The Ukrainian capital Kyiv came under a massive Russian attack early on Saturday, with explosions sounding in the city, air defences in operation and the Ukrainian military saying missiles were being deployed.
The Russian action took place two days before a meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says he is due to hold in the United States with President Donald Trump to work out details of an accord for settling the nearly four-year-old war pitting Russia against Ukraine.
I came back from Ukraine just the other day. That trip I visited Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Sloviansk and Kramatorsk (~20km from the eastern front lines).
This is just the latest in a long campaign by Russia to make Ukrainian cities unlivable. Ukraine's third biggest city, Odesa, was almost entirely without power for about a week straight after Russia did a massive attack against power plants and substations in that area.
Worse though was losing water: on top of the attack against power, Russia also attacked water infrastructure such as water pumps, water towers, treatment plants, etc.
In Ukraine pretty much all businesses have backup generators, so losing power isn't that big of a deal. Losing water however really makes life hell. I personally know a mother with a baby who had to endure a week without running water in a 5th floor apartment. Every time you want to flush a toilet you need to drag up another few kg of water in jugs.
On top of that Russia is constantly attacking Ukrainian civilians directly, from Shahed attacks on apartment buildings, to the Human Safari campaign of suicide and grenade dropping drones again ordinary people, to regular attacks against markets. I personally took these photos in Kyiv and Sloviansk:
Closer to the front lines gas stations are particularly high risk. This particular one in Kramatorsk had already had to rebuild their wall after an attack. The concrete blocks and sandbags are very much needed:
Russia is simply evil.
Fortunately, Ukraine can certainly win this. For example, Russia's economy is in such bad shape that they're starting to use horses rather than proper vehicles:
If you've been paying attention, you'd also know about the endless hits on Russian oil and gas. The biggest obstacle is the unwillingness to accept that Russia is evil and needs to be destroyed. Ukraine damn well should be attacking all Russian infrastructure. Failing to do so is prioritizing the lives of evil people over good. This bullshit is so ridiculous that while Russian literally dumps anti-personnel mines over Ukrainian cities with drones, Ukrainian forces can't even publicly publicly admit to using anti-personnel mines against Russia.
Ultimately this is no different than how the far left prioritize the lives of rapists and murderers over their victims. The only difference is that this absurdity is mainly coming from the right, rather than the left.
Killing Russians faster makes the world a better place.
The problem is, the west spent so much of last few decades on populist handouts, feeding diversity and climate agendas that rhwy don't have the resources to spend for some serious hardware or training for the Ukrainian soldiers.
Ukrainian soldiers don't need training from NATO; NATO soldiers need training from Ukraine. We are setting ourselves up for a much bigger and more expensive war by failing to stop Russia (and China) now. And we're squandering our opportunity to learn how to fight drone warfare.
As for money, we're holding hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian assets that can trivially be sent to Ukraine. It's more money than Ukraine has ever gotten in military support. Indeed, one objective by Russia in all these fake peace negotiations is to present the narrative that the money can't be spent lest it prevent a peace deal.
A second factor is that Belgium actually taxes the interest on those frozen assets, tbe majority of which it has, adding billions to its federal budget.
Anyway, if the west is serious, it can easily deport these parasites on society and use the money saved to defend themselves via Ukraine. Unfortunately the incentives to do that aren't there: Ukrainian refugees are a rare example of financially profitable immigration.
Western companies have exposure in Russia too, in numbers bigger than Russian asset in the EU. So in a title for tat asset seizure, the EU will likely be a net loser.
Western companies with exposure in Russia were knowingly trading with evil. They deserve their losses. And, once Russia is actually defeated, many of those losses can be taken back by force.
I doubt the west will ever rule Russia for the take back by force option to be viable.
Vladimir Putin belongs in The Hague. Sic semper tyrannis.
So strange when so close to peace talks
They are nowhere near a genuine peace. This is not a war between honorable people with a reasonable dispute. This is a war between Russians who want to continue their centuries old practice of stealing land and subjugating people, and the people who don't want their land stolen.
Thinking you can "negotiate" your way to peace here is ridiculous. Russian imperialism is just as evil as any other thief or rapist. They're taking what isn't there's because they have no sense of ethics, and because so far, they've been able to get away with it.
What's really going on is Zelensky and co are using peace talks to show how evil Russia is (eg the very clever demand for free and fair elections in occupied Ukraine). Russia meanwhile is using peace talks to try to delay aid getting to Ukraine long enough that they can get a military victory.
The actual path to peace is to kill off the part of Russia's population that subscribes to this ideology. No different than how the most effective way to reduce rape and murder is to imprison and kill rapists and murderers.
They're just evil.
But I don’t understand how they got this way. Does this go back to Stalin? Like the Berlin Wall did come down so at some point Russia did have some compassion right??
Russia has been attacking and subjugating it’s neighbors for centuries.
The Berlin Wall is in Germany.
The belligerents are so far apart and not budging from their maximalist positions that it's difficult to imagine these "peace talks" will lead to anything positive. We seem to be making a step forward but I'm convinced that in reality we're actually moving backwards...
Yeah I should take more time to do a deep dive on the war. I sort of ignored it these last few years
Most independent analysts I follow are convinced that Russia has already won the war, and it's just a question of what will remain of Ukraine after they collapse...
You are either reading Russian propagandist directly or indirectly from those who have been influenced by it.
https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-december-24-2025/
Very difficult to get a good understanding of this war because there’s so much propaganda out there
Everyone is biased, and that's ok. The more biases we're exposed to, the better it is. I enjoyed the article.
Here in Europe, Russian opinions are verboten, this is why podcasts like The Duran are popular and helpful
USA cannot anymore fight a war of any scale because it has lost the ability to produce the materials required to fight a modern war.
https://archive.ph/4AYHm
Russia is a military proxy to China and can only mount this war because of Chinas support.
China is challenging US hegemony...and USA is on the back foot.
I watch The Duran YouTube channel almost daily, and I like their analysis in general.
Give us the best video that represents the situation there in your opinion
I'd recommend you watch any video from Alexander Mercouris, one of the hosts of The Duran yt channel. He also has his own yt channel where he posts daily updates, mostly on the situation in Ukraine. His analyses are based on Western and Russian information, and he has very well connected sources that often provide him with interesting scoops.
archived link because I'm getting a paywall
People getting their hits before the peace bell rings.
This is not a conventional war fought over negotiable interests but a sustained campaign rooted in an imperial mindset that sees Ukrainian sovereignty as expendable.
The challenge with calls for negotiations in such a context is that they often ignore the nature of the aggressor. Peace cannot be built on terms set by those who view the existence of the other side as intolerable. Any genuine settlement requires not just a cessation of violence but a dismantling of the ideology that fuels it.
When key infrastructure like water systems is targeted it underlines the intent to erode basic human dignity. Such acts are in clear violation of international humanitarian law and deserve unequivocal condemnation. Support for Ukraine therefore cannot be limited to words or diplomatic gestures. It must include sustained material aid robust defensive capabilities and a recognition that resilience alone will not end the conflict.
The reality is that until the threat of this kind of aggression is neutralized any talk of peace is little more than a tactical pause for the side that initiated the war. This is why the international community must treat the situation not as a frozen conflict to be contained but as a challenge to the very principle that sovereign nations have the right to exist free from coercion.