It was as if they invited him to the Whitehouse to set him up for a lecture and scolding. They had no intention of anything other than humiliating him in front of the world. It's shameful what our administration has done.
But overall, he did rather well, considering the shit-show it was.
I still can't believe Trump publicly tries to humiliate an ally like this, and at the same time calls Biden "the stupid President".
Stupid or not, perhaps he is, but not to stay in public like that. It shows Trump doesn't respect the function of the US President and shits on the vote of the citizens.
I don't think I'd consider that a mistake. Not that it matters to everyone but it's one more asshole thing to know Trump did, which was only publicized because Zelenskyy respectfully asked for his turn to speak. Other leaders are likely to have taken note of that: Trump isn't even pretending that you're equals.
To some common folk, it will make Zelenskyy look weak but also consider this exact thread in which people say his calm demeanor makes him look strong. I'd wager Zelenskyy is interested in impressing the latter folk and not interested in impressing the former.
They’re not equals and to pretend otherwise is delusional. One is the leader of the most powerful country on earth. The other is broke and soon to be defenseless.
The first one is getting emotional in the first place. His team and Ukraine's intelligence services should have spent weeks interrogating and trying to provoke him in order to desensitize him to this kind of shit. Trump, Vance and Musk are primarily trolls and they should be dealt with as such.
He should not have interrupted Vance answering him either. That was fatal.
He needed to stay calm and slow. He did better than any of us could ever have done, but it wasn't quite enough for this situation. He could have looked a lot stronger and I think we need everything we can possibly get in the situation we're all in right now.
I want to highlight this comment too: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43211604
But Trump jumped in angry at the implication that one day Putin will come for the US. That is when Trump stated his machine gun speech … millions will die, world war 3.
This was a shameful day for America. Period. Full stop.
Vance was absolutely trying to score domestic political points by undermining Zelenskyy, but Zelenskyy was unable to communicate or respond in the manner he wanted to, and definetly committed some obvious Russian L1 / English L2 mistakes (Zelenskyy's first language is Russian and this can be seen by his "costume" statement, because the direct translation for suit across the CIS is костюм/costume [0][1][2][3] because of French influence), and he inadvertently insinuated that Trump wasn't doing enough even though he was trying to join Vance in dunking on the previous admin.
This is why the Japan and India meetings with Trump had English translators despite Ishiba and Modi having a similar level of English fluency to Zelenskyy.
[0] - https://stager.ua/ru/category/kostyumi/
[1] - https://arber.ua/ru/catalog/kostiumi
Felt like watching your friend get scolded by his parents when they find a cigarette in his backpack
Probably why people voted for him.
> shits on the vote of the citizens.
yes 4 years ago. But now… can’t really say we didn’t know what we were voting for. I didn’t vote for him, but most of my fellow Americans did, and we gotta live with that, and hope we learn.
Not true.
Harris - 75 million votes
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/11/05/us/elections/...
Stuff like this https://www.gregpalast.com/trump-lost-vote-suppression-won/
- an American citizen who wasn't able to vote in multiple presidential elections due to nonsense like being unregistered without notification in a state with an early registration deadline
"First past the post" means "first to get above 50%". He didn't win enough of the vote to be elected.
First past the post is plurality wins.
Anyways, that's not how US presidential elections work. The aggregate of votes doesn't matter, only the electoral votes divvied up by state.
I personally think everyone looked rather unprofessional in this meeting..
IMO he’s damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. Maybe he could have been more professional and statesmanlike but I don’t think it would have earned him a thing. The US strategy seems locked in at this point and it’s a pro-Russia one. He could have really flexed the “deal with a heckler” muscles but the risk is far too great.
European leaders are queuing up to restate their support for Ukraine after this and I think that’s probably the best he could have gotten from it anyway.
The Trump-gang seems to underestimate everyone and everything. I still don't know whether they mean all this excessive behavior for real, or if this is an elusive ploy to divert from something else. Trumps seems to operate by selling big to gain small, but I can't really understand yet what his real long-term goal seems.
But at this point it seems other politicians around the world have got an understanding of him and his behavior and started playing along. I'm curious if Zelenskiy did the same, he certainly gained more from this than if he had been avoided it from the beginning.
I'm not disappointed in Trump; he remains exactly who I thought he was even before running in 2015. I'm disappointed in how many of my fellow citizens applaud his buffoonery, ignorance, and malice. While Trump himself is not competent, he has surrounded himself with people who can actually do the damage.
To conservatives who are about to say I'm a snowflake liberal, I ask you this: if Biden had invited George Soros to run wild through the government and ignore the laws, demanded a $800B reduction in the military budget and reallocated it to distribute to those in poverty, commanded schools to hire only gay people, fire anyone who didn't declare loyalty to Biden, and had minions collecting all your data for whatever purposes, and threatened to wipe out Israel unless they gave over their country to the Palestinians, what would you have done?
I can't even construct a proper analogy because those goals above are just a parody of what the left wants, whereas Trump/Musk are actually doing that about actual right wing wishes.
if Biden had invited George Soros to run wild through the government and ignore the laws, demanded a $800B reduction in the military budget and reallocated it to distribute to those in poverty,
- This sounds awesome. He's got a plan, he executed. If we didn't piss off our allies, we could probably ride on our military spending lorals from decades past. It would probably completely irradicate poverty, if he got the whole 'left' side of silicon valley to start building super cheap sky scrapers for the homeless. it'd be a pretty cool golden age. But here lies the issue... He inacted radical change towards some end, and hired some of the smartest minds in the world to help him enact his policys.
commanded schools to hire only gay people, -..... Hmmmmm, Sounds like we'd have a complete population collapse in about a single generation. I'm a normal dude, i've had gay friends, trans friends, w/e. But do i disagree with them on that issue? Do i think this should be taught in school at all? no... so yeah, i'd be pretty pissed and i'd homeschool my kid forsure.
fire anyone who didn't declare loyalty to Biden, Well.... Yeah, i mean, that's how a cabinet works, right? The people voted for the president, so who are you to defy the people? get in line or get out.
and had minions collecting all your data for whatever purposes, - Well... They hopefully used the data to irradicate the military budget.
and threatened to wipe out Israel unless they gave over their country to the Palestinians, what would you have done?
at 61, i'm suprised in your inability to see the world as... real... with real violence. People seem to forget that a couple generations ago the entire world was imperialistic with a large percentage of the human population as slaves. We are those same people, our evolution didn't change in 250 years. Only with a complete monopoly on violence can you ensure peace between neighbors. This war has been going on for too long and will never end if a complete monopoly of violence is not secured. So honestly, if he came in and ended the war, i don't really care how he'd do it. Pick a side is a side as any. but like... hamas is literally a terrorist organization funded by iran so....
Having a plan and executing on it is not intrinsically good if the plan itself is corrupt. It is telling that Project 2025 was disavowed by Trump before the election due to its many unpopular goals, but obviously that was a ruse and than plan is being carried out. That doesn't fit your description of it is commendable to carry out that plan.
Many of these plans are just based on pretext. P2025 isn't going to reduce the debt -- the money saved by cutting social services will be rerouted to the military and bankroll tax cuts that are clearly advantageous to the rich. Recall in Trump's first term there was the case of megacorps using accounting tricks (like "the double irish") to avoid paying taxes that were otherwise legally due. Trump gave away an immediate trillion dollars via that amnesty and reduced rates going forward for trillions more. If the real goal was debt reduction, we'd be reverting those tax giveaways and restoring the capital gains tax to a higher level.
"Hmmmmm, Sounds like we'd have a complete population collapse". I agree, as would just about everyone, that such a policy would be bad. But that doesn't address my point: should Biden/Soros be allowed to ignore the laws to do it?
"i mean, that's how a cabinet works" Nobody is upset that Trump is replacing political appointees. The problem is that he is turning apolitical positions into political positions. Should the IRS be staffed with political appointees? The DOJ? The FBI? By claiming for years that he is the victim of a politicalization of the DOJ, it is the pretext for actually politicizing the DOJ.
"hopefully they used the data to irridicate the military budget." First, the military budget is set to increase. Second, why offer him the benefit of the doubt? It is OK he is violating laws just in case he is doing it for good? Half of Trump's former inner circle, lifelong Republicans, refused to endorse him, many expressly saying he is manifestly unfit. The data is that Trump is transactional and is motivated only by self interest.
What would I have done about Gaza? Yes, it is a Gordian knot of conflicting principles. But again, that isn't my point. Biden didn't ask for the cleansing of Israel, unlike Trump who has called for a cleansing of Palestine. Is this playing out like you expected when you voted for Trump? Your response seems to indicate you have bought into the cartoonish version that the right pushes of the conflict: looking only at the violence done to Israel without acknowledging the violence done by Israel. To disclose my position, of course, I don't want bombs falling on the heads of Israelis and Israel has the right to defend itself. Yes, Hamas is a terrorist organization. Is your problem that they should behave more honorably? We can help that by giving them billions of dollars annually and giving them some nukes. Sarcasm aside, it is like people complaining about Iraq using IEDs; of course I don't want to see US soldiers blown up, but to complain about them resorting to primitive tricks while we occupy and bomb the crap out of their country is rich.
Biden campaigned on ending those tax cuts. He did not end the tax cuts. These are not new, and these are from trumps first term.
>Second, why offer him the benefit of the doubt? It is OK he is violating laws just in case he is doing it for good?
Can you tell me what laws he violated? have you actually seen the doge website? They are using FPDS-NG which is all public information... They are all vetted and passed a background check.
Finally, on Palestine... Yes, they elected an internationally known criminal organization, which is designated as a terrorist organization by the department of state to run their country. They then murdered a bunch of people at a music festival to give israel all the ammunition it needs. Now it's crying foul because Sharīʿah turns out to be a very evil way to govern yourself. Again, not saying israel is blameless in the last 100 years of fucked up shit that they have done to eachother, but you keep poking a bigger bear, doesn't matter who was wrong, that's not how war works.
Trump is operating on the novel legal theory of the unitary executive -- that the executive branch really has all the power and the other two are subordinate and operate at the will of the President. I don't understand how people can listen to Trump assert this and the the next moment Trump is railing about how Obama broke the law by spying on Trump's campaign. If they really believe "if the president does it, then it is legal" then how could Obama have broken the law.
We aren't entirely sure what he is up to, but clearly allowing unfettered access to Musk's minions, none of whom have clearance, to hover up all data and install who knows what software on the computers of every department is not legal. Clearly, demanding George to "find 11,780 votes" is not legal. Illegally taking top secret documents, lying about having them, actively moving them when the Feds came to collect them, all illegal. Clearly, keeping cooking books and keeping two sets of books in his personal business are not legal. He has taken in tens of millions, possibly billions, despite the emoluments clause (the open extortion of media companies in the first case, the pump and dump trump crypto coin, the suspect investments from Qatar and others into Kusher's failing real estate deals).
The one's humiliated on the global scale are the ones who are lying through their teeth with less than zero class.
Now, if SS or Medicaid is gutted... that will be the turning point for this admin.
They are in the process of being gutted ... but Trump, Musk and the right wing media will spin it as being Biden's fault, and those same people will accept it as gospel truth.
Either way, it's going to be interesting to see them blame any problems on Biden.
I wonder if Trump got Elon in to do the axing just so he could blame him if his base turns on him. Remember the first cabinet meeting? He made a joke about firing Elon. To me, that was a reminder to everyone who is in charge. Also, Elon didn't even have a chair at the table. What a power play.
Zelensky came to the USA to sign an already agreed-to minerals deal that would have (eventually) paid back the billions of dollars they’ve received. There were no additional security guarantees. No further agreements. This was back pay. And it was agreed to before he left Ukraine.
He reneged, got called out for demanding further security guarantees, thought he could bluff them into agreeing to more, and summarily got his ass handed to him on live TV. Trump is not the one that tried to change the deal.
The real moment of the day was when Trump asked him point blank if he even wants a ceasefire. And he couldn’t say yes.
You can’t end a war diplomatically if there’s no will to stop fighting and accept peace. For lack of a better term, Ukraine is in a shit position. Billions more dollars will not change that, it will just cost more blood.
If people think the situation and accepting the current positions is bad now, just wait to see how bad it will be when the USA weapons spigot gets turned off.
I think the risk of nuclear war in the future just went up.
Would you be mad if you gave up your guns and your neighbor promised to protect you and then he said, unless you give me your back yard, I'm not helping, I know we had an agreement, but oh well, good luck on your own?
Why would you want to enter another agreement with this neighbor when he's already opportunistically screwing you over on existing agreement?
Nobody is saying Zelensky and Ukraine should be happy with where they've ended up. War is terrible and the desire for revenge or retribution will never subside. Diplomacy is putting aside that raw emotion to get the best deal you can, working with the situation that you have.
For them to come to USA to sign an agreement, renege, demand more, and create a spectacle in front of the cameras, is incredibly non-diplomatic. You can see it on the face of the Ukrainian ambassador: https://www.newsweek.com/photo-ukrainian-ambassador-amid-tru...
That minerals deal was going to be the first step toward peace. But Zelensky royally fucked it up. And the only way to fix it is going to be for him to come groveling back or step down so someone else can do the groveling. And that's not a desire of mine, that's the reality of the situation. Their country is broke and will run out of ammo in six months without further assistance. As Trump said during the call, he has no cards to play.
No, it was the first step toward conceding everything to Russia, also conceding to an outrageously overzealous US (for reasons unclear to anyone outside the Trump bubble), with a guaranteed future war with zero protections.
If they wanted to give Russia everything they wanted, they could've done that years ago, and not given up minerals to the US.
This would be an impressively terrible deal.
This is what Zelensky tried to explain to Vance before the discussion blew up.
The reason why he didn't answer is because the answer is meaningless. Putin won't respect a cease fire. And if you think he would, you are completely clueless about the history of that region and what has already transpired. The "guarantee" that Putin gave that he would not invade if Ukraine gave back their nukes. That promise was ignored in 2014 when he took Crimea.
As for the rest of your reply: I assume you are discussing this in good faith and you're not trolling. If the US withdraws support and Ukraine falls to Russia, what do you think will happen after that? Is the rest of Europe (east and west) safe from further incursions?
Attributed to (the half-American) Winston Churchill: "The American people can be counted on to do the right thing — after they've exhausted all other possibilities."
The people that suffered the most from the first Trump administration are the white republicans: they died because they did not want to be vaccinated against COVID nor wear masks. In 2024 white republicans voted for Trump even though they were personally hurt by Trump's COVID advice.
One of my friends is a Trump supporter who almost died of COVID (he got intubated!!). His wife also got COVID. Never you mind: both of them voted for Trump in 2024.
We have ample precedent: Germany in 1945.
I think Zelenskyy didn't give them the sound-bites or vibe they were looking for, but they're claiming some kind of victory (WTF) on social media anyway. Meanwhile all they managed to do was look some combination of stupid, childish, and traitorous, while he came out looking incredibly restrained, and overall more-articulate than them despite the handicap of speaking in English rather than his native tongue.
Vance made a comment about the US' goal to be diplomatic.
Zelensky speaks up and says he wants to ask Vance something. He then goes on to talk about how Putin annexed Crimea and that between 2014 - 2022 Putin was murdering Ukrainian citizens and ignoring cease fires. He mentioned that nobody did anything to stop Putin, implying that Trump didn't do anything during his first term in office. Then Zelensky ends with something along the lines of "so what do you mean diplomacy" to Vance.
Even if Zelensky's statements were correct, that was not a wise course of action to attempt to call out the President and VP while you're in the Oval office. The meeting erupts from there.
Regardless of how you feel about the current administration, it is a fact that Ukraine has been dependent on the US' aid. I don't know what Zelensky expected to gain from those statements.
My understanding is that the mineral deal is back pay. And if the development is going to be done by American firms, then of course there’s a security alignment for the USA.
The dumb move of the day was on the part of Zelensky thinking he could somehow expand things at the last moment or on live TV.
Vance took it in a really weird direction, first pushing "the kind of diplomacy that is going to save your country", then accusing Zelensky of not saying thank you (despite him having said thank you several times that very meeting?).
The reporters reiterated Zelensky's point, asking what Trump would do if Putin breaks the deal, and Trump just shoots down the possibility, saying he doesn't think it would happen and the possibility isn't worth considering. "What if a bomb drops on your head right now". His only justification being that Trump is president and Putin wouldn't do that to Trump.
Zelensky needs guarantees or the ceasefire isn't worth it to him, so it's fair for him to push back on the lack of guarantees even at the risk of annoying Vance. But they snapped back at him in a very unreasonable way.
But, he also highlighted a couple of times that that no one did anything to stop Putin which implies that the US didn't do anything. Which could be taken as criticism. Also, ending his statements with "So what do you mean diplomacy" is clearly a snarky response.
The fact is Zelensky has no leverage. He was given aid from the US, apparently as a grant. The US has no obligation to help Ukraine. My understanding is that the aid was given to Ukraine in the hopes that it would weaken Russia. That gamble doesn't appear to be working.
If he didn't like the terms of the deal, it should have been discussed in private, before coming to the US. Instead, he chose to push back in a public forum. So I don't feel the response he got was unwarranted.
An analogy that comes to mind is helping out a friend that just lost their job. You give them money and a place to stay and over time the friend starts to feel entitled to your generosity. Eventually, you get tired of it and give them a deadline to find their own place. Then during dinner with a group of friends, they complain to the table that you only gave them 3 months left to stay instead of 6...
I got carried away with the analogy and of course it doesn't capture the gravity of the situation in Ukraine, but I feel like it captures the core sentiment.
That's not really true. His leverage is that it's also in the interests of the US to maintain norms in which territorial conquest is not rewarded. "Crime doesn't pay". He also attempted to convince the US of this but was brushed off.
Looking at it as a one-off situation in which the US doesn't have any interest results in it not being a one-off situation, because if Ukraine loses then everyone starts itching to take land from their neighbours. And everyone else starts arming themselves with nukes, having seen what Ukraine got for giving them up. That's the path to World War 3. And the US might realize then, with regret, that it was easier to plug the dam when the crack was small.
Trump doesn't understand this. He made it clear that he doesn't see it as an iterated game, just a one-off. Or perhaps he's the one who wants to establish norms of taking over neighbours with force?
As for an analogy, a better example is that your friend's house is being broken into by a notorious gang of criminals threatening the neighborhood, and his children have been picked off one by one, and he's knocking at your door screaming "I'll hold them off if you can pass me some more ammo!", and you're haggling him down for his furniture.
When the USSR invaded Afghanistan, the US was happy to send the Taliban weapons. That wasn't for love or charity. It was American self-interest. So is this.
JD's statement about "diplomacy" which precedes Zelensky's comments about how Russia diplomacy plays out starts here: https://youtu.be/CIEZEvx1HfU?si=IdGw2g74643yEQrE&t=45
I suppose its arguable that it wasn't the most diplomatic thing to say in the moment. But I can't fault the guy for pointing out the undiplomatic behavior while his country is being squeezed by Russia and US (wrt mineral rights). How frustrating it must be to hear "have you tried diplomacy?" in the context of an invading force.
I can understand his frustration as well. But, he's a leader at war and lives of his men depend on his actions. The moment is much much bigger than him.
Vance’s answer “I mean the kind of diplomacy that would save your country” is a meaningless bullshit sentence.
The difference between this and the more confrontational corrections of Trump's bullshit in similar situations recently, by Macron and Trudeau, is stark. Trump and Vance were primed to pounce.
To me the implication was that "diplomacy and deals didn't work" and they ended up with the current war, anyway. It's a common talking point.
He wanted/needed American aid, but there was no way he could just go in there and kiss the ring, while being slandered as the aggressor and letting Putin off the hook. There's no way that would fly for his people back home -- remember that they are as much of an audience as the Americans.
Well, them and the Russians. "Ooopsy, we let Russian state media in, however did that accidentally happen?!?"
Failing that, this is a pretty good outcome, in the scheme of things. He outed Trump as a committed Russian ally, not behind closed doors, but on international television so nobody (who matters in this context, I mean world leaders, not Trump voters) can ignore it. He may have just kicked over the final leg holding up the American-centered security apparatus, in such a shocking and spectacular fashion that others will be compelled to form a new one without us, which is something they absolutely need if they're going to keep fighting and the US is withdrawing support. They need other countries not to follow America's lead.
> did the us held elections while world war 2 was happening?
> Elections were held on November 7, 1944, during the final stages of World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was easily re-elected to an unprecedented fourth term, and the Democratic Party retained their majorities in both chambers of Congress.
They expected Zelensky to be Charlie Brown kicking the football.
We have no fucking right to the "mineral rights" in Ukraine.
This news press is his only chance to potentially flip the script with his public opinion advantage. We will see how that goes.
I'm wondering what all the people in the US military and government who swore to protect the US from "all enemies, foreign and domestic" are thinking now.
[1] https://thehill.com/video-clips/5168859-watch-live-donald-tr...
https://www.dw.com/en/how-trumps-foreign-policy-is-impacting...
Up until that point there had been 40 minutes of cordial discussion. I don't think it was intended that the talks would break down and the deal would fall through.
But congratulations, you win. I will delete that link rather than be drawn into an unrelated conversation about the history of one man's views.
But frankly in today's world where we've got people making serious decisions in government who are avowed segregationists I think it is rather important to mention when people oppose the Civil Rights Act when considering their opinion on political news.
Hanania's opinions here are not one weird quirk. They are central to the modern GOP's project.
Edit to clarify what I mean: You could have written that you are of the same opinion, independent of who that is. But instead you hide it, as if you had come to that conclusion totally on your own.
When a reply mentioned unrelated past statements from the same person, it was clear that they wanted to tar the statement by association rather than discuss it substantively.
I believe that mentioning that he is a virulent racist who is actively seeking a much more brutal and unjust world is critical to the substance of his other political writing. These are not unrelated statements.
It seems like they were having a pretty good meeting, right up until Vance decides to interject his stupid talking points, and then the exchange between Vance and Zelensky gets Trump to launch into his bizarre grievance tirade. It's like dementia was in full-self-driving mode and had no brakes.
Maybe Vance got what he wanted out of this meeting, but I could plausibly believe that Trump wasn't planning for it to blow up like this -- he just didn't have the level of self-control or self-awareness to stop himself. Which isn't exactly a good look either.
Trump and Vance are directing their answers at the reporter. Vance's reply does not criticize Zelensky at all.
Then Zelensky interjects to directly confront Vance about his answer. That was the moment when it became argumentative.
Don't get me wrong, I understand the righteous fury that Zelensky feels. His country was invaded. But I think it was a blunder to pick a fight over Vance's answer.
Also, Vance's claim that Trump is the first one to actually engage in diplomacy is pretty wild, considering that Trump called Zelensky a dictator and essentially succumbs to all of Putin's demands, going so far as to side with Russia in the UN.
TRUMP: "But you see, I think it’s good for the American people to see what’s going on. I think it’s very important. That’s why I kept this going so long."
TRUMP: "All right, I think we’ve seen enough. What do you think? This is going to be great television."
I just watched Trump greet Zelensky entering the Whitehouse with words like "and he even got all dressed up", foreshadowing Tulsi Gabbard's journalist boyfriend asking Z why he doesn't wear a suit.
It was definitely a planned media ambush intended to undermine support for Z and Ukraine.
If he was asked a question on American politics I would tend to agree but this is Americans here espousing their views on Ukrainian politics and then expecting to not hear the Ukrainian side to it.
His point that Russia has not abided by previous agreements is well-taken. Clearly any future cease fire will need better enforcement provisions. But this is putting the cart before the horse: the deal that should have been signed today was not a cease fire, it was a mineral rights agreement. If and when a cease fire is on the table that Zelensky feels will be unenforceable, then he can criticize its provisions.
I, for one, don’t want to keep dumping money on him throwing his citizens into the meat grinder.
All that being said though it doesn't change anything about how the meeting went down. I've been lucky enough where I've literally never worked at a place where that would've been acceptable behavior, I've seen people talked to for less. To do that then double down more later was pretty embarrassing. Zelensky pushing back on their view on diplomacy in Ukraine didn't seem like a particular insult to me to make the meltdown make sense.
as sorta an aside: I was especially confused about them getting mad at Zelensky for telling them how to feel but as a native English speaker saying "you're going to feel it" means more you're going to feel the effects not you're going to feel a specific emotion (like after a hard workout at the gym if someone told me "you're going to feel it tomorrow" it would then be really weird for me to interpret that as them telling me how to feel emotionally). Trump responding he was going to feel strong was surreal and confusing to me. Especially with Zelensky as a non-native speaker it was weird to see Trump be the one struggling more with language. I can sorta understand agreeing with Trump politically but I just don't see how that was an acceptable or even normal way to react.
Anyway, that's a long post. I've watched the whole video and watching it just makes me feel like I've been taking crazy pills so I've thought about it a lot today.
Edit: and I forgot the whole thanking thing. Zelensky famously has thanked the US for aid and it seems like something they should know (even I was aware of it and confused while watching the video). But then Vance just pivoted to being mad about something else. Like people are talking about this like it's a policy dispute but I feel like I just watched some someone's villain arc on "The Bachelor", they seemed like reality TV characters.
Sure. They can do what they want and so can we. We don’t owe them anything. And honestly, in a way we’re just enablers at this point. We’re enabling them to fight on and enabling them to pointless throw away more lives.
Neither does he, Ukraine just wants real security guarantees.
I wish Zelensky made those points instead. "The US voted to open a NATO path for us, The US asked not to renew the base, and the US refused to negotiate with Russia when tanks were on our boarder. And now you want to walk away?"
Why would that change if he hasn't?
They have their land bridge to Crimea now, and if I had to speculate, they’d be happy with a neutered neighbor that can’t join NATO, essentially a populated DMZ. I can’t see what benefit in wanting to take Ukraine on again after the dragged out meat grinder it was this time around.
Expanded access to the Black Sea and natural gas/minerals were and still are very important to Russia. Aside from these, a total victory would allow Putin to cement himself as a conqueror in Russian history books.
This bright shining revelation of just how ugly and stupid Trumpism truly is (and America, by proxy) may realign world powers for decades, to our great loss.
The only things that seem to sway him is the sentiment of his voters and the economy.
Bully or not, I think the entire schoolyard theory that bullies fold when pushed back is bunk, cartoon logic. Did Russia give up and go home when Ukraine pushed back?
Hell, even Trump supporters know it. Half the reason I’ve heard for that vote is that they know, and are relying on, Trump lying about various things.
Why vote for someone you know to be a liar? Not sure, but I did learn that non-Trump supporters generally take him much more at his word than Trump supporters.
And then it became dishonesty when in the face of plenty of evidence to his being incorrect, he chooses to go on national TV and show a map modified with a marker, insisting he was right all along and no, it is the meteorologists who are wrong.
I would consider "folding" to be backing down and giving in to whatever Zelensky requests.
Throwing a tantrum, embarrassing oneself, or even harming your own interests is distinct from folding.
If you tell a mugger, "what are you going to do, shoot me" and they do, the mugger is stupid but didn't fold.
Anybody else saw Vance and Trump humiliating themselves. Showing the intellectual and emotional capacity of a middle schooler to the world while a man whose people are suffering occupation and mass casualties and deals with death every day just looks stunned.
To anybody with critical thinking skills it feels like Trump & Vance are talking about a TV show or video game. Completely disconnected from reality. Horrifying and shocking level of narcissistic immaturity.
we do not have enough of an interest to go send young Americans to die. to deploy boots-on-the-ground forces for what amounts to a minor territorial war in a country with limited strategic importance beyond being a buffer state. smells too strongly of vietnam and korea.
to those who disagree with this, alright that's a fair position to hold. what number of young Americans is it appropriate for us to sacrifice to hold the donetsk and luhansk oblasts? how many of our children should we send to die? which number is reasonable and which is too great? if you don't believe there's a limit, and we should risk any number of Americans and potential nuclear exchange, why?
the minerals deal was actually a pretty fair offer the way it was worked out. then zelensky decided to, at the eleventh hour, push for a full security deal which isn't tenable from where we stand. this wasn't what had been discussed with Rubio; it was a bait-and-switch pressure tactic. zelensky was trying to either squeeze out that guarantee or humiliate the admin with failure coming from what otherwise would have been successful.
i think the constant lionization of zelensky has gone to his head. he feels confident in disrespecting nations who have invested significant resources in the war by refusing to so much as dress for the occasion, expecting the sort of standing ovation the prior administration and european leaders gave him. i can respect someone who's fighting for causes i generally support, as can most of my countrymen, but zelensky is no holy warrior and we have no moral duty to offer unlimited resources and manpower. we have aligned interests, but if not for that, there are more than enough domestic US issues that we otherwise would not (nor should we) send the sort of resources we have. similar thing with Israel: we have strongly overlapping interests but she needs to mind her place and toe the line if she wants our support.
This is a straw man: nobody asked you to.
> the minerals deal was actually a pretty fair offer the way it was worked out
There was nothing fair in that mineral deal: the US would get resources and Ukraine was getting... nothing. No security guarantees, no military support, nothing. Trump said it himself: he wanted it to get back what the US spent helping Ukraine so far.
Getting something for nothing is fair to you?
> as dress for the occasion
The is the King of Saudi Arabia at the white house: https://www.gettyimages.com/photos/president-obama-meets-wit...
This is the pope at the white house: https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2015/09/25/photos-...
This is Elon Musk giving an interview in the oval office: https://edition.cnn.com/2025/02/12/tech/elon-musk-x-oval-off...
Did they all disrespect the US?
Ukraine is sending its youngs to die to keep Russia (the west common enemy) at bay and your concern is... Zelinsky wearing a tie?
US state dep't lawyers have generally understood "security assurance" to mean that we won't violate someone's territorial integrity, while "security guarantee" implies the use of military force to defend the security of a nation and her territorial integrity. unless and until we have a fully-autonomous military, this does, in fact, necessitate putting American servicemen at risk of death. this is why i think your analysis is a misread of the situation; i haven't seen media report this distinction well and it's hard to keep track of which treaty terms are vague sympathies with a general direction of action and which promise specific actions.
it was, in fact, a fair deal. the minerals deal was to ensure we got some sort of repayment for all the aid we've already sent and to make us a bit more comfortable with the additional aid they still want. since we are already well into the twelve figures w.r.t. aid to Ukraine it seems pretty reasonable. but i don't particularly think a minerals deal is worth sending young men to die halfway across the world in a border war over land the size of west virginia.
the saudi king was in his own cultural formalwear. the pope did the same. if zelensky wanted to dress down and call it "cultural formalwear", he should have tried an adidas tracksuit. what he did was simple disrespect. it's not the end of the world but i think he owes us more than this "great value steve jobs" routine. i dress better than that for a normal workplace.
"parroting russian talking points" isn't a good response or critique. i don't read RT or alt-right twitter. i agree we have some interest in keeping russia contained and it's generally a good move to put resources behind that. i do not think there's this odd moral obligation to do whatever it takes and back ukraine to the hilt. this is sort of a "heartbreaking, the worst person you know just made a good point" situation.
the whole "sending ukraine materiel is going to cause WWIII" thing is sort of bs russian propaganda. the idea that direct American military intervention isn't risking that is very much not.
again, how many Americans do you think it's appropriate for their own government to sign up to die for this cause? i think the number is zero. if you think it's higher, i'd very much like to understand why and how many you think is a reasonable number. i understand it'd be a ballpark figure, not a bright line, but i'd like at least an order of magnitude grasp of what people think is appropriate and why they think so.
you can make a "what about czechoslovakia/poland/nazis" argument about heavy intervention in what would otherwise be any proxy war. you say czechoslovakia, i say vietnam, i say korea, i say the middle east.
the American interest in this war isn't so much "we love the ukraine" as "this is an effective way to cripple russia for the next decade by proxy". by doing so, we avoid that situation in a much smarter way than chamberlain. and because russia wasn't in that great of a spot to start with, a protracted war of attrition is really bad for her.
are you suggesting we should begin a war against russia, historically a massively losing proposition, over a couple oblasts of the ukraine? again, how many americans should we send off to die? how much should we weaken our resources for a much more concerning conflict with china?
It does not. Europe has been willing to send troops on the ground. The guarantee from the US could be in the form of equipment, air interdiction, etc. Note the the US already had guaranteed Ukraine sovereignty when it gave up its nukes. So no new treaty should even be necessary if the US only stuck to its words.
> it was, in fact, a fair deal. the minerals deal was to ensure we got some sort of repayment for all the aid we've already sent
No repayment was expected when the aid was given, otherwise it would have been given as loans.
Do you ask for repayment 2 years after giving people gifts? I would hate to be at your Christmas gathering.
> to make us a bit more comfortable with the additional aid
That's not how treaties work. You put, IN WRITING, something you agree to do and the other sides does too.
If Ukraine commits to give something while the US "feels good" about maybe doing something (or not, who knows?), that's not fair.
> what he did was simple disrespect
Musk holds conferences in the oval office in T-shirt and MAGA cap while his child scolds the president. Nobody stepped in to ask where was his suit, and certainly not the president.
a security guarantee necessitates a response adequate to maintain territorial integrity. i.e. in the current scenario we'd be obligated to send troops to stop the war of attrition and reverse the russian advance (which has continued since last year, if slowly.) that is precisely what zelensky wants. unfortunately for him, i don't value the ukraine enough to condemn my friends to go bleed out in an eastern european border state.
no repayment was demanded when the aid was given, true. however, the US changes leadership, and therefore policy, on a semi-regular basis. the condition of future aid is that past and future aid should be repaid to some extent, in some manner, at some point. rather than demanding cash or structuring a loan, the US proposed to find something else that would benefit both sides. implying that hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. taxpayer dollars, at a time when boomer welfare is already bleeding the country dry, is equivalent to a Christmas gift is ridiculous. i think it was De Gaulle who said countries don't have friends, they have interests; foreign aid is a strategic tool and that alone, because the U.S. federal government is not a charitable organization.
you say "that's not how treaties work"; I say undeveloped nations have a long, long history of taking and later failing to repay loans from America or proxy organizations such as the IMF. if you're suggesting we restructure this as a loan, that seems like a monumentally poor investment, not to mention draining cash from a nation trying to rebuild is a similarly poor idea.
where did i say i approved of Musk's actions? i believe trump complemented zelensky's outfit today. i don't really care about what trump thinks of zelensky, musk, or anyone else's choice of presentation. i am not donald trump. i am saying i think it is disrespectful, doubly so given that he came calling with his hand out, again.
But more likely, US troops won't be directly on the front lines even after a peace. It adds too much risk of either (super)power escalating in the event of casualties.
the way i see this, it's fine if ukraine loses a little territory. since putin is an evil dictator and all, he can't especially afford to look weak, and anything less would back him into a corner. however, doing so is a risky move so we should hold off on that for another year or two until russia is truly crippled. ensure an economic depression and depletion of materiel that takes a decade to dig out of. by doing so, we also give the ukraine stronger security in fact, rather than merely on paper.
might be worth bargaining with the crimea: renounce claims to it in exchange for russia returning territory from the current war. realistically russia has wanted that spot at various points for hundreds of years as warm-water ports are too important for her.
i get that the point is to ensure peace after a ceasefire, but, as zelinsky said, russia has broken ceasefires before. we should not sign something like that simply on the assumption that it will make war too costly for russia. we should do so if and only if we're willing to engage in a shooting war/great-power conflict with russia over a couple oblasts. i don't think we're really willing to do that.
Ukraine and its allies are a match for Russia and its. Perhaps more so, since Ukraine's allies have limited its use of force. With the US out, Ukraine may be able to exert much more force.
Which is to say Trump's judgment of who is weak is deeply compromised by his belief in single strongmen. This will not go well for him.
I am curious about this. Why you say it?
Europe has similar concerns, but if Ukraine loses American support, they may not be able to afford that. They might gamble on direct strikes on Moscow, or at least make it clear that they can.
Which might end life as we know it. Or it might force Russia to the bargaining table directly with Ukraine. Who knows? Let's find out!
When I first watched the argument without the proper context, I thought it was possible that Trump and Vance ambushed Zelensky or were even trying to humiliate him. That's not what happened.
You had 40 minutes of calm conversation. Vance made a point that didn't attack Zelensky and wasn't even addressed to him, and Zelensky clearly started the argument.
In the first 40 minutes, Zelensky kept trying to go beyond what was negotiated in the deal. When Trump was asked a question, it was always "we'll see." Zelensky made blanket assertions that there would be no negotiating with Putin, and that Russia would pay for the war. When Trump said that it was a tragedy that people on both sides were dying, Zelensky interjected that the Russians were the invaders.
For his part, Trump made clear that the US would continue delivering military aid. All Zelensky had to do was remain calm for a few more minutes and they would've signed a deal.
The argument started when Trump pointed out that it would be hard to make a deal if you talk about Putin the way Zelensky does. Vance interjects to make the reasonable point that Biden called Putin names and that didn't get us anywhere.
The Zelensky/Trump dynamic was calm and stable. It was when Vance spoke that Zelensky started to interrogate him. Throughout the press conference to that point, everyone was making their arguments directly to the audience. Zelensky decided to challenge Vance and ask him hostile questions. He went back to his point that Putin never sticks to ceasefires, once again implying that negotiations are pointless. Why on earth would you do this? Then came the fight we all saw.
Zelensky was minutes away from being home free, and he would have had the deal and new commitments from the Trump administration. The point Vance made was directed against Biden and the media, taking them to task for speaking in moralistic terms. This offended Zelensky, and that began the argument.
I've been a fan of Zelensky up to this point, but this showed so much incompetence, if not emotional instability, that I don't see how he recovers from this. The relationship with the administration is broken. Ukraine should probably go with new leadership at this point.
if the conference had ended without argument but behind the scenes Trump/Vance were setting up negotiations that go against Ukraine's interest, that would not have been a "win" for Zelensky other than in terms of a contest of popularity - but only the popularity among westerners who have no real personal stake in the conflict. it's Ukrainians and Russians who are dying on the front lines.
There are no winners from an exchange like this. Trump and Vance come across as bullies. Zelenskyy comes across as needlessly argumentative. Trump and Zelenskyy both come across as quick to anger. Not a good look for any of them.
The shameful part was ten years ago.
[0] https://x.com/RapidResponse47/status/1895633109649134013