Important Takeaways:
- U.S. President Joe Biden announced more than $8 billion in military assistance for Ukraine on Thursday to help Kyiv “win this war” against Russian invaders, using a visit by President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to make a major commitment.
- The aid includes the first shipment of a precision-guided glide bomb called the Joint Standoff Weapon, with a range of up to 81 miles (130 km).
- The bulk of the new aid, $5.5 billion, is to be allocated before Monday’s end of the U.S. fiscal year, when the funding authority is set to expire.
- Another $2.4 billion is under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which allows the administration to buy weapons for Ukraine from companies rather than pull them from U.S. stocks.
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Important Takeaways:
- Ukraine’s shock incursion across the Russian border into Kursk Oblast may force important strategic decisions on Moscow as President Vladimir Putin’s troops are taken as prisoners of war and supply lines are threatened. The Ukrainian attack took Russian forces by surprise, according to one U.S. official who was not authorized to speak publicly.
- According to the Institute for the Study of War, Ukraine’s cross-border gambit has allowed Kyiv to seize the battlefield initiative, long held by Russian forces who were able to dictate the time and place of fighting and force Ukrainian troops to expend manpower and equipment on defensive operations.
- “It’s been a very real success,” former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine John Herbst, now a senior director at the Atlantic Council, told USA TODAY. “The latest data, not confirmed, says they’ve taken as much as 750 square kilometers and may have gone as far as 35 kilometers from the border.”
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledged the operation in a post Saturday to X, formerly Twitter, describing a push to drive the war into “the aggressor’s territory.” Zelenskyy thanked international partners for implementing sanctions against Russia and the United States for new defense aid, including Stinger missiles, HIMARS mobile artillery ammunition and 155mm artillery shells.
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Important Takeaways:
- Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelenskiy will sign a 10-year bilateral security agreement at the G7 summit in Italy, as arguments continued on the sidelines about how the west can provide a Donald Trump-proof $50bn loan to Ukraine.
- As with the other bilateral pacts, the agreement with the US will not require America to come to Ukraine’s defense if attacked. But it could make it easier for Ukraine to enter into peace negotiations with Russia, as Kyiv would have some assurance about the help it would receive in the event of a further Russian attack.
- The US-Ukraine agreement does not require the authorization of Congress and could be undone by a future Trump administration.
- Biden has said previously that guarantees for Ukraine would be equivalent to those to Israel, covering financial and military assistance as well as the possibility of the joint weapons production.
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Important Takeaways:
- German chancellor Olaf Scholz has been accused of a “flagrant abuse of intelligence” for divulging details of British aid for Ukrainian forces.
- Scholz said Germany will not be sending Kyiv Taurus, Berlin’s version of the Storm Shadow missile, pointing to a risk of his country becoming directly involved in the war, referring to the UK and French assistance to Ukraine.
- On Monday, he said that German soldiers could not follow the lead of their British and French allies in “the way of target control and accompanying target control”.
- “This is a flagrant abuse of intelligence deliberately designed to distract from Germany’s reluctance to arm Ukraine with its own long-range missile system,” said Tobias Ellwood, the former chairman of the Commons defense committee.
- Rishi Sunak on Tuesday confirmed the UK government has a “small number” of soldiers deployed inside Ukraine but added that Britain has no plans for a large-scale deployment of troops to the war-hit nation.
- “Beyond the small number of personnel, we do have in the country supporting the armed forces of Ukraine, we haven’t got any plans for large-scale deployment,” the PM’s spokesperson told reporters, adding that large numbers of Ukrainian troops were being trained in Britain and London was supporting Kyiv with equipment and supplies.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- China will work to mediate peace, Xi tells Zelensky in first call since war
- Ukrainian officials have long been calling on Beijing to use its influence in Russia to help end the war.
- Describing the phone call as “long and meaningful,” Zelenskiy tweeted: “I believe that this call, as well as the appointment of Ukraine’s ambassador to China, will give a powerful impetus to the development of our bilateral relations.”
- Xi told Zelensky that China would send special representatives to Ukraine and hold talks with all parties seeking peace, Chinese state media reported.
- China says it is positioned to help mediate the conflict because it has not taken sides.
- Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a “no limits” partnership agreement weeks before Putin ordered the invasion.
- Western countries say China’s 12-point peace proposal is too vague, offers no concrete path out of the war, and could be used by Putin to promote a truce that would leave his forces in control of occupied territory while they regroup.
- Earlier this week, European countries raised alarm after China’s ambassador to France said states such as Ukraine that won independence with the break-up of the Soviet Union “don’t have actual status in international law.”
- Beijing said its position on the independence of ex-Soviet states was unchanged.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Kremlin warns more US arms shipments to Ukraine would mark ‘aggravation of the conflict’
- The Kremlin on Wednesday warned that additional U.S. arms shipments to Kyiv would mark an “aggravation of the conflict.”
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is slated to visit Washington on Wednesday, when President Biden will meet with him and announce an additional roughly $2 billion in assistance for the country.
- The package will include Patriot Missile Batteries, which can generally operate with a maximum range of 100 miles and help target ballistic and cruise missiles.
- Ukraine for weeks has asked for more advanced air defense systems as the country faces a barrage of strikes from Russia that in particular has targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
- Congress on Tuesday also proposed a $45 billion emergency aid package for Ukraine
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Kremlin says no chance of peace with Kyiv after Zelensky Washington trip
- The Kremlin said that nothing good would come from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s trip to Washington on Wednesday and that Russia saw no chance of peace talks with Kyiv.
- Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that continued Western arms supplies to Ukraine would lead to a “deepening” of the conflict – something which could backfire on Kyiv, he warned.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Kremlin warns of nuclear World War III: ‘Will be catastrophic for all mankind’
- Kremlin Security Council Deputy Secretary Alexander Venediktov warned if western nations supporting Ukraine decided to use weapons of mass destruction on Russia, it would all but guarantee World War III.
- Venediktov’s comments come days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for the West to carry out “preventative strikes” against Russia before it uses its nuclear weapons and “to eliminate the possibility that Russia will use nuclear strikes.”
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Ukraine Frantically Tries to Walk Back Zelensky Call for ‘Preemptive Strikes’ on Russia
- The presidential press office of Ukraine accused global media outlets of “nuclear hysteria” on Thursday for sharing remarks made by President Volodymyr Zelensky in which he asked the world for “preemptive strikes” on Russia to avoid nuclear war.
- Zelensky made the remarks during a question and answer session with the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank, on Thursday, asserting that NATO had a responsibility to “make it impossible for Russia to use nuclear weapons.”
- “Preemptive strikes are needed so that they know what awaits them if they use nuclear weapons. Not the other way around, waiting for Russia’s nuclear strikes and then saying, ‘oh, you’ve done that, then get this,’”
- Zelensky’s “preemptive strikes” remarks on Thursday caused alarm worldwide in the greater context of growing panic over a potential nuclear war, fueled by individuals such as Biden, who warned of an impending “Armageddon” on Thursday. The Russian government, as the target of the remarks, was particularly appalled, referring to Zelensky as a “monster.”
- One of Zelensky’s top advisers, Mykhailo Podolyak, took a different approach, claiming that Zelensky was calling for countries to “outline” potential consequences preemptively rather than actually making “preemptive strikes.”
- “Zelensky reminded the world of Russian nuclear blackmail and suggested it pre-emptively outline the consequences for Russia and intensify strikes against Russia – sanctions and armed aid,” Podolyak wrote on Twitter.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Russia expands its Ukraine goals, now seeks to oust Zelenskyy’s ‘unacceptable regime’: Live updates
- Russia has expanded its military goals in Ukraine from seizing control of the eastern Donbas region of the embattled country to regime change in Kyiv, the Kremlin’s top diplomat says.
- “We will definitely help the Ukrainian people to free themselves from the regime that is absolutely anti-people and anti-history,” Lavrov said.
- Zelenskyy was unbowed, pleading to win “this war for independence” and to keep Ukraine on a course towards full membership in the EU and becoming one of the most modern states in the world.
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