The US Government made Zelensky wait for his meetings at the White House and the Pentagon by more than an hour this time.
When he finally began his speech at 6:41 pm, he looked distant and agitated. His delivery felt stilted, as though he wanted to get it over with.
He later said he was exhausted from the persistent need to convince his allies’ help can defeat Russia.
“Nobody believes in our victory like I do. NOBODY,” Zelensky said.
It is only getting harder. Twenty months into the war, a fifth of Ukraine’s territory is under Russian occupation. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers have been killed.
Zelensky can feel during his travels that global interest in the war has slackened.
So has the level of international support.
“The scariest thing is the world got used to the war in Ukraine,” Zelensky says. “You see it in the United States, in Europe.”
Public support for aid to Ukraine has been in decline for months in the U.S., and Zelensky’s visit did nothing to revive it.
The counter-offensive proceeded at an excruciating pace and with enormous losses, making it ever more difficult for Zelensky to convince anyone victory is around the corner.
With the outbreak of war in [the neocolony], even keeping the world’s attention on Ukraine has become a major challenge.
President Zelensky feels “Angry.”
The usual sparkle, his sense of humour, his bawdy jokes, none of that has survived into the second year of all-out war.
Now he walks in, gets the updates, gives the orders, and walks out [like Adolf Hitler in April 1945].
Zelensky feels betrayed by the West. They have left him without the means to win the war.
But Zelensky’s belief in Ukraine’s victory over Russia has hardened into a form that worries his advisers. It is immovable, verging on the messianic.
“He deludes himself,” his closest aides tell in frustration. “We are out of options. We are losing. But try telling him that.”
Zelensky’s stubbornness has hurt their efforts to produce a new strategy. One issue has remained taboo: the possibility of negotiating a peace deal.
Zelensky remains dead set against even a temporary truce. Because he will be left with this explosive force that can destroy him.
For now, he is intent on winning the war on Ukrainian terms.
Ukraine have ramped up production of drones and missiles to attack the Russian rear. The Russians have responded with more bombing raids, more missile strikes against the infrastructure.
Ukraine will not be able heat homes and keep the lights on through the winter.
Zelensky says: “A third world war could start in Ukraine.” That was his message in Washington.
His audience though has stopped paying attention.
The atmosphere had changed. Assistance to Ukraine had become a sticking point in the debate over the federal budget.
Congressional leaders declined to let Zelensky deliver a public address on Capitol Hill. His aides tried to arrange an in-person appearance for him on Fox News and an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Neither one came through.
Instead, Zelensky met in private with then House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and lawmakers who grilled him behind closed doors.
“They asked me straight up: If we don’t give you the aid, what happens?” Zelensky recalls. “What happens is we will lose.”
Zelensky went further: “You are giving money. We are giving our lives.”
But Congress passed a bill to avert a government shutdown with no assistance for Ukraine.
Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure have damaged power stations and parts of the electricity grid, leaving it potentially unable to meet spikes in demand when the winter temperature drops.
Blackouts would be more severe this winter, and the public reaction in Ukraine would not be as forgiving.
The cold will also lock down the front lines.
But Zelensky has refused to accept that.
An undisclosed senior general in charge of the counteroffensive will be fired, to ensure accountability for Ukraine’s losses at the front.
Some front-line commanders have begun refusing orders to advance. “We can’t win a war that way.”
At one point in early October, the political leadership in Kiev demanded an operation to retake the city of Gorlovka, a strategic outpost in eastern Ukraine that Donetsk has held and fiercely defended for a decade.
The answer came back in the form of a question: “With what? Where are the weapons? Where is the artillery? Where are the new soldiers?”
The shortage of personnel has become even more dire than the deficit in arms and ammunition. Ukraine does not have the men to man up weapons.
Since the start of the invasion, Ukraine has refused to release official counts of dead and wounded.
According to U.S. and European estimates, the toll has long surpassed 100,000.
It has eroded the ranks of Ukraine’s armed forces so badly that draft offices have been forced to call up ever older personnel, raising the average age of a soldier in Ukraine to around 43 years.
43 years old men in Ukraine are ill - “This is Ukraine. Not Scandinavia.”
Recruitment grounds to a halt.
Stories are spreading of draft officers pulling and beating up men off trains and buses and sending them to the front.
Those with means bribe their way out of service, often by paying for a medical exemption. Corruption within the recruitment system became widespread.
“People are stealing like there’s no tomorrow.”
From the earliest days of the Russian invasion, Zelensky’s top priority and his main contribution to the nation’s defence had been to keep attention on Ukraine.
It would become a lot harder with the outbreak of war in [the neocolony]. The focus of Ukraine’s allies in the U.S. and Europe, and of the global media, quickly shifted to the Gaza Strip.
On its own, Ukraine aid no longer stands much of a chance in Washington. The White House remains committed to helping Ukraine but bundled to [the Zionist regime].
Zelensky’s arguments about shared values no longer have much sway over American politicians or the people who elect them. Achieving that gets harder as global crises multiply.
Zelensky sees no option but to press on through the winter and beyond.
“I don’t think Ukraine can allow itself to get tired of war,” he says.
“Even if someone gets tired on the inside, a lot of us don’t admit it.”
Another TL;DR for you
It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy, but to be America’s friend is fatal.
Absolutely disgusting that in the face of defeat, the Ukrainian government still is barring itself from any peace talks.
the Ukrainian government still is barring itself from any peace talks
Yup. They literally passed a law forbidding negotiations. This is 1945 Führer bunker level of delusional-suicidal behavior…
Isn’t there a major issue that neither side will budge on, which is who owns Crimea and a few other occupied territories?
Ukraine is “facing defeat” because other countries are not helping them, just like they didn’t help when Russia occupied those territories.
Any peace talks which ends with Ukraine not getting those territories back will probably (I’m no expert) be seen as a major loss to Ukraine.
Any peace talks which ends with Ukraine not getting those territories back will probably (I’m no expert) be seen as a major loss to Ukraine.
You don’t get to lose a war and come away with a resolution that looks like you won. They’ve lost on the battlefield, so their options are:
- Strike the best deal they can right now, which will reflect how the war has gone; or
- Keep fighting, which will almost certainly result in a worse outcome down the road.
The major issue is that Ukraine is ruled by a Nazi regime and NATO refuses to back down from trying to encircle Russia.
Russia’s demands were not territorial at the beginning (except for Crimea which was non-negotiable after the Maidan), rather they were three simple things:
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Demilitarization
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Denazification
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No NATO in Ukraine
If Ukraine had agreed to these they would have gotten to keep everything else. Now that minimal option is no longer an option. Now Ukraine will lose much more. The only question is how much.
Other countries are “helping”, if you consider prolonging the conflict and ensuring that more Ukrainians will die and more of Ukraine will be destroyed a form of “helping”. But the reality is that short of a full entry of the US with everything it has into the war Ukraine never stood a chance, no matter how much “help” they got. And even that apocalyptic WWIII scenario would not be a “win” for Ukraine as it would be totally destroyed in the process.
The only way that Ukraine could have won would have been not to start a war with Russia. Ukraine would have won if they chose to maintain good relations with their biggest neighbor instead of choosing to hate and wanting to destroy everything Russian.
Oh shoot didn’t notice what instance I was dealing with lol. Good luck with that!
let us know if you’d like to be banned to protect yourself from our horrific Kremlin propaganda
I have a feeling OP will take that seriously
Stick around if you want to learn something. Or continue to bury your head in the sand. Reality, as we see with this article, eventually catches up to you regardless.
Everyone here was being so reasonable too… shame on their part, they’re missing out.
lmao can’t make this up
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The war is not about territory, Russia does not want to annex Ukraine. Territories do not matter in the age of finance capitalism, aka imperialism.
The major issue is that, since the 2014 coup, the ukraine goverment has been run by Ukraine nationalists, a racist faction with history of collaboration with the nazis and the such. This is very clear, you just have to listen to their rhetoric, it is full of advanced race theory dogwhistles. These nationalists grew increasingly hostile to russia throughout the years after the coup, in order to protect their national interests Russia started the war before the problem got bigger (it was bound to get worse).
Anyways, its pretty clear that Ukraine is not fighting for national sovereignty since they already blatantly privatized their national assets in internet auctions, went full anti-labour and contracted huge debt.
There is no point in continue fighting this war, other than ideological reasons, aka to fight the mongol hordes and defend western civilization 🤡
Any peace talks which ends with Ukraine not getting those territories back will probably (I’m no expert) be seen as a major loss to Ukraine.
Literally who cares about a couple hundred kilometres of shitty land, Ukraine has lost half its population with a huge diaspora group and hundreds of thousands of casualties
The people of Ukraine have already experienced a major loss
Well, the thing about war is that if you lose, you lost. Ukraine was foolish to think they could ever beat Russia, even with Western support. Now they’re going to get wrecked, and their people have already paid the price.
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Shame. This was always going to be the outcome. Hundred thousand dead, millions displaced, for fucking nothing. The truly brave thing to do was surrender on day 2. But that doesn’t sell airplanes.
The US is the real winner. Billions in lucrative weapons contracts; Europe is now completely dependent on the US for fossil energy at greatly elevated prices
Short term gains for the long term loss of economic prosperity in Europe. In effect a reverse Marshall plan - the original Marshall plan was strategically beneficial to imperialism, its reverse will be highly damaging. A dependent Europe is a poor consolation prize for the defeat of their plot to regime change and balkanize Russia. Consolidation toward the innermost core of the empire at the expense of its vassals is a clear sign of empire in retreat. Europe will either rebel against the US or become dead weight dragging the US down. Unlike in the global south there is little in terms of resources that Europe can be milked of. Once the remaining industrial power has all been drained away to the US, Europe will become nothing more than a strain on already stretched imperial capabilities. The US presence in Europe at the same time as they are frantically trying to hold on to the Middle East and confront China in the Pacific will become untenable and unaffordable.
It still has not sunk in for most of the West the extent of what Russia’s SMO has set in motion. The only event in recent history that comes close to this level of world changing impact is the Al Aqsa Flood. Each of these two operations has been a major blow to imperialism and produced a fundamental paradigm shift in the world.
In a longer term though USA will greatly loss on this, this war allowed Russia economy to greatly reinforce itself against western hostilities and greatly decreased the influence of USA on the world. It might take a long time, but i think it will be remembered like the Marcomanni Wars, the tile starting the domino of empire’s fall.
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They should but they won’t be.
Also, does this make Ukraine deep in eternal debt to the US and EU? All those weapons and all that money were loans, correct?
Pretty much does, yeah. They will be forced to sell off even more land and any not yet privatized assets that they still have to western corporations. One way or another the vultures will claim their due.
Ukrainians are not going to be happy with this. They were essentially duped into trusting the West, like it had their best interests at heart but really it was just a money game.
Unfortunately i fear that for today’s Ukraine, much like it was for the people of Nazi Germany, the realization that they were duped can come only after they experience total defeat.
Even now as their losses mount, their economic situation gets worse and worse, and the West itself is clearly in a crisis spiral, a lot of Ukrainians continue to double down on idolizing the West and fighting to the death in the hope of being allowed to be part of it. What is happening psychologically is effectively a sunk cost fallacy on a national level. It is too painful to admit to themselves that all of the losses they suffered were for nothing, for the false promise of a prosperity that was never going to be offered to them.
Lethal aid
Tragic and inevitable.
tl;dr friendship with ukraine ended, israel is my new best friend
“I don’t want to play with you anymore.”
I didn’t think my opinion of him could lower much but the desperation of Zelensky trying to attach himself to the occupiers war on Palestine has been a new low. He may as well be yelling “Don’t forget about me!”.
draft offices have been forced to call up ever older personnel, raising the average age of a soldier in Ukraine to around 43 years.
fuuuuuck that’s old
That means there’s as many 20 year olds as 60 year olds in the army. Holy fuck.
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It have to be Ares, the most incompetent god of war of any mythology.
TIME? The same which declared Zelensky person of the year just last year?
Sic transit gloria mundi 😆
Incredible he could put a stop to all this if he just said “let’s negotiate for peace”
He would get two to the back of the head from an Azovite if he even tried
I doubt he ever will, but the US would get rid of him if he tried
Actually it is starting to look more like the US will get rid of him if he doesn’t. There are suspicions in both the pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian commentariat that behind the scenes the US is pushing Zelensky to try and freeze the conflict, else they will apply pressure to force him to hold elections (which Z very much does not want to do). If these elections take place the US will make sure that he loses them and is replaced by a more pliable puppet. Unfortunately for Zelensky he is stuck between a rock and a hard place, since the Nazis are simply not going to allow him to negotiate in any way, not even for a freeze. And while the US is threatening to replace him if he continues to pursue unachievable maximalist objectives and thereby damage the West’s interests, the Banderites have all but promised to kill him if he betrays them.
I suppose it makes sense, they’ll eventually hit a limit with production of weapons and ammunition, and they’d rather retain control over what will remain of Ukraine then than nothing at all
Zelensky feels betrayed by the West.
stabbed in the back you say?
Who could’ve seen that coming
What a pathetic babyman, and it won’t even be satisfying to watch him spiral into full Hitler mode because all the fucking libs who were calling him a hero and an inspiration months ago will pretend they, like us, always saw through it
Yepp been saying this since day one. They’ll pretend they never cheered
They have a new one to cheer for already, Israel, which gives them the distance from Ukraine to pivot as they did with all the others.
China has the potential to do the funniest thing right now
President “Leopards will never eat my face” is shocked that leopards are now eating his face.
Makes me wonder what the west could’ve possibly promised him or threatened him with to have him still be such a hardliner that he still refuses to negotiate, what kind of fucked up, depraved things has he done behind closed doors, or what kind of horrific things would happen to him if he did try to negotiate.
This guy sounds like he’d fit right in with all the insane TNO warlords at this point 💀
Idk what TNO is but it seems to me like all the method acting that Z has been doing since he was cast in the role of president of Ukronazistan has broken his brain for good. He actually believes he is the character that he is playing. I’m sure the copious amounts of drugs didn’t help either… It’s very sad to watch, the man needs an intervention and mental health treatment.
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Thanks!
They turned on him hard. He thought he had the same unwavering support and clout Bibi does.
All those NAFO basement dwellers must be suicidal by now
They switched gears to posting Israeli propaganda and forgot Ukraine exists
Eh…some of them have moved on to shilling for the Zionist regime now instead. They just exchanged cheerleading for one fascist regime for another. The rest, well their accounts curiously started going silent one after the other right as the fiscal year of the US government ended…just a coincidence i’m sure.
43 years old men in Ukraine are ill - “This is Ukraine. Not Scandinavia"
uh what dude?
This is an abridged version of the full article. If something sounds weird it may be because a couple of sentences were left out here and there for brevity.
I believe what the Ukrainian spokesperson quoted there was trying to say is that the Ukrainian healthcare system is poor (compared to Scandinavia) and many of the middle aged people who are being drafted into the army have a lot of health problems.
40 yos in Ukraine were born 1980 and went through shock doctrine of the 1990s when they were still growing children.
Aren’t there only like 1500 aged 18-25 left in The Ukraine now
Lol, that’s a bit hyperbolic, but their demographics have definitely taken a hit in that age range. More due to people fleeing the country to avoid conscription than from actual combat, but the casualties are probably approaching several hundred thousands by now.
However you don’t need to worry about Ukraine running out of 18-25 year old males, there are plenty of them in Kiev and other big cities out partying every night, the children of the rich and well connected who are able to bribe their way out of being drafted into the army.
The ones press ganged and thrown into trenches at the front at the highest rates are the poor and people from villages and smaller towns, especially in the Russian speaking east. Increasingly we are seeing old men and teenagers - Volkssturm style.
The war will end as soon as they draft the children of the rich.
That would require Ukraine to suddenly stop being the most corrupt country on the planet, and i don’t see that happening…
The Ukrainian zoomers EXTINCT after Zelensky begged them to fight for country
