Summary

A senior White House team, led by Steve Witkoff and Mike Waltz, is traveling to Saudi Arabia to set up Ukraine peace talks, excluding both Ukraine and Europe from negotiations.

This move raises concerns about sidelining key stakeholders while favoring direct U.S.-Russia discussions. European leaders, including Macron and Starmer, are meeting in Paris to respond.

Trump’s team has hinted at lifting Russian sanctions, a stance welcomed by the Kremlin.

NATO allies are wary of U.S. inquiries on security guarantees for Ukraine, fearing strategic leaks.

  • TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee
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    6 days ago

    EU needs to just say fuck it at this point and give the ultimatum that unless they and Ukraine are included with the talks, they are sending troops into Ukraine. The Polish have been itching to kill Russians for decades and to be honest, 80% of the EU has well. When that first underwater cable was cut, it should have been game on.

      • Zaktor@sopuli.xyz
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        6 days ago

        Just FYI to other readers, this is just made up. Like not even “did a search and is being a little hyperbolic”, just not even in the vague realm of reality.

        • TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee
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          6 days ago

          Plus calling the Russian army a "peer military " is fucking hilarious after the display in Ukraine. I’m sure the asshole you’re responding to in St. Petersburg is desperately trying to avoid being sent there.

            • TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee
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              6 days ago

              Just one fucked their shit up with a bolt action M28-30 and a submachine gun.

              Imagine with all the gear they have now lol.

              Dead orks. Far as the eye can see and hip deep.

              • PetteriPano@lemmy.world
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                5 days ago

                A large group of Russian soldiers in the border area in 1939 are moving down a road when they hear a voice call from behind a small hill: “One Finnish soldier is better than ten Russian”.

                The Russian commander quickly orders 10 of his best men over the hill where Upon a gun-battle breaks out and continues for a few minutes, then silence. The voice once again calls out: “One Finn is better than one hundred Russian.”

                Furious, the Russian commander sends his next best 100 troops over the hill and instantly a huge gun fight commences. After 10 minutes of battle, again Silence. The calm Finnish voice calls out again: “One Finn is better than one thousand Russians!”

                The enraged Russian commander musters 1000 fighters and sends them to the other side of the hill. Rifle fire, machine guns, grenades, rockets and cannon fire ring out as a terrible battle is fought…

                Then silence.

                Eventually one badly wounded Russian fighter crawls back over the hill and with his dying words tells his commander, “Don’t send any more men…it’s a trap. There’s two of them.”

          • Zaktor@sopuli.xyz
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            6 days ago

            No you didn’t. Every major country has standing armies well over 100k. The entire EU has ~1.3M active duty troops.

          • forrgott@lemm.ee
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            6 days ago

            Uh no. I’ve done my research, now do some yourself. Learn to fish grasshopper.

            You seemed to have misspelt “circle jerk”.

          • marcos@lemmy.world
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            6 days ago

            The EU has some negotiations going badly on finding 100k people to keep permanently stationed in Ukraine from now on. And it’s not even a failure, it’s just that some people disagree… what never happens on the EU…

            Way to turn a non-news into the weirdest false fact you can get.

          • Stalinwolf
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            6 days ago

            Did you also meticulously research how to close your comment with the lamest fucking sentence possible?

      • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Funny, I recently spoke with a guy from Finland, who basically claimed they could take Russia on their own.
        That’s probably overstating it a bit, but in the 40’s Germany took a pretty huge chunk of the Soviet Union alone.
        Only with help from USA was the Soviet Union able to resist the Germans.

        Russia is thoroughly corrupt and incompetent, and even the Soviet era of willingness to die for nothing, will not help them if Europe joins in helping Ukraine in a full scale military effort.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_military_and_paramilitary_personnel

        France alone has 270000 troops! Just including Germany makes it almost ½ a million! Adding Italy, Spain, Poland and Greece we are easily at a full million!

        This is even without counting about 20 smaller countries, and UK which is not in the EU, but would absolutely help too I’m sure.

        • truthfultemporarily@feddit.org
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          6 days ago

          The Finns could probably take Russia on their own. They have been continuously preparing since the winter war. Everything is build around it, everyone has trained for it, they even test moving their entire economy to war economy on a regular basis.

        • badwetter@kbin.melroy.org
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          6 days ago

          Son/kid That’s not all combat troops. I’m referring to boots on the ground, combat troops. How many rear soldiers do you think it takes to support 100 k soldiers? I bet you have no Fricken clue … Look deeper.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            6 days ago

            OK first you are moving the goal post, you merely wrote troops originally, now you change it to combat troops.
            But yes I know the ratio is usually 1:4, meaning about 250K European COMBAT troops.

            This is still way more than the 100K you claimed above.

            All in all you are literally full of shit.

            • badwetter@kbin.melroy.org
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              6 days ago

              I’m not moving the goalposts. I forget that I’m talking to civilians. It takes more soldiers in the rear to support soldiers in the front. So the % of combat troops is the tip of the spear. The total number of troops means little, it’s the number of troops that are the tip of the spear. The EU has little in combat capacity, and most of the equipment has been destroyed in Ukraine. So what are they going to fight with?

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            6 days ago

            Oh boy, so Ukraine is most corrupt? And only a 4th the population and military of Russia, Still Ukraine has very successfully fought against Russia. So Russia in 3 years has only been able to achieve a fraction of what they claimed could be done in 3 weeks, or maybe even 3 days!
            And you claim Europe combined wouldn’t do any better?!
            You are a very special kind of delusional.

        • badwetter@kbin.melroy.org
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          6 days ago

          I don’t agree with that number.

          EU Combat Troop Numbers The European Union has established EU Battlegroups, which consist of battalion-sized forces reinforced with combat support elements, typically comprising 1,500 troops each. As of 2023, eighteen battlegroups were operational, with two being ready for deployment at any given time. Additionally, a permanent European Union Rapid Deployment Capacity (EU RDC) consisting of up to 5,000 troops (the size of a brigade) is to be operational by 2025. These forces are under the direct control of the Council of the European Union. 🌐 en.wikipedia.org Defence forces of the European Union - Wikipedia 🌐 en.wikipedia.org EU Battlegroup - Wikipedia 🌐 boell.de The never-ending debate of the European Army and why it is unhelpful | Heinrich Böll Stiftung 🌐 en.wikipedia.org United States military deployments - Wikipedia 🌐 en.wikipedia.org European army - Wikipedia 🌐 eeas.europa.eu EU Battlegroups |

          OK, do you math at any one time 2 battlegroups are ready to go, that’s 27,000 and not all combat troops. LOL

          • truthfultemporarily@feddit.org
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            6 days ago

            Maybe you should read that article you linked completely. EU battle groups are multinational rapid response forces, and merely a subset of troops the EU can muster. Germany alone has 180k active service personnel.

          • Skua@kbin.earth
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            6 days ago

            The EU Battlegroups are not the combined militaries of the member states. They are a specific group that works directly under the EU. The vast majority of the militaries of the EU member states are not in EU Battlegroups.

            Did you not actually link of of your sources because you were concerned someone might actually read them?

            • badwetter@kbin.melroy.org
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              6 days ago

              That’s correct, and they’re the active brigades available. I’m a soldier, it takes months to have troops ready for combat, at a minimum 6 months of training. Just because one has a relatively large military means squat. What counts is how many can go to war immediately.

              • Skua@kbin.earth
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                6 days ago

                Why do you equate “not in an EU Battlegroup” to “not able to go to war immediately”? Every EU member retains independent control of their militaries. They do not need to use the EU Battlegroup command structure. In fact they never have, and yet they have still regularly deployed troops.

      • forrgott@lemm.ee
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        6 days ago

        You sound like you’d be interested in this piece of waterfront property I happen to have for sale! It is on the moon, but that just makes the views amazing, right??

        Did it ever cross your mind that if there was any truth to your statement, Russia would’ve easily invaded every country in Europe by now? Oh, but I suppose facts and logic are just fancy words for lies - I mean, not like your feelings would lie to you, right???

        ಠ_ಠ

        • badwetter@kbin.melroy.org
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          6 days ago

          Why would Russia want to invade? If NATO stays out of adjoining countries they won’t need to. Imagine if Russia or the Chinese put troops in Mexico or Canada, what do you think the US would do? Get a damn clue, you’re extremely naive.

          • forrgott@lemm.ee
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            6 days ago

            What would the US do? Not a fucking thing.

            We’re not the heroes; we never were.