This is CBSI on the world.

I'm John Betcher with my colleague and co-host Bill Rajo of the Foundation for Defensive Democracy.

Quickly, we're speaking with John Hardy of FDD, looking at the Ukraine-Russian conflict,

but now we've had a memo from Moscow, said to be from Mr. Putin's demands.

Several of them are characterized as non-starters.

John, the one that seems most overreach is that Ukraine must withdraw its forces from

Tenez, Ljansk, Sapericia, and Herzan.

The fact, I'm told, is that that would mean quitting provinces

that two of them, Saperitian and Herson, that are barely touched by Russian forces.

In fact, none of them have been cleared by Russian forces whatsoever. This seems beyond

an unstarter. It seems delusional. How do you measure such a

demand? Give up where we're not. Yeah, absolutely. The demands the Russians that lived at their last

meeting in Istanbul were, I think, just non-starters for Kiev, almost all of them. And it's really clear

from those demands, which actually haven't changed much since 2022 when these negotiations

fell apart. And actually, they've gotten harsher despite the fact that Russia's now in a worse

position to dictate terms. The fact that those demands are still so draconian just shows that Putin is not yet ready for compromise or genuine peace talks.

He's really only interested in peace if it means Ukrainian capitulation.

So basically what the Russians are demanding us, give up territory, demilitarize, hold more elections,

which is basically their way of trying to install a more pliable leader to replace Zelensky.

So, you know, obviously these are non-starters for Ukraine.

And I think the unfortunate reality is, and I think President Trump actually alluded to this,

you know, perhaps in any kind of crude terms, but I think President Trump actually alluded to this, you know,

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