Ukraine Negotiations: a Battle in Washington D.C.
Minor misdirections in the confrontation with BRICS
[A repurposed headline graphic from a Warmonger’s Think Tank.]
Published: 2025-01-27
Reality
Reality is bearing down on the US and its new administration, Ukraine, NATO and Western citizenry as new US President Trump begins attempting to achieve his desire to extricate the US from its involvement in NATO's war versus Russia in Ukraine.
In Big Serge's most recent, extended article he summarizes using reliable data sources and sensible analysis the major operations of the conflict and the current situation. The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) and its NATO backers cannot conscript more men than they are losing without NATO nations starting a hot WWIII with their own insufficient troops. NATO has emptied its stocks of excess armaments, and has but one more rung to climb on the armaments escalation ladder. But, that undeployed weapon type, the JASSM class of missiles, is reserved for use by the US military in future conflicts. Using it now would reveal its capabilities to Russia and potentially its partners, and expose counter measures being developed against it. There is no room for military, strategic maneuvre for NATO and Ukraine.
Russia has defeated what was NATO's largest army, augmented by NATO specialists, and every technical, tactical weapons based escalation thrown at it.
The Fronts’ Current Status
The following is a summary of the current fronts, north to south, in the "Ukraine" war starting in Kursk, Russia based on numerous sources and this author’s study of the conflict.
The Russian invasion by the AFU has been reduced to half of its maximal territorial occupation. It is being compressed week by week back to Sudzha, the city it occupied at the outset. As Serge noted, and was immediately predicted by every educated military analyst and historian, it has been a tactical defeat and a strategic disaster. There, the AFU have lost tens of thousands of its best armed and trained soldiers for nothing when, instead, they could have reinforced fronts in Ukraine.
[Kursk front lines; all map images are from Military Summary]
The hypothesized presence of North Korean soldiers in Kursk, on Russian soil, was used by Western media, repeating commentariat and political leaders’ propaganda, to manufacture consent for increased and continued arms supply to Ukraine. The disappearance of this narrative shows that the moment for its utility has passed. Big Serge concluded that the presence of Korean troops was a Korean idea. A limited number of their best trained soldiers, no doubt fluent in Russian, may have been allowed by the Russian military to participate. They are not and have not been even remotely important. Russia is fighting for its territory, and would not place that at risk for any reason, no matter what the Western commentariat spews.
The Russian salient into Ukraine north of Kharkiv city has been quiet for many weeks.
The entire line along the Oskol river in eastern Kharkov oblast has been active. The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (AFRF) have advanced across the Oskol north of Kupiansk city, taken a position on the city's northeastern edge, and taken a huge swath of territory to the south of the city, expanding outwards from the eastern edge of the lower Oskol dividing what was the Kupiansk front into two halves.
Further south, the AFRF are pushing towards Lysichansk from its northeast. South of there is the Siversk pocket which has been well defended by the AFU.
Moving further south, just how bad the situation has become for the AFU becomes even more obvious.
The battle for Chasiv Yar has been long, though Russia has recently enveloped the central stronghold to its north and east, with more progress westward to the south. Chasiv Yar will fall during the approaching spring.
Just to the south, Toretsk has only a tiny pocket of resistance remaining in its mining area on its northern edge. To Toretsk's northwest and Chasiv Yar's west is the major industrial city of Kostiantynivka. It is likely to be a significant target during the spring and summer for the AFRF, assuming a conflict settlement has not been reached.
It is in southern Donetsk, to the south of Pokrovsk, that the disaster which has befallen the AFU is most apparent. The AFU has been in a variously disorganised fighting retreat since the summer of 2024. The key breakthrough was in the early spring of 2024, with AFRF's capture of Avdiivka. This was compounded by the fall of Vugledar in the late summer. The AFU have been under constant pressure and retreat across the fronts there ever since. The AFRF are 4 Km from the Dnipropetrovsk oblast to Pokrovsk's southwest.
The AFRF has made minor progress pushing the east-west contact line northward in Zaporozhye. The strategic junction town of Vesilyka Novosilka is about to fall.
The contact lines across the reach of the Dniper river in Kherson have remained static for months.
Negotiations
US President Trump wants to end the war in Ukraine. He issued one of the most surprising statements from a US president when he expressed compassion for the millions of people killed or injured during the conflict.
“It’s gotta end. These are human beings that are being slaughtered” on the battlefield, President Trump said to interviewer Sean Hannity.
[Antiwar]
One of President Trump's former advisors, Steve Bannon, warned him indirectly via a statement made during an interview — Ukraine would become for him that which the war in Vietnam became for Nixon if he did not resolve it immediately. He would come to "own it".
In Trump’s initial batch of Executive Orders was a freeze for 90 days on all foreign aid, which includes financial aid to Ukraine.
The Atlantic Council, a US establishment think tank funded by Goldman Sachs, the Rockefeller brothers and others, and closely related to the Council on Foreign Relations, has begun the process of blaming Trump for what was and is a Biden war, from the 2014 coup until now. Unsurprisingly, the propaganda was written by coup architect and facilitator 'Toria Nuland's husband, Robert Kagan. Its lead image was repurposed for this article.
The CIA are running two campaigns. One is a "save my arse" misinformation operation via US corporate media which Larry Johnson identified. In one article ex-CIA Director Burns stated the number of Russian casualties is 700,000. Johnson noted later that this matched Trump's revised figure, down from a million. From this Johnson identified the source of Trump's figure which reveals the second campaign, providing Trump with erroneous information about the conflict and Russia's economy. Johnson issued a VIP's style 'Memorandum for the President', attempting to alert Trump to the rubbish he was being fed.
The operation's purpose seems to be insertion of false information to scuttle negotiations from the outset. This is being run while Trump’s appointment for Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, is being slow rolled through Congressional confirmation.
Meanwhile, the staff of the section of the Pentagon which has been managing the delivery of military supplies to Ukraine has been put on leave or reallocated, according to Johnson. This is less than the 'complete reboot' echoed across some media which Scott Ritter found unbelievable, but supports the view that Trump wants this conflict ended.
These two situations, the CIA campaigns and Trump’s duty reallocation within the Pentagon and pause of all foreign aid, support one of the agreements between Johnson and Crooke on their recent discussion on Johnson's show Counter Currents: the real battle for the resolution of Ukraine is not happening over and across the Atlantic, but in Washington D.C., between the new administration and elements of the Deep State.
Just as Congress are slow rolling Gabbard, the CIA is slow rolling effective negotiations.
Trump may be setting up a delegitimization of the military and financial aid. They are to be reassessed based on reports required by Executive Orders. The rife corruption in Ukraine could be used to attack the effectiveness of the aid rather than its motivation. This would sidestep some of the politics of the aid and fit neatly into the Republican sensitivities for wasted spending. That Trump is taking this clever approach was suggested by Col. Douglas Macgregor.
Big Oil vs The Military Industrial Complex
US President Trump is variously inconsistent in his statements. While this may form a part of his "Art of the Deal", experienced diplomats would advise against this type of artifice for negotiating serious international agreements, of which war resolution is a prime example.
US President Trump's volley of initial Executive Orders reinforced his campaign rhetoric to support the US fossil fuel industry by immediately overturning Biden's last minute ban on offshore drilling on much of coastal areas of the US. Trump's recent implicit threat to Saudi Arabia for not increasing production to lower fuel prices seemed to be intended to advance his negotiating position against Russia in NATO's war in Ukraine by threatening Russia's energy exports.
Amb. Freeman highlighted Trump's market ignorance by observing that the current price of energy leaves enough room for US fracking companies to profit. A reduction in price would undermine profits for those US energy companies making their operations a loss. You can't have your cake and eat it too in market economics.
Another topic visited by Crooke during his discussion with Johnson was that of Syria. It is exemplar for sanctions being a regime change preparation strategy. In the case of Syria, US military support for the Kurdish occupation of northeast Syria denied the state access to its own oil. It was extracted and sold to Israel via Turkey. That illegal military occupation also denied Syria its agricultural heartland, forcing food imports the prices of which were jacked up by the sanctions. Secondly, the sacking and theft of industrial machinery by Turkish supported Islamist forces during the Dirty War left the region bereft of the technology to rebuild its industry. This was also exacerbated by the US sanctions, preventing reinvestment by again jacking up prices.
Parts of the world who were not aware of just how war-like "universal coercive measures" are, have been awakened to the fact. Escape from vulnerability to this economical subordination is the heart of BRICS and the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation).
BRICS
M. K. Bhadrakumar (MKB) provided his analysis of the recently signed Comprehensive Strategic Partnership treaty between Iran and Russia. In it one will find commentary which one cannot expect from journalists, as they neither have the the first hand experience of negotiating with diplomats of the Islamic Republic nor the knowledge of history which MKB possesses.
Both Russia and Iran envisage tactical and strategic advantages in working together closely in the conditions under sanctions. Interestingly, Article 19 of the Treaty devotes much attention to the sharing of experiences on how to push back the draconian western sanctions.
...
The salience of the treaty lies in the expansion and deepening of military cooperation, a big leap forward in energy ties with some mega projects on the anvil such as oil swaps and a brand new gas pipeline through Azerbaijan with a planned capacity of 55 bcm, joint efforts on de-dollarisation and clearing system in local currency and, on the whole, a qualitatively new level of coordination in the foreign policy strategies of the two countries in both bilateral and multilateral framework such as EAEU, BRICS and SCO.
...
Russia’s keenness to get the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) fully operational is self-evident. The treaty (Articles 20 and 21) dwells on the transportation sector as a strategic area in the Russian-Iranian relationship. Iran stands to gain in its positioning as a dependable regional hub connecting Russia with some of the key countries in the Global South, including India and Pakistan.
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Sources
Total Kievan Debellation ; Big Serge; Big Serge Thought; 2025-01-09
Trump: Zelensky Passed on Deal, 'Decided To Fight'; Kyle Anzalone; Antiwar; 2025-01-24
Trump Is Facing a Catastrophic Defeat in Ukraine; Atlantic Council (Robert Kagan), Archive.today; 2025-01-23
Russian Casualties and the Russian Economy - A Memo for President Donald Trump; Larry C. Johnson; SONAR21; 2025-01-23
CIA Busy Polishing Its Ukraine Legacy; Larry C. Johnson; SONAR21; 2025-01-22
Trump Falters in his Approach to Putin; Stephen Bryen; Weapons and Strategy; 2025-01-23
It's Official: US Abandoning Ukraine; Kit Klarenberg; Kit’s Newsletter; 2025-01-22
Zelenski, Having Failed, Blames His Sponsors; b.; Moon of Alabama; 2025-01-22
Accepting the Truth About Ukrainian Casualties is the Only Real Path to Peace; Michael Vlahos; Natylie's Place: Understanding Russia; 2025-01-22
Russia-Iran treaty signifies a 'breakthrough' in ties, M. K. Bhadrakumar; Indian Punchline; 2025-01-24
Amb Chas Freeman: Is the World on the Brink of Total CHAOS?; Alkhorshid interviews Freeman; Dialogue Works; 2025-01-24
Trump Goes on the Offensive against Russia, China, and Iran; Larry Johnson interviews Alastair Crooke; Counter Currents; 2025-01-25
INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern: Weekly Wrap; Napolitano interviews McGovern & Johnson, Judging Freedom; 2025-01-24
COL. Douglas Macgregor: The Coming World War III; Napolitano interviews Macgregor; Judging Freedom; 2025-01-23
Cold War II❄️V. Novosilka Endgame🏘️⚔️The CIA Is Preparing Negotiations🤝📜 Military Summary 2025.01.25; Military Summary; 2025-01-25
Culture
Creedence Clearwater Revival - Bad Moon Rising (Official Lyric Video); the lead single from Creedence's 1969 album Green River; Creedence Clearwater Revival; uploaded 2012-12-11
Copyleft: CC0
