NEW YORK TIMES: …The Ukrainian leader repeated a few of Kiev’s central demands, which underscored the gulf between its position and that of Moscow. Ukraine endorsed decentralization but not federalization, he said, noting that the separatist regions could be granted rights similar to those in autonomous communities in Russia.
In Moscow, Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, said at a news conference that talks among experts had made “noticeable progress.”
But he also took exception to certain Ukrainian positions, suggesting that a truce, the withdrawal of heavy weaponry and the beginning of a political process, as well as the restoration of economic ties between Kiev and the separatist regions, were far more important than control over the border.
Ms. Merkel has emphasized repeatedly that she regards the chances of success in the talks as slim, even after she and Mr. Hollande met with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Moscow and with Mr. Poroshenko in Kiev on Friday. But she said the effort would continue given the civilian death toll in the conflict, which the United Nations has estimated at more than 5,400 since violence erupted last spring… (more)
The U.S. goal is to create some type of “cease fire” without changing anything, re-arm the Ukrainian government so they can break the truce and go on the offensive and eventually re-install the U.S. puppet Kiev government inside all of the original borders of Ukraine.
Putin knows this, but he also knows that the puppet Kiev regime is losing the hearts of most Ukrainians, they just want the fighting to stop.
Count the numbers of draft age men who are in exile in Russia tells you Kiev isn’t going to be able to win this war.
I seriously doubt the U.S. will risk their own in this conflict but we really would get to see once and for all just who has the better tanks and infantry. Got a taste of that in Georgia, that didn’t go the U.S. way either did it?