Russia

800 000 troops at Russia’s underbelly

The American peace proposals have been countered by the proposals drafted by the European Union. The European Union has frantically elaborated its own vision of the peace process because the American points are not much to the commissioners’ liking, and because – and that is utterly important – the European Union desperately seeks to become politically relevant. As it is, the war is going to be brought to an end through negotiations conducted by the Russian Federation and the United States – the only protagonists on the world’s political stage. Neither Ukraine nor the EU matters. Ukraine has been objectified, while the European Union – sidelined.

The EU’s attempt to regain political traction reminds one of France’s attempts towards the end of the Second World War to play the war game on a par with the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union. And, indeed, France managed to restore at least a semblance of its political relevance. The allies allowed Paris to be present at the ceremony of accepting the German surrender and to have its own occupational zone in Germany. It was – as said above – only due to the political generosity of the victorious powers that France was recognized as one of the winning parties because in reality France had been routed and occupied for a couple of years and – what follows – without the intervention of the Americans (and the British) France would not have liberated itself, on its own. No wonder then that when Marshal Keitel saw the French delegation attending the act of capitulation he could not restrain himself from remarking, ‘They, too, have defeated us?’

Today, it is not France alone but the entirety of the European Union plus Great Britain. In particular Germany, France, and the United Kingdom want to take a seat at the negotiating table and put forward their own proposals. They want to leave their mark on the peace process. And again, it depends on the United States of America and maybe also on the Russian Federation whether the EU will be admitted to the inner circle of world politics.

The counterpoints drafted by Brussels at times converge with those authored by Washington, and at times they diverge. Of the 28 points, Point 6 is quite peculiar. It states: ‘Size of Ukraine military to be capped at 800,000 in peacetime.’

800 000 troops at peacetime! That’s more than the standing armies of France (200 000), Germany (180 000), and the United Kingdom (140 000) combined! That’s more than twice as many troops as Turkey has (350 000). Consider that the Turkish armed forces are the second most numerous in NATO. And consider that Turkey’s standing army of 350 000 is sustained by Turkey’s population of 85 million, while Ukraine’s ‘capped’ military of 800 000 would have to be supported by 30 million, maybe even fewer people! If you add to it the devastation of Ukraine and the million or so of Ukrainian young men who have been killed or maimed, you begin to wonder how such an army could ever be raised in the first place.

The enormity of the size of Ukraine’s armed forces is one thing. The other is: why should Ukraine have such a huge standing army even if its maintenance were feasible? This question will surely be answered by Brussels along the lines of ‘making Ukraine capable of defending itself against the Russian aggressor,’ but is this explanation plausible? After all, at present, the Ukrainian army numbers maybe more than the said 800 000, and – as can be seen – it cannot withstand the Russian steady offensive. Why should it be capable of withstanding a similar offensive in the future?

Or maybe what the European Union covertly seeks is to keep using Ukraine as a permanent battering ram against Russia. in such a scenario the negotiated peace is going to be a mere ceasefire.

The proposal allowing Ukraine to have such a large army also runs counter to one of the two aims of the Special Military Operation, which is (apart from denazification) – demilitarization. How can Brussels expect Moscow to even consider Point 6? How could President Vladimir Putin or anybody in his place agree to having such an army at Russia’s underbelly after four years of war, after all the sacrifice and effort? Do Brussels politicians believe in the acceptability of this proposal? If they do, then their sanity is questionable. If we assume that their sanity remains all right, then we must come to the conclusion that this point alone serves the purpose of torpedoing the whole peace process, for a 800 000-men-strong army on Russia’s doorstep is a non-starter for Moscow.

Stated goals – genuine goals

Among the twenty-eight points of the peace proposal that has been drafted by the Americans is one that – if agreed upon – promises amnesty to all the participants of the conflict in Ukraine. This point reveals a huge lot.

For a long time now we’ve been fed the narrative that it was the Russian soldiers who were cruel and inhumane. Stories were spun and, indeed, pictures shown in the media about the atrocities committed by the Russians on Ukrainians. Do you still remember the notorious Bucha massacre? The intended pun on words – Butchery in Bucha or Butchers from Bucha – and the village carefully and intentionally selected to make the headlines sound alarming?

At the same time we’ve been fed the narrative that Ukrainian soldiers behave themselves gallantly. They are not the ones who commit atrocities, they are not the ones who assault civilians. Such things are only done by those evil Russians.

Let us assume the veracity of such statements. Then, like a bombshell, we can read one of the points of the peace proposals about pardoning the perpetrators of war crimes or other atrocities. If it was the Russians who committed those crimes, then the pardon extends to them and them alone, right? Why does the United States want to spare the Russian ruffians in uniform? Why such magnanimity? Didn’t the collective West – the United States and the European Union – label Russia’s president a killer, didn’t the commissioners want him on trial in the Hague? They wanted to hold accountable no less a figure than Russia’s president: surely they would be much stricter while handling figures of a lesser caliber!

Reading this point of the peace proposal you suddenly learn that atrocities and war crimes are not worth prosecuting. Are the Americans genuinely trying to shield the hated Russian evil-doers? Do the Americans genuinely suggest that justice should not be done? No, certainly not.

As usual, we need to distinguish between stated goals and genuine goals. The stated goal is the amnesty, something enticing for the Russians who are allegedly up to their hilts in blood. The genuine goal is – yes, you guessed it right – to protect the Ukrainian soldiers and the multiple mercenaries fighting on the Ukrainian side who have committed atrocities and downright war crimes. They are to be shielded from justice, they are to be protected, they are to be saved for future conflicts when they will come in handy.

Barely anyone remembers or, indeed, knows about the 2014 Odessa fire, a fire that burnt fifty or so (Russian) men and women alive in the Trade Union House, which was set ablaze by Ukrainian political activists. Still fewer people took notice when Russia’s President Vladimir Putin announced in one of his speeches at the very beginning of the conflict in Ukraine that Moscow knew the identity of the perpetrators of that fire and was about to track them down with the purpose of bringing them to book. Europeans or Americans may not have taken notice of those words; most probably they wouldn’t have heard them, since they only consume the news from the official channels. Yet, the wrongdoers would certainly have heard those words and consequently must have had the fright of their lives. The influential ones, those with connections to the powerful figures in the West, must have used all their influence to extract that kind of guarantee for themselves from their Western overlords.

The Burevestnik

The Burevestnik is a Russian name for a bird species. It corresponds to the petrel in English. The name itself carries a meaning. It stands for an announcer or herald of storms. The bird is known for its ability to fly long distances and to be able to defy the natural elements. Maxim Gorky, one of Russia’s greater writers and poets, composed a rhythmic blank verse about the bird. He describes a petrel or the burevestnik soaring up in the skies in expectation of the gathering storm while other species of birds – be it seagulls or penguins – are trying to find shelter. Maxim Gorky depicts the petrel or the Burevestnik not because of the bird’s natural features; rather, he points to the bird as to a rebellious or defiant human character that is in constant quest of change, of victory, of challenge.

A few days ago Russia’s President Vladimir Putin announced a successful test concerning a new missile by the name of Burevestnik. The technological novelty consists in the engine: the missile is powered by a nuclear reactor. The fact that it is powered but a nuclear reactor makes it possible for the rocket to stay in flight for a very, unimaginably very, long time. That in turn means that it can be positioned anywhere around the globe in air and keep flying back and forth, in circles or along any trajectory, and remain on constant alert. Apart from receiving signals from Moscow, it is most likely equipped with AI. The Burevestnik is not supersonic, but its maneuverability makes it difficult to detect, let alone to be intercepted or downed. Russia does not need to rely anymore so much on its submarines located somewhere close to the United States: soon, Russia will be able to position its the Burevestniks in proximity to America. Unlike the nuclear but manned submarines that from time to time need to return to their bases because of the human factor, the said missiles are unmanned. Hence, the only fatigue that one can think of in reference to the Burevestnik is the fatigue of the stuff from which the missile is made, not that of humans.

Besides the Oreshnik and the Sarmat, the Burevestnik is yet another novelty in Russia’s missile arsenal. The announcement of the rocket’s successful tests may have been intended as a means to force the West to sit down at the negotiating table over the conflict in Ukraine. The announcement about the missiles might also be framed as a response to America’s plans of providing Ukraine with Tomahawks. Neither the United States nor Europe have anything comparable with the Burevestnik. The Western leaders might feel ill at ease. That this is so can be proven indirectly by the West’s reaction. Rather than showing an interest in the news, Western diplomats and experts make believe that they couldn’t be bothered about the expanding Russian arsenal. President Donald Trump is reported to have commented that [Putin] “ought to get the war [in Ukraine] ended. A war that should have taken one week is now soon in its fourth year. That’s what he ought to do instead of testing missiles.”

It is also symptomatic and concurrently funny that the experts who admit to not having enough information about the Burevestnik still belittle, devalue or critique its technical capabilities or its usefulness. Let it sink in: they know nothing about the missile and yet they keep talking about its accuracy, duration of flight, usability, purposefulness and, and, and. One of the problems that those experts point to is that the Burevestnik will pollute the environment with radiation. But will it? If the Burevestnik is to be effective, and an effective missile is one that it is hard to locate, then it might be that it is provided with such technology of the engine that makes this engine leave no radiation. Consequently, no radiation trace gives away the position of the rocket. If that is the case, what then?

The Burevestnik has its undersea counterpart which is the nuclear-driven drone – the Poseidon. It, too, can remain in water for a very long time; it, too, is unmanned, and it, too, can lurk somewhere along the American eastern or Western coastline. For the time being these new weapons are unmatched game changers.

America has no chance in the Arctic

The conflict between Israel and Hamas is good for Russia. When the Israeli army began its operation in the Gaza Strip and the Houthis began attacking container ships in the Persian Gulf in retaliation, shipments through the Russian Northeast Passage increased rapidly. No wonder: the route is 30% shorter than the one through the Suez Canal, free of terrorists and Somali pirates (who have something to say in the case of the other alternative route – around Africa).

The ice is melting and Russia, having the largest fleet of icebreakers, is modernizing the ports in Murmansk and Sabetta and is expanding old military bases built during times of the Soviet Union in the north. Experts believe that the Arctic Ocean will probably be ice-free by the 2040 summer season due to climate change. Moscow estimates that 44% of the Arctic shelf is under its control, and the oil and gas reserves there are estimated to be worth around 20 trillion dollars. The Arctic has huge energy reserves of global importance. According to the US Geological Survey, around 30% of the world’s natural gas reserves and 13% oil fields (90 billion barrels) lie beyond the Arctic Circle. However, there are technical and financial problems with their production. The extraction of deposits in difficult polar conditions requires modern technologies and enormous investments, which Russia is still often unable to afford.

And this is where the Chinese friends come to the rescue, for whom the Northeast Passage (NSR) is a plan B for the New Silk Road: the Chinese are financing LNG projects, developing cooperation in the construction of satellites to monitor ice density, participating in the modernization of ports and the construction of transhipment terminals. Examples include the participation of CNPC, the largest Chinese oil and gas trading company, and the Chinese Silk Road Fund in the Yamal LNG project, as well as the announced investment in Arctic LNG 2. In the fall of 2024, the Chinese Coast Guard announced its first patrol in the waters of the Arctic Ocean, and the operation was carried out in cooperation with the Russian Coast Guard. Chinese shipping companies and logistics firms are increasingly operating transits via the NSR; specific liner projects (container shipping) and joint ventures with Russian players (e.g. Rosatom cooperation) emerged in 2023-2024.

Meanwhile, America is letting go of its opportunities in the north, is barely expanding its fleet of icebreakers, no new bases are being built and Donald Trump is on a collision course with Canada, the most important partner when it comes to the alternative northern passage through Canadian waters. Period.

War is a blessing while people are like grass

The war in Ukraine is dragging on. The end is nowhere in sight. It is dragging on and soon it will be entering its fourth year. Reason suggests that Russia with its demographic and industrial potential could put the hostilities to a rapid end. Nothing of the sort is happening. Reason suggests that Ukraine should lay down its arms since there is no way it can regain lost territories, not to speak of winning over its much stronger neighbour. Nothing of the sort is happening. Reason also suggests that the West should work towards ending the hostilities because if Ukraine’s defeat eventually comes, the EU will be politically worse off. Nothing of the sort is happening. Why?

Russia. Russia has been benefiting from the war effort just like the United States benefited from the First World War and the Second World War: at that time American economy was boosted, and so is Russia’s economy today. Russia is benefiting from the war also in terms of its society rallying around the head of the state. Precisely as it was the case with the United States in both world wars, so it is now in the case of Russia: it is not directly affected by the hostilities it. Yes, Russian soldiers are dying or are wounded, but Russian soil and Russian civilians remain for all practical purposes unscathed.

The European Union. The European Union is in decline. A decline caused by its deviant green ideology, by the indiscriminate acceptance of the influx of foreigners, and lastly by its economic problems brought about by the renunciation of cheap Russian gas. The welfare state is becoming overburdened, the governments and heads of state are increasingly unpopular while national and right-wing parties are on the political rise. Not infrequently people take to the streets and show their disdain for their leaders. The European dream is shattered. What then are the EU managers trying to do the save the day? Yes, they are trying to find a scapegoat for all the negative phenomena. This scapegoat is Russia. A very convenient scapegoat. All economic problems can now be blamed on the aggressor from the east, all shortages and shortcomings – on the ‘Mongols’ looming large on the eastern horizon. Europeans ought only to understand what is at stake, and rally round the EU commissioners in a joint attempt to defend the Garden against the Jungle.

The United States. The United States has used the war in Ukraine not only to weaken Russia, but also to subjugate Europe. Yes, Washington knows that Russia will eventually win, but in the process it will lose some of the people, and it will be kept busy, letting Washington more leeway elsewhere in the world. Europe has been conveniently rendered economically impotent, which is another gain for Americans. A competitor has been removed. The competitor’s reliance on Russian energy sources has been significantly lowered. Washington is cherishing high hopes that some of Europe’s industries and businesses will relocate to the United States, which will further deindustrialize the Old Continent and re-industrialize America.

What is the attitude of the three mentioned players to Ukrainians?

Russia. Russia recognizes in Ukrainians brothers by ethnicity. That is one of the reasons why Russian troops steer clear of destroying civilian objects and objects of cultural heritage. Concurrently, Russian troops are fighting hard culling the Banderite-type troops. This alone will render Ukraine less hostile to Russia. Also, the Russian army is destroying Ukraine’s military, thus making it no match to the Russian Federation in the nearest future. The destruction of the civilian infrastructure will make it barely possible for Ukraine to be accepted as a member of the European Union.

The European Union. The European Union couldn’t care less about Ukrainian life though, sure enough, the EU managers say they do. Ukrainian lives are pawns on the geopolitical chessboard and are willingly sacrificed on the altar of combating Russia. And what a paradox! The EU commissioners are gladly embracing ‘refugees’ from Africa and Asia who allegedly escape from war while they would gladly see all Ukrainian able-bodied men drafted into the Ukrainian army and sent to the front! The European Union accepts males from the Third World: why would it rather not accept all Ukrainian men who want to be drafted? True, Europeans are not as yet rounding Ukrainian men up in their cities and sending them back home, but such ideas have emerged now and again, here and there.

The United States. The United States views Ukraine precisely as Europe does: after all it was Zbigniew Brzezinski, the American politician and political thinker, who famously framed the globe as a chessboard. That’s precisely how the big players think about nations and countries: nations are chessmen while their territories are black and white squares of the chessboard. Accordingly, you sacrifice a chessman or you let go of a square as the case may be. The United States is one player, Russia or China is the other. Anything between them is – as we have already said – chessmen and chessboard squares. That’s all there is to it.

That’s also precisely how the managers of the world view the common people and their countries. The European elites may be whipping up war hysteria, but they themselves will not handle rifles or lie in trenches. Far be it from them! Whatever they want to impose on the common man and woman, they themselves prefer not to be affected by. Immigrants by the million for the common European to live with on a daily basis, but the commissioners live in places where they do not need to bother about strangers. Is it any different with war? No. Consider Ukraine’s President Zelensky. How has he experienced the three years of hostilities? He’s been travelling the world over, has been warmly received everywhere, and has given hundreds of interviews and made hundreds speeches, issuing hundreds of statements. How about the members of the Ukrainian government, of Ukraine’s parliament, how about higher officers? Pretty much the same story.

It has always been so throughout human history. Napoleon Bonaparte had half a million soldiers killed, frozen, or maimed in Russian steppes, but he himself made sure to be able to escape from the enemy and the frost in a comfortable coach, wrapped in warm furs. Adolf Hitler and his entourage? After the Red Army had crossed the Oder and was approaching Berlin, he and his ministers and generals must have realized that the end was inevitable and that the end was just round the corner. Some of them must have already taken the decision to commit suicide, and yet in order to prolong their lives by mere three-four months they did not stop the war. Rather, they sent new waves of troops – teenagers and the elderly – and added hundreds of thousands if not millions deaths to the huge overall toll.

For the managers of the world affairs, war is a game, a game that thrills them because it is a game played in reality. It is not a computer game. Augustus II the Strong (1670-1733), Elector of Saxony and King of Poland conspired with Tsar Peter I of Russia to attack Sweden in the latter’s possession on the Baltic. The war, which began in 1700 and lasted till 1721, soon after its outbreak turned to be a catastrophe for Saxony and partly for Russia. Augustus was forced to draft new and new men to either defend his country or help his Russian ally. When someone pointed to him that so many men had died and so many more were about to die, he shrugged his shoulders and merely replied: people are like grass. The more you trample it, the more abundantly it will regrow.

Ribbentrop-Molotov (1939) occurred in the wake of Chamberlain-Hitler (1938)

Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a speech during one of the sessions of the Valdai International Discussion Club (September 29 – October 2). That’s already a traditon: Vladimir Putin is habitually invited to to sessions of the Club, and this year was no exception. The speech was was followed by about two hours of questions from the journalists and the president’s answers. In both parts of his presence at Valdai, the Russian President laid down Russia’s point of view, Russia’s expectations, and Russia’s intentions.

[1] The world should be rid of military blocs. They have no purpose. Or – if there needs to be a military bloc – let it be one big military bloc – like NATO – but inclusive of all countries. Russia twice attempted to become a member of the Atlantic alliance: in 1954 (the being a part of the Soviet Union), and then in 2000. In either case Russia’s proposals have been turned down. Why? President Putin recounted his 2000 meeting with President Clinton and his suggestion concerning Russia’s NATO membership. The American president was willing to accept the proposal in the morning, only to turn it down later in the day, saying that the time was not right yet. Why? When would the time be right? asked Russia’s president.

[2] In anti-Russian narrative the West is glaringly biased in its actions and unfair in its propaganda. Take the historical policy, said the president. Much fuss is about the so-called Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact of 1939. As a result of this pact signed by foreign ministers of respectively the Third Reich and the Soviet Union Poland was dismembered in the following weeks. Yet, the West glosses over the preceding Munich Agreement of 1938 between the British and French prime ministers Chamberlain and Daladier on the one hand and the rulers of Italy and Germany – Mussolini and Hitler – on the other within the framework of which Czechoslovakia was dismembered within the following weeks. Why do Western propagandists lay emphasis on the former and ignore the latter?

[3] Similarly, if Russia is a paper tiger, as President Donald Trump famously said, and this paper tiger – that is Russia – is successfully fighting in Ukraine against NATO, then what NATO is? asked Vladimir Putin to the amusement of the audience.

[4] Though the war in Ukraine is waged and the collective West appears to be bellicose towards Russia, nonetheless the United States keeps importing Russian uranium for American nuclear power plants, and Russia appears to be America’s second largest provider of this resource. This Russo-American deal should continue, said the Russian president, because it serves the interests of both partners, but why then can’t Western Europe purchase Russian gas? Why does the United States demand that China and India stop purchasing Russian gas and oil? Obviously, the old rule of quod licet Iovi, not licet bovi applies here.

[5] The West is deteriorating, losing its identity, having problems with immigrants and others. So, rather than being focused on Russia, the West ought to deal with its internal problems. The loss of cultural identity has brought about a new phenomenon: an ever larger stream of people from the West is arriving in Russia to settle. One of the most striking examples is the case of Michael Gloss, son of a deputy director of the CIA, who arrived in Russia and voluntarily joined the Russian armed forces to fight against Ukraine. He was accepted, trained and sent to the front where he was killed. He was killed by a Ukrainian drone, while being wounded and trying to help his Russian mate. The Russian authorities granted him an order for bravery and requested Steve Witkoff – President Trump’s special enboy to Moscow – to hand it over to his family. Michael Gloss fought for Russia as he viewed Russia as a guard of traditional values that are shrinking in the West. They are shrinking so rapidly and have shrunk so much that even those Russian intellectuals – said Vladimir Putin – who have always dreamt about the West as paradise, as a model for Russia, as the Garden of Eden, began to say that the Europe that they have loved so much is no more.

[6] The Russian President revealed Ukrainian losses: in September 2025 alone Ukraine had 44.700 casualties of which 50% were irretrievable. During the same time Kiev could send to the front 18.000 of those drafted and 14.000 from hospitals as replacements, which means that the Ukrainian Army was short of 11.000 troops. The Russian President also said that between January and August of the current year as many as 150.000 Ukrainian soldiers deserted the ranks. Some surrendered willingly to the Russian troops, although that was a hard task on their part because they were often killed by drones operated by mercenaries who do not care about Ukrainian lives.

[7] Vladimir Putin said that Russia along with China and India and others do not want to dethrone the dollar: the fact that Russia, China and India and other countries are beginning to use other currencies in their trade is a simple result of the West’s financial policy that leaves Russia, and China, and others no other way as to bypass the dollar.

[8] President Vladimir Putin praised President Donald Trump and said, indeed, that he believed that the war would not have broken out had Donald Trump been the American president; and, yes – said the president – Donald Trump is a man who has the ability to listen to his interlocutor, to hear him out, and grasp his point of view.

[9] Unfortunately, just as once it was the Soviet Union that would impose its ideology on other countries, now this attitude has been adopted by the United States in Washington’s attempt to homogenize the world and create it in America’s image.

[10] At a point during the questions-and-answers part, Vladimir Putin confessed to being an ardent reader of poetry, especially Alexander Pushkin. From a volume of his poetry the Russian president read out loud a larger fragment of the poem that Pushkin entitled The Anniversary of (the Battle of) Borodino (Бородинская годовщина). The text refers to the age-long dream of the West to subjugate Russia. The poem was composed in 1831 and occasioned by the 1830-31 Polish anti-Russian uprising, which had the political and moral backing of the West. The message that the Russian president wanted to put across was that the strife between the West and Russia is of very long standing.

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