by John Helmer, Moscow
  @bears_with

“The priority for peacemaking in Europe has to be Russia and the United States. It has long been US imperial policy since 1945 to break, block, and destroy the capability of the Russians, either in the form of the Soviet Union or the Russian Federation, to form a level of partnership, cooperation, and economic and political power in Europe that threatens American hegemony in Europe.  So now, at the present moment, what is Trump’s default position on that – on US hegemony? In answer, Mr Trump is the best enemy Russia has ever fought against.”

“What’s Trump’s default position if he can’t get a peace plan? Arguably right now he doesn’t know. And he doesn’t have much time before the mid-term Congressional elections come on which he’ll have to fight, not against a clear Democratic Party presidential candidate, but locally against Republicans who will be held responsible for inflation and every other ailment that Trump’s tariff war will have caused at the local level.”

Listen to this discussion with leading Indian military strategist, Lieutenant-General Ravi Shankar, aired from Chennai on April 21.   

The discussion opens with President Vladimir Putin’s Easter ceasefire, first predicted on Gunners Shot on March 22 —  Minute 28:17 —  and formally announced at a Kremlin meeting with Chief of the Russian General Staff General Valery Gerasimov on April 19.  

Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/76727 

Gerasimov emphasized that Russian forces are now on the offensive westward, although they have yet to complete the removal of Ukrainian forces which had attacked the Kursk region last August. “All six army groups are currently on the offensive along 11 theatres of action,” Gerasimov said.    “Army group North has been on the offensive to liberate districts in the Kursk Region which were invaded by the Ukrainian armed forces. Most of the invaded territory has been liberated. As of today, the liberated area is 1,260 square kilometres, which amounts to 99.5 percent of the invaded territory.”

Gerasimov limited his operational report to Kursk, and did not refer to the Russian offensive which has begun over the past week in the Zaporozhye region towards Orekhov. Putin said no more than “the situation along the line of contact is clear, it is progressing favourably for us and the Russian forces are steadily advancing their positions. Please report separately on the border area, the Kursk and the Belgorod regions as soon as combat action to clean up these territories is completed.”

The 30-hour ceasefire, Putin said, would expire at 12 am on Monday, April 21. In the podcast the possibility of an extension to May 9 was discussed as depending as much on Trump’s response, as on Ukrainian compliance. In the event, Trump ignored the ceasefire entirely.

There is no record that Trump or his advisors, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, and special negotiator Steven Witkoff, had anticipated Putin’s move, or were prepared to respond to it.

Source: https://truthsocial.com 

Source: https://truthsocial.com/

Instead, they waited until Sunday afternoon Washington time, forty-five minutes before the Kremlin deadline expired. Trump then tweeted that “hopefully Russia amd [sic] and Ukraine will make a deal this week.”  

Trump appeared to be endorsing the terms which had been agreed by Rubio, Witkoff, and General Keith Kellogg in Paris last week in talks with a Ukrainian delegation and with French and German officials.  Trump was also hinting that Witkoff would return to Moscow to press their terms at a meeting at the Kremlin. Advance notice of these Trump terms was telephoned by Rubio to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

According to Rubio, what had been agreed with the Ukrainians and the Europeans in Paris was “the outlines of a durable and lasting peace. The encouraging reception in Paris to the U.S. framework shows that peace is possible if all parties commit to reaching an agreement.”  

Lavrov’s communiqué stopped just short of rejecting the shift Rubio had made towards the Ukrainian and Franco-German terms, claiming it was in “alignment with the framework of ongoing consultations between Washington and Moscow, including the recent dialogue between President of Russia Vladimir Putin and Steve Witkoff in St Petersburg. Sergey Lavrov reaffirmed Moscow’s readiness to continue collaborative efforts with American counterparts to comprehensively address the root causes of the Ukrainian crisis.”  

The Rubio phrase, “encouraging reception in Paris” and Lavrov’s phrase, “the root causes of the Ukrainian crisis” reveal the US and Russia remain at loggerheads.

Source: https://truthsocial.com/

The podcast discussion of Russian and Indian relations focused on proposals for reciprocal visits to Moscow and Delhi by Putin and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and on a new agreement by their officials last week on six new  priority investment projects.    Neither the Russian nor the Indian press reports have identified the project particulars.  

In this context, the decline of Russian military exports to India was noted, as the Russian production lines have been redirected to accelerating the supply of materiel to the Ukraine front.

RUSSIA’S PLACE IN THE TOP-10 TABLE OF ARMS EXPORTERS, 2015-2024

Source: https://www.sipri.org/
“Arms exports by Russia dropped by 64 per cent between 2015–19 and  2020–24. Russia accounted for 7.8 per cent of global arms exports in 2020–24. The decline in Russia’s arms exports started before its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In 2020 and 2021 export volumes were much smaller (ranging from 22 to 73 per cent lower) than in any year of the preceding two decades (i.e. 2000–19). This was largely as a result of a decrease in orders from China and India. In 2024 the volume of Russian arms exports remained at around the same level as in 2023, which was 47 per cent lower than in 2022. The decrease since 2022 is likely mostly related to Russia’s decision to prioritize the production of major arms for its own armed forces over those for export, the effects of multilateral trade sanctions imposed on Russia and increased pressure from the USA and its allies on states to avoid buying Russian arms.

In the final segment of the podcast, the focus is on the Quad – the US, India, Japan and Australia – as an anti-Russian, anti-Chinese force.

Summit lineup of the Quad in the US in September 2024 – left to right: Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese; Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Joseph Biden, and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.  

In the communiqué of the 2024 Quad summit, the targeting of the enemy states was oblique.“We strongly oppose any destabilizing or unilateral actions that seek to change the status quo by force or coercion. We condemn recent illicit missile launches [North Korea] in the region that violate UN Security Council resolutions. We express serious concern over recent dangerous and aggressive actions in the maritime domain [China]. We seek a region where no country dominates and no country is dominated—one where all countries are free from coercion, and can exercise their agency to determine their futures. We are united in our commitment to upholding a stable and open international system, with its strong support for human rights, the principle of freedom, rule of law, democratic values, sovereignty and territorial integrity, and peaceful settlement of disputes and prohibition on the threat or use of force in accordance with international law, including the UN Charter… We express deep concern about countries [Russia] that are deepening military cooperation with North Korea, which directly undermines the global nonproliferation regime.”  

by Editor - Monday, April 21st, 2025