End of the Line for Diplomacy with Ukraine – John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen
The Duran | August 21, 2025
Ukraine ‘doesn’t need’ China – Zelensky
RT | August 21, 2025
Ukraine does not need security guarantees from China because Beijing failed to prevent or stop the conflict between Moscow and Kiev, Vladimir Zelensky has said.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, the Ukrainian leader commented on potential security guarantees Kiev could receive from its partners once the hostilities with Russia are over. He noted, however, that he does not want to see China as one of the guarantors upholding peace.
“First, China did not help us stop this war from the very beginning,” Zelensky said, adding that Beijing “did nothing” to prevent the secession of Crimea, which overwhelmingly voted to join Russia in a public referendum in 2014. He went on to accuse China of sitting back when the conflict escalated in 2022.
“That is why we do not need guarantors who did not help Ukraine then, when it was truly necessary after February 24 [2022],” he said.
His remarks came after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov suggested that Moscow supported robust security guarantees for Ukraine while not ruling out that they could be provided by members of the UN Security Council, including Western countries, as well as China. He stressed, however, that these guarantees should be “equal” and never be aimed against Russia.
China has positioned itself as a neutral party in the Ukraine conflict and has refused to join sanctions against Russia. It has called on both sides to hold peace talks while suggesting that one of the reasons for hostilities has been NATO expansion. In 2023, Beijing released a 12-point memorandum calling for a ceasefire, resumption of peace talks, protection of civilians, nuclear safety, and an end to unilateral sanctions.
Following the summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart, Donald Trump, in Alaska last week, China said it “supports all efforts conducive to the peaceful resolution of the [Ukraine] crisis,” adding that it “is glad to see Russia and the United States maintaining contact, [and] improving relations.”
Hungary on the brink of existential decision: confront Kiev and break with NATO or remain hostage to Ukrainian terror?
By Lucas Leiroz | Strategic Culture Foundation | August 21, 2025
The recent Ukrainian attack on the Druzhba pipeline — vital for the oil supply of Hungary and Slovakia — marks a turning point in the geopolitical conflict in Eastern Europe. The strike was confirmed by Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, with commander Robert Brovdi publicly celebrating the act of energy sabotage. Far from an isolated incident, this was a deliberate act of aggression against EU member states that have pursued a sovereign foreign policy contrary to NATO’s warmongering agenda.
The attack was not merely military. It was political, economic, and — above all — symbolic. By targeting the core infrastructure that sustains Hungary and Slovakia, Kiev is sending a clear message: dissent within the EU will not be tolerated. Budapest and Bratislava’s opposition to sending weapons to Ukraine and denouncing illegal sanctions against Russia has made them, in practice, targets of the Ukrainian nationalist regime.
Budapest responded firmly. Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó did not hesitate to call the attack “outrageous and unacceptable.” But Kiev’s arrogance remains unshaken. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sibiga not only dismissed Hungary’s criticisms but also claimed that the blame lies with Moscow, demanding that Hungary abandon its “dependence” on Russian energy. This is a perverse inversion of reality, typical of the Zelensky regime, propped up by Washington, London, and Brussels.
But the issue goes beyond oil supplies. Ukrainian hostility toward Hungary is not new — it is only deepening. Since 2014, Hungarians in Transcarpathia have lived under what can only be described as an ethnic apartheid regime. A barrage of cultural and linguistic persecution measures has taken hold: systematic closure of Hungarian-language schools, bans on national symbols, restrictions on the use of the mother tongue in public spaces, and even efforts to erase Hungarian place names in historically Hungarian areas.
Even more alarming is the practice of forced military conscription, disproportionately targeting young Hungarians in the region. There are growing reports, confirmed by independent observers and human rights organizations, that Hungarian recruits are being sent to the most dangerous frontlines in eastern Ukraine — used as cannon fodder in a campaign of collective punishment and population control. Cases of murders during forced enlistments by Ukrainian recruiters have already been documented — but are systematically silenced by a Western media eager to portray Kiev’s crimes as “democratic resistance.”
In this context, Hungary faces a question that can no longer be postponed: how much longer can Ukrainian terror be tolerated? This is no longer a mere diplomatic dispute. It is an existential issue for the Hungarian nation and for the 150,000 ethnic Hungarians who live under oppression in Transcarpathia. The logical answer would be the launch of a Hungarian special military operation on Ukrainian territory — much like what Moscow undertook in defense of the Donbass’ Russians. The objective would be clear: to liberate the ethnic Hungarians and restore historical justice in the region.
At the same time, Budapest must reconsider its membership in NATO and the European Union — structures that have proven hostile to national sovereignty, complicit with the Kiev regime, and sources of regional instability. NATO has armed Ukraine, dragged the continent into war, and now remains silent in the face of aggression against one of its own members. The EU, for its part, treats Hungary’s legitimate concerns over security and cultural identity with contempt, all while financing a failed war machine.
The decision that Viktor Orbán and his government must make is difficult — but inevitable: remain a hostage to the Western powers, or lead the way in a new European realignment, alongside nations that respect sovereignty and traditional values — such as Russia.
The attack on the Druzhba pipeline was not merely an assault on Hungary’s energy infrastructure. It was a warning. Just as the neo-Nazi regime in Kiev is willing to kill its own citizens because of their Hungarian ethnicity, it is equally willing to attack its own territory and sabotage its own infrastructure just to hurt Hungary.
The continued existence of the Kiev Junta is an existential threat to Hungary. And like all existential threats, it demands a response of equal magnitude.
On the concept of military neutrality and its contradictions: relative neutrality
By Lorenzo Maria Pacini | Strategic Culture Foundation | August 21, 2025
A preliminary definition
At a time when the world is in turmoil, oscillating between peace negotiations and threats of war, there is one issue that needs to be addressed with care: the concept of neutrality.
Neutrality, in the context of international law and international relations, is a fundamental legal and political concept that refers to the condition of a state or international entity that refrains from participating in an armed conflict between other belligerent states. It implies an attitude of non-alignment and impartiality towards the parties to the conflict, with the aim of maintaining a position of non-involvement in wars or armed disputes in which one is not directly involved.
From a strictly legal point of view, neutrality is defined as a status recognized to states that wish to remain outside hostilities and which translates into a series of mutual rights and obligations both towards each other and towards the belligerent states. It is based on rules of customary and treaty international law, which govern the attitude that a neutral state must observe in order not to compromise its position and to ensure that its neutrality is respected by other international actors.
Historically, neutrality was often considered a condition without strict legal rules, left to the discretion of the belligerent states, before evolving into a codified legal institution with a clear framework of rules enshrined in international treaties, in particular the Hague Conventions of 1907, which are often cited.
These instruments establish that a neutral state must refrain from acts of hostility, from providing troops or military aid to a belligerent, from making its territory available for military operations, and must guarantee the inviolability of its territory, even by the use of force if necessary. Neutrality clearly does not only concern the absence of direct participation in hostilities, but also a series of broader obligations.
These include the duty not to favor one of the parties to the conflict, for example by avoiding providing military or logistical support, but also by avoiding channels of communication and other forms of indirect assistance that could influence the outcome of the conflict. Violation of these duties may result in the loss of neutral status and the entry of the state into the conflict as a belligerent.
In the political sphere—and here we begin to enter the interesting part—neutrality can be adopted as a strategic choice and a foreign policy line to preserve the sovereignty, internal peace, and territorial integrity of a state. Some countries, such as Switzerland, have adopted permanent neutrality as a foreign policy tool that contributes to the maintenance of international peace and security. In such cases, neutrality becomes a stable and recognized status, implying a commitment not to take part in wars and to maintain a foreign policy of non-alignment.
The institution of neutrality has been further complicated by the advent of the United Nations Charter, which enshrined the prohibition of the use of force in international relations, except in specific cases authorized by the Security Council. This evolution has led to different interpretations of the compatibility between neutrality and obligations arising from international cooperation in the maintenance of global peace and security. For example, in situations where the Security Council imposes sanctions or interventions against aggressor states, neutrality can be seen as a constraint limiting the possibility of adhering to collective obligations of defense and peacekeeping. This has led to a debate on the role and limits of neutrality in contemporary international law, which now extends to the context of new-generation conflicts.
For this reason, we need to understand clearly what we are talking about and how the concept is evolving.
Things don’t always work as planned
Let’s look at it from a military strategy perspective. Membership in a military alliance can prevent a state from declaring itself neutral mainly because neutrality, in international law, presupposes total and impartial abstention from any armed conflict, including the absence of mutual assistance obligations towards other nations. Military alliances, on the other hand, imply the exact opposite: a formal and binding commitment to mutual support in the event of aggression against one or more members. ‘Formal’ and ‘binding’ are two key words that are legally valid.
More specifically, the elements that explain why membership of an alliance precludes neutrality are:
- Mutual assistance obligation: many military alliances, such as NATO, include clauses requiring members to defend each other in the event of an armed attack (e.g., Article 5 of the NATO Treaty). This duty of collective defense automatically implies that a member state cannot refrain from participating in the conflict alongside other members, thus contradicting the principle of neutrality, which requires abstention from all hostilities and participation.
- Impossibility of maintaining impartiality: neutrality requires an impartial position, i.e., not favoring or supporting any of the parties to the conflict. Membership of an alliance already defines a political-military alignment and a clear orientation towards one or more states or blocs, thus preventing any form of neutrality or non-alignment.
- Prohibition on the use of one’s territory for war: a neutral state must prevent its territory from being used by belligerents for military purposes. Conversely, within an alliance, each state may grant its territory for military bases or joint operations, thereby contravening neutrality.
- Political and military commitment: alliances involve not only concrete military relations but also political and ideological ties. Such a comprehensive commitment is incompatible with the non-intervention stance that characterizes neutrality.
- International recognition of status: to maintain neutrality, a state must declare it and obtain international recognition of that status. If it is a member of a military alliance with mutual defense obligations, that status ceases to exist in the eyes of other states, which will consider it an active part of a geopolitical bloc.
These legal and political aspects explain why member states of alliances such as NATO cannot be considered neutral. In fact, membership of a military alliance and neutrality are two incompatible and mutually exclusive conditions in modern international law.
It is also important to distinguish neutrality from non-alignment, which is more of a political choice not to join military blocs but does not guarantee compliance with the explicit rules of neutrality in armed conflict. Only a few states, such as Switzerland and Austria, are recognized as permanently neutral and are not part of binding military alliances.
Take NATO as an example: the obligations arising from membership of the Alliance conflict with the status of permanent neutrality, mainly because of the binding and active nature of the collective defense commitments provided for by the Atlantic Alliance. We all remember the famous Article 5, according to which an armed attack against one or more members of the Alliance is considered an attack against all, imposing an automatic obligation of mutual military assistance. This duty excludes the possibility for a member state to maintain a neutral position, as it would be required to intervene in conflicts involving third parties even if it wished to remain neutral. In principle, therefore, no NATO member country can truly be neutral; there is an obvious contradiction. Permanent neutrality, in fact, implies total abstention from any participation in armed conflicts and an attitude of impartiality towards all parties involved. Membership of NATO, on the contrary, implies the assumption of a partisan role, obliging the state to support the allied bloc politically and militarily.
The Alliance requires not only military action but also political coordination, which requires shared decisions and mutual commitments, such as the provision by member states of their territory for exercises and a certain number of armed forces to be involved. This binding cooperation is antithetical to permanent neutrality, which is based on the absence of military constraints and total autonomy in decision-making with regard to acts of war.
Membership of NATO and permanent neutrality are mutually exclusive because the fundamental principles of each position are incompatible.
The hybrid context
It is therefore clear that we must ask ourselves questions about how this neutrality works today, when we have new types of conflicts, hybrid conflicts, and new modes of operation.
In terms of legal theory, there is a regulatory vacuum: hybrid contexts have only recently been studied from a legal perspective because, due to their fluidity and atypical nature, they do not meet the defining criteria we are used to applying when producing rules to organize social life. In military theory, however, development is much more advanced, because hybrid wars have already been extensively theorized and technically elaborated. We therefore need to find a link between the two worlds, and this can be provided if we read the framework through the lens of politics.
Let’s take an example to better understand this: Finland. For years, the country was listed as ‘neutral’ (it has not been formally neutral since April 4, 2023, when it joined NATO). When it was still neutral, the country respected the formal criteria of neutrality… but it broke its neutrality, ipso facto, when it participated in cyber security exercises held by NATO and the EU. Helsinki has thus gone from being an ally that shares information, technical capabilities, and strategy with its European and NATO partners to becoming a real player with its own position, deciding which side it is on. After years of “Finlandization,” i.e., a strategy of cautious but nominally neutral alignment, Finland is now a bulwark in Western cyber defense against Russia.
Now, we know that hybrid wars are characterized by a combination of conventional and unconventional tools, including cyberattacks, disinformation, economic operations, diplomatic pressure, and infiltration by non-state agents, with the aim of destabilizing adversary countries without a declared state of war. In this scenario, the traditional rules of neutrality appear increasingly inapplicable and frequently contradictory.
Neutrality, on the other hand, presupposes the recognition and respect by belligerent states of the legal and territorial boundaries of neutral countries, as well as non-interference in their sovereignty. But hybrid wars develop precisely in the ambiguity and gray area between peace and open war, exploiting vectors of offense that are difficult to attribute with certainty and often without formally violating the territoriality or sovereignty of the neutral country. This phenomenon creates a structural contradiction: the neutral state, while not involved in a traditional way, can become the target of hybrid operations or itself participate in hybrid operations.
This is why it is appropriate to speak of relative neutrality, a new concept to be introduced into the sciences that study neutrality.
Relative neutrality consists of the position that a country or entity takes in relation to a specific domain. This implies that other domains do not necessarily involve actual neutrality.
Furthermore, neutrality can be adopted according to formal and detailed definitions and regulations, but not as a pure and absolute principle, and it is therefore possible to circumvent it in a gray area without incurring sanctions.
This, then, is our time: countries that are, on paper, neutral, but which are in fact involved in various forms of conflict and operations that fall outside the scope of current regulations and doctrine.
‘Killing Russians’ a reason to join NATO – Ukrainian diplomat
By Lucas Leiroz | August 21, 2025
Apparently, the Ukrainian army’s only “ability” is to “kill,” without any relevant tactical or strategic planning. In a recent statement, the Ukrainian ambassador to Poland, Vasily Bodnar, stated that Kiev should be granted NATO access due to its alleged capability to eliminate Russians, which shows how desperate Ukrainian authorities are and how they lack any convincing arguments to justify NATO access.
Bodnar stated during an interview with local media in Poland that Ukraine’s ability to “kill Russians” should be considered enough to give the country the right to join NATO. He believes that if the Atlantic alliance eventually goes to war with Russia in the near future, it will need Ukraine’s killing ability to protect itself from Moscow’s forces.
More than that, the ambassador made it clear that Ukraine has greater military capability than all NATO countries when it comes to fighting Russian troops. He believes that his country’s experience would be crucial in providing NATO with the combat know-how necessary to prevent defeat, which also demonstrates, in addition to strategic military ignorance, the arrogance of the Ukrainian authorities.
“If Russia attacks NATO countries tomorrow without Ukraine on NATO’s side, it would be much more difficult than with Ukraine. That’s why Ukraine should be seen as an added value to NATO: it is fighting and knows how to kill Russians, whereas you do not yet,” he said.
The Ukrainian ambassador’s attitude reveals true desperation. He is using completely unfounded arguments to advocate for his country’s entry into the Western alliance. Talking about simply “killing” is pointless from a military perspective. Fighting a war involves factors far more complex than simply physically eliminating opposing soldiers—and the reality of the battlefield shows that perhaps the Ukrainians don’t have much to teach NATO.
“Killing” is not a specific military skill. Obviously, in the context of tactical moves on the battlefield, it is necessary to use available military means to physically eliminate opposing soldiers, thus allowing the advance of troops and territorial control. However, this is not a major military issue. The quality of a country’s armed forces is assessed according to their ability to carry out concrete military actions, not simply by the elimination of enemy soldiers—which is a basic skill that every army is supposed to be capable of.
However, even considering only the isolated number of battlefield deaths, Ukraine doesn’t seem to be in a position to teach anything. In the current conflict with Russia, Ukrainian casualties are reaching high, concerning levels. Recently leaked data shows that the country already has around 1.7 million casualties, including dead, disappeared and seriously wounded. In recent exchanges of bodies, the numbers show a ratio of a few dozen Russian soldiers to every thousand Ukrainian soldiers. In practice, Ukrainians are dying more than they are killing in the current war.
It seems that Ukrainian authorities no longer know what to do to make the country appear “interesting” to NATO partners. With an almost completely destroyed army, an infrastructure worn down by three years of war, and exhausted industrial and economic capabilities, Ukraine definitely doesn’t sound like an interesting candidate for the Atlantic alliance. This is combined with the fact that the country is already at war, which in itself makes joining the military bloc impossible, as it would automatically force all other members to go to war with Russia.
In all recent meetings of Western leaders, including the summit between Trump, Zelensky, and European leaders in Washington, it has been made clear that Ukrainian NATO membership is not a viable issue. There is simply no place for Ukraine in any Western-led military alliance.
Thus, with no arguments left to try to convince their Western partners, Ukrainian officials have resorted to pointless and desperate arguments, such as this one about “killing Russians.” Instead, the right thing to do would be to stop the anti-Russian warmongering rhetoric and try to reverse the regime’s previous mistake of agreeing to serve as a NATO proxy. Unable to join the bloc, the regime now has the opportunity to decide to no longer follow the alliance’s guidelines against Russia, which would allow for a quick capitulation and the achievement of peace.
Unfortunately, the Ukrainian ambassador’s words reflect the mentality of the regime’s authorities, who are not interested in peace, but in continuing to serve the interests of an alliance that is not even willing to accept Ukraine as a member.
Lucas Leiroz, member of the BRICS Journalists Associations, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert.
You can follow Lucas on X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram.
No European security without Russia – Lavrov
RT | August 20, 2025
Collective security in Europe cannot be resolved without Russia’s participation, as Moscow will “firmly” defend its own legitimate interests, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday.
Kiev and its Western European backers have increasingly demanded “security guarantees” as a precondition for any potential peace deal with Russia. While several NATO states have voiced their readiness to deploy so-called “reassurance forces” to Ukraine, Moscow has repeatedly warned that it will not accept troops from the US-led military bloc in the country.
“We cannot agree with the proposal that security issues, collective security, be resolved without the Russian Federation. This will not work,” Lavrov said.
Russia does not overstate its interests, but we will ensure our legitimate interests firmly and harshly.
Lavrov added that the West, and primarily the US, now “perfectly” understands that discussing security issues without Russia is “a road to nowhere.”
Kiev’s negotiating team had proposed developing security guarantees that involved all the permanent members of the UN Security Council during the early Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul in 2022, soon after the escalation of the conflict, Lavrov said.
Russia, China, the US, France, the UK and some other individual countries were to be involved, and each interested party’s security guarantees were to be ensured on an equal basis, he said, adding that Moscow had supported this approach.
However, then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson had “arrived and forbade his proteges in Kiev from signing anything, and demanded that military actions be continued,” according to Lavrov.
Now, while US President Donald Trump is increasingly pushing diplomacy to end the conflict, Kiev’s Western European backers “are just trying to keep the US as a participant, less and less successfully,” Lavrov said.
According to the top diplomat, the European NATO states want to get Washington to continue to supply arms, so that they can “continue to pump the Kiev regime full of these weapons.”
Kiev’s backers fail to sway Trump on Russia – analyst
RT | August 19, 2025
The White House meeting on Monday between US President Donald Trump and Ukraine’s European backers produced no major results, political analyst Sergey Poletaev has told RT.
Trump met to discuss the Ukraine conflict with Vladimir Zelensky and some European leaders in Washington just days after holding a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska.
“Just like in Anchorage, no decisions were announced afterward. And that, in itself, is a sign that something important is happening,” Poletaev said, noting that the talks are part of a larger diplomatic struggle, the ultimate goal of which is to win over the US president.
He suggested that Moscow is seeking to draw Washington out of the conflict, while Europe and Ukraine are pushing to keep the US firmly entangled. Following what Poletaev called Putin’s “gambit” in Anchorage, the European delegation hurried to Washington to persuade Trump to toughen sanctions against Moscow and maintain weapons deliveries to Kiev.
So far, it looks like they came up empty.
Poletaev pointed out that, unusually for the US president, he did not repeat European talking points after the meeting. Instead, Trump reminded the European leaders at the start of the summit that “they had no real power,” the analyst said.
While the immediate effort may have failed, “most likely, Europe will soon try again,” Poletaev stressed.
According to the analyst, the key issue at Monday’s summit was security guarantees for Ukraine. Russia has insisted “from day one” that any such commitments must be tied to “neutrality and disarmament,” he said.
Europe and Kiev, meanwhile, are desperately trying – by hook or by crook – to preserve Ukraine’s armed forces, and even to push for a NATO presence on Ukrainian soil.
According to Poletaev, the attempts are “naive and desperate,” but whatever form security guarantees take in any eventual peace deal will ultimately determine “the fate of the Kiev regime.”
“For now, there’s no compromise in sight,” Poletaev concluded. “And as Ukraine continues to lose ground on the battlefield, the room for maneuver – for both Kiev and its European backers – is shrinking fast.”
Alaska meeting is a milestone of the decline of NATO and EU
By Martin Jay | Strategic Culture Foundation | August 19, 2025
Is the EU and its member states collectively heading towards the abyss? For so many years analysts have thundered headlines of the flavour “end of the EU” – even myself I must admit – but in recent days the EU itself has never been placed so low on the world map as it was in the so-called Alaska meeting. A few weeks earlier, many supporters of the EU were stunned at just how pusillanimous the EU commission boss was facing Donald Trump, as she accepted 15% tariffs across the board on all EU goods entering the U.S. – absolutely amazing given there was no announcement of trade talks where officials on both sides would negotiate a more appropriate rate. This move alone revealed so much. The EU is, if nothing else, a pseudo superpower administration owned wholesale by the world’s largest corporations – like Pfizer, the U.S. drag maker who Ursula von der Leyen made part of a 600bn euro EU vaccine fund – and so it would have been absurd for her to have resisted.
And now it is the EU’s time to take another body blow as it plays a secondary role in the negotiations for a peaceful settlement for the Ukraine war. Yet few are betting on a peace deal. Even Trump himself doesn’t seem to hold out much hope as Putin has made it clear that he wants the Russian-speaking regions of eastern Ukraine to be handed over as part of the deal, plus guarantees that Ukraine can never be a NATO member.
Whether NATO will even be around in the coming months is another matter as it is worth noting that this transatlantic organization, which the U.S. runs, is currently going through its lowest point of its history, like the EU. What idiotic U.S. journalists who shout out to Putin in the press conference “are you going to stop killing civilians” don’t ask is more telling. Of course, they don’t shout out such stupid questions to Netanyahu when he visits, who is the architect of the most horrific genocide of the 21st century, where women and children who manage to miss the bombs which reign down on their tents are now starved to death – all supported by the U.S. But to Putin, U.S. journalists don’t ask “how’s the war going in Ukraine, sir?” or even “what do you think will happen to NATO if your army forces Zelensky to surrender?”.
The meeting was never going to be a deal breaker for a peace deal in Ukraine as the journalists’ temporary accommodation was a clue to that. What the Alaska meeting set out to do was for both leaders to show reverence for one another so that bigger deals can be worked out – perhaps energy and infrastructure deals in Alaska itself or even more rare earth and minerals in Russia – and if you listen carefully to Trump’s responses to questions from U.S. media, you will note the hints.
But with U.S.-Russia relations moving in a soberer, grown up direction, rather than the silly Biden stance, there are many possibilities on the table. Ukraine may well be resolved at some point if some of these super deals can see the light of day.
For the Europeans and the EU, they will have to dance to the beat of the Putin-Trump drum which makes them look even more ineffective and congruent to the bigger picture geopolitics which they crave. Same goes for NATO. Both of these institutions have poured oil on the fire in recent years by only seeing the war option – or more specifically the ‘escalate to de-escalate’ option which backfired spectacularly every single time that now to justify the huge amounts of money shovelled into a war project which cannot benefit the West, its leaders only have one narrative to repeat over and over again now, so that they can save their own jobs and credibility. War talk. More war. War, war and even more war.
It’s incredible. The EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas, Estonia’s former PM gave a clue recently to the tunnel vision that the EU and NATO have about the Ukraine war. They see it as the EU’s first test at hard-core foreign policy action, despite it being bank rolled by “Daddy” Trump. Probably the most delusional and idiotic quote of the month has to go to Kallas who told journalists “If Europe cannot defeat Russia how can it defeat China?”. The entire thinking is really all based on conflict rather than conflict prevention which is also about saving both NATO and the EU from its worst ever credibility crash when Russia finally defeats the Ukrainian army. These EU buffoons have created, since 2014 and even before, a war which was inevitable, which they don’t have the means, military capacity or even the leadership to win and yet their priorities now are making a massive cover-up of the failure and protecting their own dynasties. Europe is not preparing itself for war. This is the huge bluff. It is preparing itself for a huge fall which is unprecedented and may well be a catalyst for both the demise of the EU and NATO as we know them.
Michael von der Schulenburg: Alaska Meeting Was a “Game Changer”
Glenn Diesen | August 16, 2025
Michael von der Schulenburg is a German member of the EU Parliament who was previously a UN diplomat for 34 years in positions that included Assistant Secretary General of the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs. Schulenburg explains why he thinks the Alaska meeting was a game changer.
Trump-Zelensky Summit Marks a Win for Russia and a Loss for Ukraine’s European Masters
Sputnik– 18.08.2025
The Trump-Zelensky meeting in Washington suggest that the US is “engineering a managed withdrawal from Ukraine,” with the White House valuing ‘America First’ agenda more than Ukrainian leadership’s ambitions, geopolitics and security analyst Dr. Marco Marsili told Sputnik.
Commenting on the results of the summit, Dr. Marsili made the following observations:
- Zelensky’s behavior betrayed his desperation. As Trump put an end to Biden’s blank check policy regarding the aid to Ukraine, Zelensky now has to beg for scraps as without the full US backing, “Ukraine’s military collapse is inevitable.”
- By dismissing a demand for a ceasefire before negotiations, Trump sends a message to Zelensky: negotiate now or face annihilation at the hands of the Russian forces.
- Ukraine’s impending collapse will allow Trump to claim that US weapon such as Patriot missile systems are invincible despite numerous documented instances of them being taken out by Russian missiles. Instead, the following narrative will be pushed: “We gave them perfect weapons; their corruption lost the war.”
- The protection alternatives offered by Trump to Ukraine instead of NATO membership are mere theatrics. Ukraine would become nothing but a non-aligned buffer state completely dependent on the US’ whims.
Thus, Dr. Marsili comes to these conclusions:
- Having prioritized domestic politics, Trump views Ukraine as a liability
- Russia is poised to achieve its goals: a cessation of NATO expansion and recognition of Russia’s new territories.
- Europe is unable to replace the US support to Ukraine, and Germany and France “will inherit a crisis they cannot resolve.”
Ridiculous Europe
By Ted Snider | The Libertarian Institute | August 18, 2025
By President Donald Trump’s transactional criterion, NATO has been a costly failure that needs fixing or needs to be cut lose. Europe has failed to pay the price and has left the United States with the financial and military burden of defending Europe. The war in Ukraine has proven the point.
But that was never the point of NATO. The point of NATO was never economic nor transactional. The point of NATO was, in large part, to keep Europe militarily coordinated with, dependent on and subordinate to the United States. The point wasn’t to extricate the U.S. from Europe, it was, as Lord Ismay, the first Secretary General of NATO explained, precisely “to keep the Americans in Europe,” while keeping the Russians out.” By that criterion, NATO has been a massive success. The Ukraine war has proven that point too.
While it continues, with a loud voice, to make demands regarding the defense of Ukraine and the terms for ending the war, Europe has revealed to the world that it is unable to mount that defense without the U.S. and that it has been sidelined in the negotiations, leaving decisions about Europe to the Americans.
Europe is unable to supply Ukraine with the weapons it requires and that Europe insists Ukraine must receive. The United States has reiterated that it will no longer be the font from which Ukraine’s weapons flow. On August 10, Vice President J.D. Vance said clearly again that the U.S. is “done with the funding of the Ukraine war business.” Europe does not have the stockpile to spare nor the capacity to manufacture a fraction of the weapons Ukraine needs. And though Europe has, by necessity, accepted the American plan that Europe can send U.S. weapons to Ukraine if they pay for them, that will not provide Ukraine with even close to the amount of weapons the U.S. was supplying. And even that was not enough.
Not only can Europe not supply the weapons, they cannot supply the troops. Europe has, to its embarrassment, publicly conceded that it cannot mount the number of troops needed to send to Ukraine as peacekeepers after a ceasefire.
The war in Ukraine has exposed Europe’s dependence on the United States. Europe can neither provide the weapons nor the troops to defend itself. Europe has been revealed as dependent on, and subordinate to, the United States.
Ukraine is now facing a crisis on the battlefield. Russia’s military efforts were long dismissed as not rapidly gaining ground. But keeping the media focus on that criterion kept the public in the dark about the real criterion. Russia’s war of attrition was devouring and exhausting Ukraine’s weapons and, more importantly, manpower. The shrinking Ukrainian armed forces is running out of weapons to defend itself against the massive and still growing Russian army. There are not enough soldiers to fill the front line. That leaves gaps in the line. As Ukraine moves troops from other places to fill those gaps, it leaves even bigger gaps in those places. Russia’s war of attrition was setting up this moment. And now, Russian troops are breaking through those gaps in the lines.
For the first time in the war, the Russian armed forces have broken through key defensive lines and their rapid move west is now measured in miles and not inches. Logistical hubs critical for the Ukrainian armed forces to supply their troops in the east have been partially infiltrated and surrounded. Russian positions are being consolidated and roads that are lifelines to Ukrainian soldiers have been partially cut. There is also reliable reporting from both Russian and Ukrainian sources that the rapid advance has brought the Russian army all the way to the heavily fortified second Donbas fortification line, which they have now breached. Beyond that defensive line is largely open fields with no organized line of defense. The Russian armed forces may then be free to rapidly advance, making the Russian goal of control of the entire Donbas a real possibility. For the first time in the war, the Ukrainian armed forces face the very real possibility of collapse.
Geoffrey Robers, professor emeritus of history at University College Cork, told me, “All the signs point to a significant Russian breakthrough north of Pokrovsk. The Ukrainians may be able to stem the Russian advance but I doubt they will be able to throw it back, at least not without fatally weakening their already crumbling defensive lines in other sectors of the front.” Alexander Hill, professor of military history at the University of Calgary, told me that “regardless of how one might categorise this most recent Russian breakthrough, the reality is quite clearly that the rate of Russian advance has sped up recently and Ukrainian forces are having increasing difficulty in plugging gaps in their line.” Roberts says that “if Putin doesn’t obtain the rest of the Donbass through a deal with Trump, he will certainly secure it by military means, in months, if not weeks.”
But, despite this threatening reality, Europe is pleading for the war to go on. While Trump pushes for a diplomatic end to the war, Europe continues to push for an unreachable dream of a military solution. They insist on supporting Ukraine in its aspiration of goals that were already unrealistic over a decade ago. They continue to push for an open door to Ukrainian NATO membership even though Russian President Vladimir Putin went to war to prevent that—and will not stop the war without preventing that—Trump has vetoed it and even Europe has been reluctant to grant it. Putin made it clear on the threshold of the war, that that is what he went to war to prevent. Even NATO has acknowledged that. That goal was unrealist before the war, and it is even more out of reach with Russia winning the war.
The goal of reincorporating Crimea has been unaligned with reality, since 2014, when a referendum and the reincorporating of Crimea into Russia was already a reality. The idea of a Donbas that is at least semiautonomous has been unrealistic since the conception of the Minsk Accords. That idea became more unrealistic with the mounting assaults on Donbas prior to the war and the attacks on the rights of ethnic Russians in Donbas that began in 2014 and have grown worse since the start of the war.
As the Ukrainian armed forces face collapse and defeat, Europe continues to push for a continuation of the war that they cannot help. The War in Ukraine has exposed, not only Europe’s helplessness and dependence, it has revealed its ridiculousness.
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From the Archives
Guatemala: A Test Tube of Repression
By Robert Parry | Consortium News | October 3, 2010
Last week’s grotesque revelation about American public health doctors infecting nearly 700 Guatemalans with venereal disease to test penicillin from 1946-48 marked just the start of the U.S. government’s post-World War II abuse of that Central American country.
Indeed, as troubling as the VD experiments were, U.S. administrations from Dwight Eisenhower to Ronald Reagan would do much worse, treating Guatemala as a test tube for Cold War counterinsurgency experiments that led to the slaughter of some 200,000 people, including genocide against Mayan Indian tribes. … continue
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