I didn’t.
Trump has agreed to meet Putin in Hungary in a development that surprises nobody, following a phone call between Trumpm and Putin which the Kremlin initiated. The idea that Putin, Trump and Orban are getting together is scary.
The Ukrainians are in Washington to meet Trump tomorrow but of course this has completely undercut them. They must absolutely hate visiting the White House. And of course no way Ukraine gets those missiles now.
How does Putin travel to Hungary? Is the ICC Warrant meaningless and countries like Poland and Romania are obliged to let his plane pass through?
I’d love to see Ukrainian fighters intercept his flight path.
Yeah, it’s also interesting that Putin agreed on a NATO nation being the host site for such a meeting.
Putin just visited the US a few months ago.
Yes, but he did so by flying directly from Russian airspace to US airspace.
If I were Poland, I’d be damn tempted to throw a few hundred drones in his way…
Putin would put his nuclear forces on alert, inform the world he was putting his nuclear forces on alert, and dare the Ukrainians to shoot him down. If the man dies, he’s taking the rest of us with him.
I don’t know whether the Russian armed forces, the designated survivors of the Putin government and the high command are loyal to anyone at all, but Shirley surely not to a dead man. I’d say let’s try!
Bonus points if Labrov and Medvedjev are on board too.
They’re loyal to Russia, or at least some of them are, and since the Tsar and the land are one, an attack on Putin is an unforgivable humiliation to all of them. They have to retaliate or their own people will tear them limb from limb.
Besides, bold of you to assume that a Russian cares whether he lives or dies.
This article addresses that issue:
The most likely routes are long.
I’m morbidly curious what would happen if the Flying Kremlin decided to brazenly fly over NATO airspace anyway to reach Hungary. It’s doubtful NATO would dare shoot it down, and there isn’t any other way to force a jet to land.
Poland have basically just said “not over our territory”.
However there are signals from Russia that the meeting may not happen now. I suppose Putin’s already got what he wanted from Trump.
11 European leaders issued a statement that the present frontline should be the starting point of negotiations.
(In 2024 and earlier a proposal for Russia to effectively keep what it had conquered would have been utterly unacceptable to Ukraine and its European supporters, but now the main fear would be that Trump will give Putin more than that.)
I guess my mom shouldn’t have chosen Hungary.
There is potential for Saab to supply up to 150 Swedish-made JAS-39 Gripen fighters to Ukraine. One wonders, though, how the financing will be done given the massive cost (it’s got to be something like $14 billion USD or more when munitions, training, maintenance, support, logistics, etc. are included.)
Notably, a 150-strong Gripen jet fleet would be larger than even Sweden’s own Gripen fleet itself.
This is really interesting:
It seems like any organic assembly of mutual supporters must be broken up before it coalesces into a threat to the regime, even if that assembly seems superficially like it would be the regime’s allies.
Perhaps.
Another interpretation is that Putin is now seeking (with his stooge trump’s help), an offramp from the active fighting into e.g. a “frozen conflict” status where nobody is happy, everything nearby is and stays wrecked, but nobody is officially shooting at each other. See also Kashmir.
And as such the pro-combat-forever / we-mustn’t-dishonor-our-dead-by-quitting-before-total-victory lobby is now an obstacle. Silence them, rewrite history a bit, declare victory, and Vlad’s your uncle.
And now, talk of Ukraine getting 100 French Rafales.
I have to wonder if some of these arms deals with Ukraine are pump and dump sort of things. Ukraine cannot afford these weapon systems. It is running on donated money from EU and others. But arms manufacturers can have the orders on their books to boost their companies value. An order with a EU country will have to be paid for with money donated or loaned to Ukraine by the EU. So France is going to get a big load of cash for it’s arms manufacturer from the EU and itself. If the deal is ever actually paid for at all.
I think it’s more likely that they are mere verbal statements and good-looking photo ops that will either 1) not happen at all or 2) only happen on a much smaller scale. I can’t fathom any way that Ukraine scrounges up the 20 billion euros for hundreds of Rafales and Gripens or that anyone donates Ukraine that much money, much as I wish they would. If it happens, it will probably be a fleet maybe one-third or half that size at most.