm Russia had pushed onto Ukraine with Germany and France. 2/

Two years ago a Ukrainian seven-year-old boy named Oleh was declared an orphan and placed with the family of a Russian paratrooper from Pskov Oblast.

In 2022 his adoptive father served in the unit that killed civilians in Bucha — Ukrainska Pravda. 1/ Oleh is one of 37 children taken from the Donetsk orphanage “Teremok” on February 18, 2022 — six days before the full-scale invasion. That day 626 orphans were taken from occupied territories to Russia. 2/

Russia’s elites start to believe Putin is leading the country into a dead end — but still expect him to escalate the war, not stop it.

One businessman close to the Kremlin: “There is profound disappointment in Putin,” The Guardian. 1/ Putin publicly projects calm and control.

Days after reports claimed he was hiding in a bunker fearing assassination or a coup, Kremlin TV showed him casually driving his former schoolteacher to dinner at the Kremlin carrying flowers in jeans and a light jacket. 2/

Zelenskyy: Russians just destroyed the Chornobyl museum — built one month ago. Crazy assholes.

We strike military targets — weapons production, energy that funds their army. Russia hits museums, schools, apartments.

1/ Zelenskyy: Russia destroyed the Chornobyl museum — built to honor those who saved lives. Then hospitals, kindergartens, schools.

They call it retaliation. They started this war. When we respond, we hit military targets. When they respond, they kill civilians.

2/

Rubio: Iran deal still in progress. The offer is solid — open the Strait, enter real time-limited nuclear talks.

Every country we've briefed calls it the right thing for the world. President won't rush and won't take a bad deal. Diplomacy gets every chance first.

1/ Rubio: Lebanon and Israel aren't the problem — Hezbollah is. Last night they called for the Lebanese government's overthrow.

100% Iranian proxy. They victimize Lebanon's own people. The 45-day ceasefire holds. We work the track and make progress.

2/

Former Ukrainian FM Dmytro Kuleba: China is carrying out an ultra-slow absorption of Russia, starting from the side closest to it.

For Siberian peoples, China is understandable — and they see that where China is, there is welfare and order, while where Russia is, everything is the opposite. 1/ Kuleba: “Russian” is not really an ethnic belonging — it is imperial belonging.

That is why someone who is clearly not ethnically Russian can still shout: “I am Russian, I am for Russia.” The empire works through identity, not blood. 2/

Kasparov: Putin is not just at war against Ukraine. He is at war against Europe, European institutions and the free world.

Dictators lie about what they have done, but very often they tell you exactly what they are going to do. Putin has for decades. 1/ Kasparov: Putin’s goal was, is and will be to restore the Russian Empire and push NATO back to 1997 borders.

Ukraine is the main target now, but not the ultimate goal. Europe still treats this as hypothetical. It is not a threat — it is a menace. 2/

Kasparov: Nothing will happen in Russia unless Ukraine wins the war. Period. Ukraine must win, Russia must lose.

Any war that ends “okay” for Russia strengthens the regime; only Ukrainian victory can open the road to change by proving the empire is dead. 1/ Kasparov: This is not just Putin’s war or one inner circle’s war. The mistake after 1991 was thinking the problem was only the communist virus.

The real problem is the imperial virus, mutating in Russia for centuries, and it will not die without defeat. 2/

Putin put a nuclear-capable Oreshnik into Russia’s overnight strike on Kyiv region.

The hypersonic missile hit Bila Tserkva as Moscow launched around 90 cruise and ballistic missiles plus hundreds of drones. 4 people died, at least 80 were injured — Telegraph. 1/ Oreshnik travels 10 times faster than sound and can carry nuclear warheads. Russia had used it before near Dnipro and Lviv with dummy warheads, causing little damage but sending a symbolic threat.

Ukraine said earlier this year Moscow had only 4 of these missiles. 2/

Only death or Russia can depose Putin. Democracies cannot remove him.

They can still defeat his external ambitions. The only language he understands is military and economic force backed by political will — Timothy Garton Ash, The Guardian. 1/ Putin wants to subjugate Ukraine, restore the Russian empire, destroy NATO's credibility, undermine the EU, and rebuild a Russian sphere of influence over eastern Europe.

To prevent each of these is to defeat him. 2/

Ukraine is building air defense to intercept 95% of Russian air threats.

Interceptor drones doubled their Shahed kill rate in 4 months, while Russia launched 35% more Shaheds per month — United24. 1/ The Defense Ministry works on three lines, protecting the skies, stopping Russia on the ground, and draining the Russian economy.

The aim is to force Russia to negotiate through sustained pressure. 2/