Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley reaffirmed on Wednesday that he sees an opportunity for peace talks between Russia and Ukraine and that the chances of a Ukrainian military victory happening anytime soon are “not high.”
“In terms of probability, the probability of a Ukrainian military victory defined as kicking the Russians out of all of Ukraine to include what they define or what the claim is Crimea, the probability of that happening anytime soon is not high, militarily,” Milley told reporters at a joint press conference with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. He said the areas that Ukraine has recaptured in Kharkiv and Kherson are “relatively small” compared with the territory Russia controls.
Milley said it’s possible that Ukraine could achieve some of its goals politically, through diplomacy. “There may be a political solution where, politically, the Russians withdraw, that’s possible. You want to negotiate from a position of strength. Russia right now is on its back,” he said.
Milley said that he believes the fighting could slow down in the winter, providing the opportunity for diplomacy. Austin said he believes fighting will slow this fall going into the winter but that things could pick up once the ground hardens.
“So when the ground hardens, trafficability will probably improve, and then we’ll be — we may see more activity. But I would remind everyone that this war started in February. So it — you know, winter does not mean that we’re going to stop fighting,” Austin said.
Russia could be preparing to launch a major offensive this winter as it has been reinforcing its positions after mobilizing 300,000 fresh troops. Moscow this week has launched massive missile barrages across Ukraine targeting infrastructure, which continued on Wednesday.
Also on Wednesday, Ukrainian President Voldymr Zelensky said that he received “signals” from his Western backers that Russian President Vladimir Putin desires direct negotiations with Ukraine. Zelensky said he proposed a public format for talks, suggesting he might have softened his stance on negotiations.
While there are much more talks of diplomacy now, Milley and Austin’s primary message was that they would support Ukraine in its war for “as long as it takes.” The two military leaders attended another meeting of the Ukrainian Defense Contact Group, which consists of representatives from about 50 countries.
“We just spent almost four hours with our colleagues there in the Ukraine Defense Contact meet — Group meeting. It was amazing to me how many ministers of defense, on their own, said ‘we’re going to do this for as long as it takes,'” Austin said.
To continue supporting Ukraine, the White House has asked Congress to approve $37.7 billion in new aid, which would bring total US spending on the war to about $105 billion.
By all means, let there be a public format for the talks. It’s high time the American people get to hear the Russian side of things.
Biolabs, Nazis Satanists! Oh and killer mosquitos!
Well mosquitoes do kill people by the thousands 🙄
More like how Ukrainian nationalism has been purging eastern Ukraine of Russian culture, creating a hostile environment for the Russian speaking populations to live in, hence the separatist provinces voting to join Russia.
That would never be allowed. Did we hear the North Vietnamese side during Kissinger’s peace talks?
And just to think all this could have been avoided with a little DEPLOMACY , but when you consider the fact the US /UK /EU/ NATO hasn`t a decent Diplomat among them you get some idea why this war is taking place .
Diplomats or dip-sh-ts?….
Meh. It was not the lack of “decent diplomats.” It was the straight up desire for war.
The diplomats are in on that.
Full throated. Shouldn’t even be called diplomats.
I hate McFaul, for example.
Like, back in December, 2021.
“Milley Says Chances of Ukrainian Military Victory ‘Not High’”
Captain Obvious!
A regular Sherlock Holmes he is. With all those pretty medals and pins.
Meanwhile, here is the ten point “peace plan” put forward by the little comedian at the G 20 meeting:
https://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/ukrayina-zavzhdi-bula-liderom-mirotvorchih-zusil-yaksho-rosi-79141
As you can see, Zelensky’s “peace plan” is just total capitulation on the part of Russia. On every issue, territorial and otherwise. A complete non starter.
Then, for a private viewing, he whipped out his thingy and began playing Tchaikovsky.
“So when the ground hardens, trafficability will probably improve, and then we’ll be — we may see more activity. But I would remind everyone that this war started in February. So it — you know, winter does not mean that we’re going to stop fighting,” Austin said.
Did Llyod just admit something?
Milley said:
“In terms of probability, the probability of a Ukrainian military victory defined as kicking the Russians out of all of Ukraine to include what they define or what the claim is Crimea, the probability of that happening anytime soon is not high, militarily”
“Russia right now is on its back”
At what point would the probability of a Ukrainian military victory be possible?
For $105 Billion, you should be able to buy PEACE!
No return on investment. Also, end of gravy train for MIC.
To quote a boxer: If he dies, he dies.
The real story about Gen. Milley is that as the man who must run US help to Ukraine, he knows it is not going to work. He is actually saying so, unlike our generals from Vietnam through the last 20 years of wars.
He is getting a lot of pushback, and he is not especially brave about sticking his head up into the fire. But he is saying it.
He desperately wants delay in the inevitable, time to get US production of ammo and weapons ramped up. That however requires more like two years, and he can keep the present supply going only for a few more months. So he wants talks to hold the line.
The Russians know that even Milley wants only delay, to enable more NATO war on Russia. They are unlikely to fall into that.
1. Russia will stop Ukraine’s terror bombings of Donetsk, which the Kiev regime is keeping up even now in wartime, spending artillery shells on murdering civilians instead of for military objectives. Those firing the artillery shells will be killed. Sorry, Biden. Sorry, Zelensky.
2. Milley isn’t one of Biden’s Democrat collaborators, he was appointed by Trump and can say what everyone knows. There is zero percent chance that Russia would give up Crimea, which is inhabited by Russians and has been Russian longer than California has been American. Crimea was conquered and settled by Catherine the Great, defeating the Turk-backed Khanate that kidnapped countless Russian and Polish women and boys to sell to the Turks as sex slaves. Crimea has a large naval base that, as we have seen all too well, Russia needs to counter the Democrats’ plans for hegemony. Donbass was also built by Russia. Russia would rather mobilize its entire military than let Biden’s coup regime invade these people and slaughter them like Kiev did in Buchma.
3. Russia is killing 300 Ukie conscripts a day – AT MINIMUM. Confirmed by Ukraine’s top command. The Biden side pretends “80,000 Russians have died” – but do the math. The NYT boasted, falsely, that something like 300 Russians had died over a couple of days in a failed attempt to take a town. (A figure they got entirely from Kiev.) So 300 is considered by the NYT to be an unusually high number of dead Russians, and that’s what Kiev loses EVERY DAY. Because they throw the conscripts at Russian lines. Russia has overwhelming artillery superiority and massacres them when they come.
4. Now Biden’s side has found some 1950s tanks, designed in 1949, to send to Kiev. That’s what they’re down to. They promise more HIMARs to kill Donetsk inhabitants with, but producing them takes a year or so. Kiev has used up one third of the U.S. HIMAR ammo supply already, and aren’t getting much more, and the effectiveness of this is way less than when they first got the HIMARs as the Russians have learned how they operate. The high point of supplies was in June-July. And Zelensky wasted all the best on throwing tens of thousands of conscripts against Kherson, with 12,000 dying and tanks and armored vehicles destroyed, for what good that did them. They’re soon down to bicycles.
5. Russia has soon finished training and deploying its 300,000 reservists, which leftist media falsely call “poor Russians conscripted against their will!” The average age is 34, because they are ex-soldiers and RESERVISTS, getting paid for exactly this scenario. Russia’s big winter offensive is coming. Their new commander has done exactly what he said he would, grind down the Ukies, take difficult decisions to abandon exposed positions in order to avoid battles before the big offensive is ready. The opposite of Zelensky’s “defend every square meter” order.
6. The media keep talking as if the winter would stop the Russians. In historical times and modern times Russia has fought well in the winter. It’s what they train for. Unlike NATO tanks sent to the Ukies, Russian tanks are lighter so as not to sink down, and the difference is enormous. And there is something called pavement these days.
7. Zelensky should have agreed to the conditions back in March. They were simple: Stop murdering the people in Donbass with artillery. Stop denying the people in Crimea electricity and water. Follow the Minsk II agreement Poroshenko already signed. Zelensky wouldn’t even have to give up any territory in Donbass already occupied by Ukraine.
But Zelensky’s approval rating tanked after betraying the Ukrainians, selling out their land to Biden-allied Blackrock and to China (10% of farmland) who are generous with the bribes, so the approval went down to 30% in the summer 2021, while Zel’s main rival had way higher approval. He wanted an invasion of Donbass to change the conversation. And the war gave him an excuse to imprison his rival. So here we are.
Zelensky should have agreed to the conditions back in March. They were simple: Stop murdering the people in Donbass with artillery. Stop denying the people in Crimea electricity and water. Follow the Minsk II agreement Poroshenko already signed. Zelensky wouldn’t even have to give up any territory in Donbass already occupied by Ukraine.
Yes, and if the deal now is going to be not as sweet for the Ukraine as the Russian demands were back in March, how is that not a defeat not only for the Ukraine, but for the USA, the UK, and NATO as well? After all the Big Lie nonsense, after all the endless propaganda, after all the crap that has been shoveled day and night, from the very first days of the war (Ghost of Kiev, Snake Island defiance, etc), not to mention all the blood that has been spilled, all the property that has been destroyed, and all the lives that have been disrupted, now the Ukraine (and it’s backers) are just going to acquiesce to the loss of territory?
If the Ukies are not actually going to “win,” then what was the point of all the aid, the sanctions, the brave speeches, the MSM frenzy, and so on? If some kind of deal is going to be made, do the exact parameters of it matter, when the whole affair was couched in such apocalyptic terms, and when such high minded principles as the sacredness of international borders, the rule against aggressive war, and, indeed, the integrity of the entire international order itself, were supposedly at issue? If the war is going to end up in a horse trade, one which includes at least de facto recognition by the Ukraine as to some loss of territory, then why weren’t the horses traded back in February, or even earlier? Certainly, Russia was amenable to such a deal way back then. Why wasn’t the Kiev regime, and, more to the point, it’s Western puppet masters?
This is going to be a hard sell to all the fools, dupes and stooges, left, right and center, who fell for the narrative that the Administration, NATO, the neo cons and neolibs, and the MSM, have been reciting for close to a year now. How is anything less than, at the least, the “liberation” of all the territory taken by Russia since February, not going to be seen as “a stab in the back.” As the USA and NATO “abandoning” the Ukraine, and “appeasing” Russia?
I mean, great for the Ukies that they now have Kherson, and can negotiate from a position of relative “strength” on that basis. But they still lost and haven’t recovered Melitopol, Mariupol, the twin cities of the Luhansk, and so on. Not to mention having no chance of taking Crimea. The Russians retaining those places……is that now OK? Also, what about Russia’s other, non territorial demands? Are the Ukraine and it’s puppet masters going to agree to neutralization? To permanent non NATOization? To demilitarization? And deNazification? Those issues have also been presented as being non negotiable, as being matters of “principle” that could not be bargained for. Is all of that now no longer “operative” too?
The money has been laundered. They don’t care if any of it makes sense. The CIA will send this down the memory hole, like how so much of the internet was scrubbed of articles on Ukraine and the Nazis. Also, remember how for 20 years the military official story was how we were winning the battle in Afghanistan? Now all the people talk about is whether the pull out was good or not, not the phucking 20 year debacle where criminals took all. Short attention spans, triggering emotions and gaslighting is key.
Milley will soon be on Ukraine’s murder blacklist if he keeps this up.
I laughed.
Finally, someone speaking some sense.