rootube said:

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agent-maroon said:

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Teslag said:

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That's a ridiculous deal. We didn't send them $500 billion total. And the the aid we did give them was mostly book value of weapons, some of which was produced during the Cold War to be used against Russia.

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Why is it "ridiculous"? Because it favors the USA? Freedom isn't free, and it's far better to consider our aid a loan to be paid back rather than yet another domestic inflationary handout to a foreign country that almost certainly wouldn't do the same if the situation were reversed.

I'm as in favor of effing up the russians as anybody that's posted on this thread, but if we can get the Ukranians to pay for their own sovereignty then how could anybody be against that?

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If you are in favor of "effing up" the Russians then consider the deal from the Ukrainian perspective. The deal includes no security guarantees for Ukraine in exchange for forfeiting basically all mineral rights in their country. In the last several days Trump has.

Blamed Ukraine for the war
Called Zelenskyy the illegitimate leader of his country
Issued a reparations number TO UKRAINE many times the value of what we have given in aid
Excluded Ukraine from the negotiations for ending a war in their own country
Conceded that Ukraine will never join NATO
Conceded that Ukraine will need to give up more territory
Mike Johnson has clearly stated we have no intention of signing a deal for additional aid.

All this PRIOR to starting negotiations with Russia. Can you name a single Russian concession that the Trump team is discussing?

If I were Zelenskyy, I would be discussing mineral rights with a country willing to provide additional military guarantees.

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Just a thought here, but if we have mineral rights with Ukraine, they're useless if they fall into Russia's hands. The US has a vested interest in Ukraine remaining sovereign because of the minerals.

74OA said:

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That's shamefully extortionate.

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If that's the IMPROVED version then we really are just trying to ruin them, not simply recoup.

Touchless said:

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rootube said:

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agent-maroon said:

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Teslag said:

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That's a ridiculous deal. We didn't send them $500 billion total. And the the aid we did give them was mostly book value of weapons, some of which was produced during the Cold War to be used against Russia.

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Why is it "ridiculous"? Because it favors the USA? Freedom isn't free, and it's far better to consider our aid a loan to be paid back rather than yet another domestic inflationary handout to a foreign country that almost certainly wouldn't do the same if the situation were reversed.

I'm as in favor of effing up the russians as anybody that's posted on this thread, but if we can get the Ukranians to pay for their own sovereignty then how could anybody be against that?

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If you are in favor of "effing up" the Russians then consider the deal from the Ukrainian perspective. The deal includes no security guarantees for Ukraine in exchange for forfeiting basically all mineral rights in their country. In the last several days Trump has.

Blamed Ukraine for the war
Called Zelenskyy the illegitimate leader of his country
Issued a reparations number TO UKRAINE many times the value of what we have given in aid
Excluded Ukraine from the negotiations for ending a war in their own country
Conceded that Ukraine will never join NATO
Conceded that Ukraine will need to give up more territory
Mike Johnson has clearly stated we have no intention of signing a deal for additional aid.

All this PRIOR to starting negotiations with Russia. Can you name a single Russian concession that the Trump team is discussing?

If I were Zelenskyy, I would be discussing mineral rights with a country willing to provide additional military guarantees.

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Just a thought here, but if we have mineral rights with Ukraine, they're useless if they fall into Russia's hands. The US has a vested interest in Ukraine remaining sovereign because of the minerals.

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I guess you would have to assess our willingness to pursue defending mostly undeveloped mineral rights in Eastern Europe with the backdrop of the US pursuing disengagement with NATO and Europe in general. There have been serious discussions about the US removing troops from Poland and the Baltics. We have also ruled out US peacekeeping forces in Ukraine.

A cynic would say it would be easier for us to cut a deal with Russia to give them Ukraine in exchange for a mineral deal. There is zero evidence we would double down in Europe and strong evidence that our relationship with Russia is warming.

A FAR easier solution would be for Europe to use the $300B in frozen Russian assets to purchase US weapons. This would provide a direct investment in the US economy and have a secondary benefit of allowing us to modernize our own defense.

Depends on whether we'd try to make Europe pay the same 100% mark-up on weapons purchased for Ukraine. I doubt they'd choose to go with Us weapons vs domestic weaponry where possible. Additionally, we're not even sure whether or not Trump doesn't agree to release those assets as part of "negotiations" with Russia.

Rossticus said:

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Depends on whether we'd try to make Europe pay the same 100% mark-up on weapons purchased for Ukraine. I doubt they'd choose to go with Us weapons vs domestic weaponry where possible.

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The fact that they are even considering this mineral deal tells me Ukraine doesn't have a lot of options for home grown or European arms as a replacement for US arms. If they did have better options they would reject it outright.

I'm not sure how much I like the idea of providing military support only if we get paid at the national level, instead of on principle or in national strategic interests. Are we a mercenary nation? I don't mind asking for development rights or some sort of garnishment of national resource revenue to a compensation fund but 50% seems rather extreme. I suppose the alternative might be 100%Russian ownership.

They will hate the Russians AND also resent us longer term, and go right to…,China.

rootube said:

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Rossticus said:

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Depends on whether we'd try to make Europe pay the same 100% mark-up on weapons purchased for Ukraine. I doubt they'd choose to go with Us weapons vs domestic weaponry where possible.

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The fact that they are even considering this mineral deal tells me Ukraine doesn't have a lot of options for home grown or European arms as a replacement for US arms. If they did have better options they would reject it outright.

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Because it's early and there's a deal there with a change in terms.

rootube said:

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Rossticus said:

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Depends on whether we'd try to make Europe pay the same 100% mark-up on weapons purchased for Ukraine. I doubt they'd choose to go with Us weapons vs domestic weaponry where possible.

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The fact that they are even considering this mineral deal tells me Ukraine doesn't have a lot of options for home grown or European arms as a replacement for US arms. If they did have better options they would reject it outright.

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I'm not so sure. We've been providing much more than just weapons and materials. And yeah, we can almost certainly provide weapons and materials better than the EU but I think the biggest loss is the intelligence we've been providing.

A LOT of this discussion can happen on the other thread. This thread is for updates and tactical/strategic discussion not hemming and hawking about possibilities with a bunch of blind squirrel conjecture

agent-maroon said:

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If "additional security guarantees" means American or any other NATO boots on the ground, then that's a hard no from me. What other country could offer these guarantees anyways? The Chicoms?

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Given that Trump (pbuh) just said last week that any peacekeeping force (i.e. "boots on the ground") HAD to be composed of NATO nations' troops but without the protection of Article 5, this would seem to counter to what the Chosen One has demanded.