They would have to converse in English right? I don’t think they have another language in common.
I would suspect that they are using interpreters, who aren’t shown in the photo.
Grey Poupon?
It’s the tackiest looking table ever. He looks like an idiot. If he’s going to emulate Hitler at least go with the decor.
I think Russians have historically liked gaudy décor. Hitler seemd more Bauhaus.
A friend of mine married a Russian woman (my wife really believes that she was a mail-order bride) and he was fixing up the house to agree with her tastes. The living room, in this fairly modest (on the outside) house looked like some sort of whore-house reception room. There were multiple layers of gaudy and gauzy curtains and they got some friend from the Russian community to paint some god-awful rococo thing on the ceiling (I don’t recall if there were cherubs or not but I wouldn’t be surprised). It was truly bizarre.
While true in spirit - he was unassuming and functional decor-wise - he persecuted the actual Bauhaus school. Same thing goes for Modernism in general even though they couldn’t prevent some of its influence from creeping in in their architecture.
No wonder Trump likes Russia so much. It sounds like they share similar taste.
Nearly everyone on the planet feels compelled to leap across the table and strangle Putin. This table makes in much more difficult.
Mostly wishful thinking.
Can someone explain why Russia would want Transnistria drawn into the conflict? It’s already solidly controlled by Russia. The population is Russian and Russia supports it with free gas and some troops.
I understand the desire for a land bridge through Odessa.
Transnistria is very small and has 1,500 Russian troops. What’s the point in throwing them into war in Ukraine?
Is Moldova the target?
Perhaps a ‘strategic distraction’?
That it is already solidly controller by Russia may be why they are using it (assuming it is a false flag operation). The Russians don’t have to worry about blow back, and they can attempt to cast asparagus on the dastardly Nazis in Ukraine and how they are attacking innocent civilians.
In theory the Russians can reinforce Transnistria and then run a joint Op to go after the largest port in Ukraine, nearby Odessa. It is less than 40 miles between them.
Putin seems to have an objective to connect Transnistria to Russia via a corridor through Ukraine and, in theory, they want for him to succeed.
You could say that it’s in his interest to get any help that he can in the fight. It they’ve declined to help out then we might note that probably the whole basis for this war is that Putin punishes those who are not obedient to his command (e.g. Ukraine).
That said, my suspicion would be that Transnistria is helping Russia out in some way or that Russia has some activities going on in the region and the attacks are by Ukraine against those. Ukraine is calling false flag to turn support away from Russia.
But, really, either is plausible.
I would think Ukraine would be unlikely to open another front unless they had extremely compelling evidence that Transnistria was an imminent threat. Obviously I don’t know what intelligence they’re getting from the US and other NATO members, but I’d put the odds on Russian false flag against Ukraine to stir up Transnistria against them, not the other way around. But who knows.
That’s a good point. Ukraine may have seen hostile activity in Transnistria that couldn’t be ignored.
Kyiv dismantled a Soviet era friendship memorial. 
What took them so long?
That ship sailed awhile ago.
Unfortunately, DoD hasn’t bought a Stinger in about 18 years. Some of components are no longer commercially available, and so we’re going to have to go out and redesign some of the electronics in the missile of the seeker head.
From what I’m reading from various military experts on Twitter who’ve had a good track record on the war so far, the Transistra stuff is likely either a distraction (i.e. Russia isn’t going to do anything significant there), or a massive blunder about to happen. They have minimal forces in Transistra, and no way of getting more forces there unless they take most of the south of Ukraine, which they’re very far from taking. And Ukraine’s anti-ship capability makes an amphibious landing almost impossible.
Yes, it is seen as part of the USSR which needs to be reabsorbed.