There are several separate wars within wars that are occurring during this Not-War.
As I have written about many times before, there’s a sanctions war, a war over assets, a war over markets and then, yeah, the war ostensibly over clay in Donbass. The Kremlin oligarchy’s top priority however is to get sanctions relief, their assets released and to have their authority over their turf in Eastern Europe recognized. Most of these never-ending “peace” negotiations are about trying to get both sides to stop targeting refineries and factories and even port terminals/warehouses owned by rich oligarchs.
So far, from what we’re hearing about the latest round of negotiations, they’re still talking about this separate, parallel war. The latest news was Lukashenko commenting on the possibilty of an “air truce”. This means an end to strikes on refineries and factories and warehouses owned by oligarchs.
Lukashenko believes that Putin may agree to an air truce.
“We must do everything in these 50 days to: the first step is to stop missiles and drones from flying; the second step is to come to the 50th day to stop shooting altogether. Stop shooting, fire and negotiate a final peace. Either there will be demilitarization, or it will be postponed. The devil knows what kind of war [this is], but people should not die,” Lukashenko said.
This is the second time Lukashenko has raised the issue of an air truce. The first time was (https://t.me/olegtsarov/31852) on August 1 at a meeting with Vladimir Putin on Valaam.
As I understand it, Lukashenko is referring to the 50 days Trump gave Russia in mid-July (https://t.me/olegtsarov/31117) to achieve progress in a peaceful settlement, promising the US to impose additional economic sanctions and measures against Russia and its allies. Trump later reduced (https://t.me/olegtsarov/31724) the period to 10 days. And today the period expires.
Putin has always been the one offering terms to NATO and Kiev, begging them to come to the table and end the strikes. The strikes have also been incredibly one-sided — Russia’s oil and gas infrastructure gets targeted relentlessly and goes up in flames regularly. Russia, in turn, refuses to target critical infrastructure in Ukraine, especially if it belongs to NATO countries, like the factories that Turkish and German arms manufacturers have built in Ukraine a year ago.
But another interesting little detail came out about Lukashenko.
He has announced his plans to NOT run for office again. And Time even reports that Lukashenko has been sending them crucial information on Putin this whole time and begging for a dialogue between Minsk and Washington.
“In arranging an interview with a head of state, the journalist typically makes the first move, sending a request to the press office and hoping somebody responds. Once in a while, when a president really wants to talk, the invitation might go in the other direction. But rarely have the overtures been as persistent as the ones that reached me this spring from the allies of Alexander Lukashenko, the dictator of Belarus.
…
Since the beginning of this year, the autocrat has pursued a confidential dialogue with the Trump administration, offering his services as a kind of Putin whisperer. He coached U.S. officials on how to keep talks with the Kremlin on track, and he gave them assurances that the Russians were ready to negotiate in good faith even as they continued their bombing raids against Ukraine.”
The Americans played along. Within a month of Trump’s inauguration in January, U.S. officials made the first of at least five visits to Minsk to explore what Lukashenko could achieve. In the process, they eased the image of Belarus as a pariah state, won the release of several high-profile political prisoners, and opened a quiet backchannel to the Kremlin through Minsk.
In this context, Lukashenko’s desire for an interview with TIME made sense. What remained less clear to me was whether he is a peace broker acting on his own initiative, or a puppet in the hands of the Kremlin. The Americans also had their doubts. “We’re not naive,” says John Coale, a former attorney to Trump who has met with Lukashenko on behalf of the U.S. government several times this year. “He’s friends with Putin. They talk regularly,” Coale told me. “And he has offered to give Putin messages from us. That’s a channel, okay? That’s very valuable.”
In my last deep-dive article on Lukashenko, I reported on how he was secretly working with NATO and why Lukashenko has a deep grudge against Putin, who stole the Russian Presidency from him.
It sounds to me that Lukashenko thinks he has cut a deal with Washington.
And it is easy to understand why he would seek to do so. Putin has tried to topple Lukashenko before, and Lukashenko is trying to make himself useful to NATO to get even, or to gain some leverage against the Kremlin. This is also probably why he has announced plans to demographically replace Belarussians with Indians recently. Washington insists on promoting native replacement in all White countries.
…
And here are a few more quotes from that Time exclusive:
“All the while, Lukashenko continued to deliver a very different message to the Americans: Putin wants peace, the dictator assured them, and he is ready to make concessions.”
“Throughout the spring and summer, Lukashenko passed the same message to the Americans: “Putin is ready for peace negotiations. Just treat him with respect.” He repeated the same thing several times during the three hours we spent together. “Believe me,” Lukashenko said, “Putin wants peace. He really wants it.””
I have written before many times that I believe that Putin will have to surrender Donbass to get a ceasefire, let alone a peace. To my mind, Donbass is as good as surrendered to Kiev, which will grant it some sort of extra autonomy, but also reintegrate it. Essentially, what Putin asked for with Minsk I and II (reintegration of Donbass into Ukraine with some special political privileges for its oligarchs) is what the Kremlin(!!!) wants.
Kiev simply wants even more than that!
So, there is no reality, to my mind, where Donbass isn’t given up in some way. Because that’s literally just the starting point between both sides. Kiev and NATO want more than just a return to 2022 borders. Moscow would be happy with that outcome and just that outcome. But now that their paw is caught in the trap, they’re not being allowed to pull it out.
But the real wildcard is Crimea. For some reason, the Kremlin really wants to hold on to Crimea. Donbass, not so much. I believe that Crimea is the big sticking point in the negotiations. Kiev and NATO want it back and to build bases on it. Moscow, to their credit, does not feel comfortable with it. If you are interested in the inside story of how Crimea was taken back and behind Shoigu’s back, I’ve got your back on that. Here:
So, Crimea is important, basically. And there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye.
…
Trump says that the meeting with Putin will be in Alaska.
Is that a symbolic foreshadowing? Like how Russia sold Alaska to America? And how they’re going to have to sell some territories back to NATO+ Kiev in Donbass now? Is Crimea or Sumy supposed to be Alaska?
Either way, swap or no swap, the war will continue.
Like, yes, the Kremlin may indeed be able to buy itself sanctions relief somehow. Maybe Kiev will stop bombing their refineries. There might even be official ceasefires.
But the killing will continue.
Kiev is still getting more and more weapons and training as we speak. Ukraine is a massive investment and the West will keep the war going until that investment pays off with big dividends. If Moscow gets its sanctions relief and a de-escalation of the conflict, they’re willing to keep a low-level grind going for a decade more. Using their controlled media, they will simply whine about Kiev violating ceasefires and claim that they’re no longer in a war. Well, I mean, technically, this isn’t a war according to them, but a Special Military/Policing/anti-Terrorist Operation. So don’t scoff at me when I tell you that the Kremlin can pretend that a war has been ended when it hasn’t been ended.
They did that for 8 years in the lead up to 2022, didn’t they?
Best case scenario: ceasefire (of sorts) along current lines of contact
Realistic case scenario: ceasefire (of sorts) in exchange for surrender of territory in Donbass (at least the two northern oblast’s)
Worst case scenario: ceasefire (of sorts) in exchange for renting NATO bases on Crimea, yet another invasion of 1991 Russia by UAF, which they decide to keep this time.
…
Hopefully, Boris Johnson parachutes into the negotiations and sabotages them again somehow. Because a bad peace is often worse than even the most totally retarded war. There is no “peace” possible for Russia, it is just a question of where the frontline will be after Trump leaves office. Will it still be in Donbass, or will it be inside Russia?
"Greenwald was on Substack for some time and built up a large following. But in 2023 he moved his primary activity to a new initiative called Rumble, which intends to be a rival to YouTube. Greenwald was very outspoken about his reasons: he argued that Rumble was the platform most resistant to censorship. The battle between Rumble and a supreme court judge in Brazil that has been going on since 2023 appears to support Greenwald’s view. But on closer inspection there is some very worrying evidence that suggests Rumble is far more embedded in the deep state than even its worst rivals.
One obvious concern on which public information is easily available, is that Rumble’s seed funding came from the likes of Peter Thiel, Vivek Ramaswamy, JD Vance, and Trump Media. Thiel of course being one of the founders of perhaps the most evil company on earth Palantir"
"But the really startling pieces of evidence that inspired this article are the connections between Rumble, the CIA and the FBI. In the space of two months, the chief legal counsel of Rumble (Michael Ellis) was appointed deputy director of the CIA and one of the main founding hosts (Dan Bongino) was appointed deputy director of the FBI. So two senior figures at Rumble have become senior figures in the US intelligence services."
"The disappearance of Snowden
Given the power of the agencies who want him captured, dead or alive, it has been prudent of Snowden to be careful and irregular in his public appearances and posts. The result has been that sometimes his accounts have gone silent for months at a time. But as far as I can tell, his latest period of silence is the longest - and it is entirely unexplained. Snowden has not tweeted since 31 January 2025.
Except that shortly before he went quiet, on the 25th of February 2025, Snowden met in person with Glenn Greenwald…presumably somewhere in Russia."
Putin supposedly has billions and is getting old and needs to disappear from the world stage. If one of his doubles goes to Alaska and gets arrested he can disappear into the sunset, as his mission is complete. It would also teach the world, once again, that the US / Israel can do anything they want without ramifications. Russia wont start a nuclear war because " Putin" got arrested.
https://politicaleconomist.substack.com/p/glenn-greenwalds-new-links-to-the
"Glenn Greenwald's new links to the CIA and FBI"
"Greenwald was on Substack for some time and built up a large following. But in 2023 he moved his primary activity to a new initiative called Rumble, which intends to be a rival to YouTube. Greenwald was very outspoken about his reasons: he argued that Rumble was the platform most resistant to censorship. The battle between Rumble and a supreme court judge in Brazil that has been going on since 2023 appears to support Greenwald’s view. But on closer inspection there is some very worrying evidence that suggests Rumble is far more embedded in the deep state than even its worst rivals.
One obvious concern on which public information is easily available, is that Rumble’s seed funding came from the likes of Peter Thiel, Vivek Ramaswamy, JD Vance, and Trump Media. Thiel of course being one of the founders of perhaps the most evil company on earth Palantir"
"But the really startling pieces of evidence that inspired this article are the connections between Rumble, the CIA and the FBI. In the space of two months, the chief legal counsel of Rumble (Michael Ellis) was appointed deputy director of the CIA and one of the main founding hosts (Dan Bongino) was appointed deputy director of the FBI. So two senior figures at Rumble have become senior figures in the US intelligence services."
"The disappearance of Snowden
Given the power of the agencies who want him captured, dead or alive, it has been prudent of Snowden to be careful and irregular in his public appearances and posts. The result has been that sometimes his accounts have gone silent for months at a time. But as far as I can tell, his latest period of silence is the longest - and it is entirely unexplained. Snowden has not tweeted since 31 January 2025.
Except that shortly before he went quiet, on the 25th of February 2025, Snowden met in person with Glenn Greenwald…presumably somewhere in Russia."
Putin supposedly has billions and is getting old and needs to disappear from the world stage. If one of his doubles goes to Alaska and gets arrested he can disappear into the sunset, as his mission is complete. It would also teach the world, once again, that the US / Israel can do anything they want without ramifications. Russia wont start a nuclear war because " Putin" got arrested.