Yesterday, the Washington Post slyly ran a fake investigative piece, no doubt dished up by the intel agency, headlined “CIA director, On Secret Trip To Ukraine, Hears Plan For War’s Endgame.”
Hahahaha! A secret trip to Ukraine! On the WaPo’s front page! These guys are so funny.
The sub-headline explained the “endgame” isn’t about winning. “During meetings in Kyiv, William Burns was told of Ukraine’s ambitious goal to retake territory and push Moscow into talks by the end of the year.”
Talks! By the end of the year. In a serious, non-circus world, this sea-change in Proxy War policy about how the war will end would be earthshaking news. Until ten seconds ago, the official Biden policy has been “no deals.” Recent disclosures have shown that Washington has even frustrated and blocked several earlier peace talks.
Before continuing the story, it is helpful to note the clock the Biden Administration is under. The Proxy War must be wrapped up by the end of this year to avoid becoming an election-year issue in 2024. The general rule is that virtuous, exciting, NEW wars are helpful to a candidate’s re-election chances, whereas old, languishing wars of attrition are NO BUENO.
With that in mind, consider this next paragraph from the WaPo’s story:
In preparation for the fall, Zelensky and top aides have begun thinking about how Kyiv can force an end to the fighting on terms that are acceptable to Russia and the Ukrainian people, who have been subjected to a year and a half of violence, forced displacement, atrocities, and food and electricity shortages.
In addition to telling us all about Zelensky’s “secret meeting” with the head of the CIA, William J. Burns — and just what is the CIA even doing in Ukraine, one wonders; and what does the CIA have to do with negotiating a peace deal? I mean, whose war is it anyway? — the paper also told us all about Ukraine’s “secret” new strategy to improve its negotiation position: first move artillery and missile systems near the boundary line of Russian-controlled Crimea; push further into eastern Ukraine; and only then open negotiations with Moscow for the first time since peace talks “broke down” (with U.S. help) in March of last year.
“Russia will only negotiate if it feels threatened,” explained an unidentified, anonymous senior Ukrainian official. More specifically, the strategy is to build up pressure so the war-torn country isn’t negotiating from a position of weakness:
In agreeing not to take Crimea by force, Kyiv would then demand that Russia accept whatever security guarantees Ukraine can secure from the West, said Ukrainian officials.
Conspicuous by its absence was any mention of getting back the “disputed territories” in Eastern Ukraine that Russia now claims to have annexed into the Motherland. Maybe revealing this change in position was the article’s real goal, to re-set liberal expectations for what might be considered acceptable terms.
Interestingly, WaPo’s story also dropped the nugget that the U.S. intelligence community knew as early as mid-June that the Wagner Group was plotting an armed assault of some kind, according to an unidentified, anonymous U.S. official. Then the newspaper assiduously assured its readers that Biden had nothing whatsoever to do with the Wagner “rebellion,” just like he didn’t have anything to do with blowing up Russia’s gas pipelines.
But … I mean … where’s the old journalistic curiosity? Exactly HOW did the CIA know about Prigozhin’s little civil war ahead of time? Hmm? The WaPo didn’t speculate.
But look at what the relatively-short article did admit:
Ukraine has taken heavy casualties as its troops and armored vehicles navigate thick minefields and fortified trenches across wide-open territory. The challenging terrain has left troops vulnerable to Russian airstrikes and missile attacks. Zelensky has acknowledged that the counteroffensive is going “slower than desired,” and officials have confirmed the destruction of some Western-provided Leopard 2 tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles.
Uh oh. So, I guess things aren’t exactly going swimmingly in the Proxy War. Here is the timeline that one can piece together from this fake news story:
1) Ukraine was losing the “last chance” counteroffensive.
2) The CIA waited for the Wager Group’s rebellion, which came, if you think about it, at a particularly peculiar time, given that Ukraine was losing. Was Wagner’s implosion a deep-state Hail Mary?
3) Then, the WaPo published this story stating, for the very first time, there’s a “secret plan” to negotiate and end to the war with only “security guarantees.” Forget about that stupid “not one inch” business.
Now, I’m just a lawyer, not a deep-state color revolution plotter, but as a litigator I have LOTS of experience with negotiating. And I can assure you with no reservations that telling your negotiating opponent about your secret negotiating strategy ahead of time is NOT a typical move. Loose lips sink ships, and so forth. Usually, giving away your secret haggling formula is not especially helpful to getting what you want.
So. The Proxy War clock is running.
Two more blockbuster Supreme Court decisions; Ukraine's secret CIA deal to end the war; more Brits de-banked; NYC installs drug paraphernalia vending machines; SADS cancers and mystery deaths; more.
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Politico ran a story yesterday headlined, “U.S. Approves Cluster Bombs Despite Humanitarian Concerns.”