Two quick housekeeping notes. First, Rosie is still doing great. Thank you for all the good thoughts, well wishes, prayers, and donations.

Second, there’s a lot going on and I know everyone is on edge regarding tomorrow’s election. I’m going to try to keep this as brief as possible tonight. And I will be very happy if tomorrow night or, Wednesday night, I have to write that I am very, very, very glad that my assessment of what was likely to happen did not.

Before we start I want to note an unfortunate anniversary. Today is the 29th anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. I’d only been back from Scotland for about two months and I remember walking into the house and my dad sitting on the arm of the soda just sobbing. I asked what happened, what’s wrong and he just kept gesturing at the TV with his right hand as CNN was running its breaking news coverage.

Rabin was not perfect and there was no guarantee that his vision for Israel and the Palestinians would have worked had he not been assassinated. But it would definitely be better than what we have now with the man responsible for inspiring the assassination continuing to serve as Israel’s Prime Minister while one of the young extremists who had been trying to assassinate Rabin serves as the Israeli Minister of National Security and has subverted Israel’s police.

💥PM Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated 29 years ago today. pic.twitter.com/uGTrusA63p

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 4, 2024

That’s a very young Itamar Ben-Gvir in the lower left holding the hood ornament of Rabin’s official vehicle. He, along with a number of his violent extremist buddies, had broken through the security cordon around Rabin’s vehicle in the days leading up to the assassination and since he couldn’t get his hands on Rabin, he broke the hood ornament off as a trophy and then boasted to the news media that they got to the car, they would get to Rabin. In the bottom right is one of the incendiary images that were everywhere at Bibi’s campaign rallies. The other ones were Rabin’s face superimposed on Arafat’s head. Bibi’s incitement and Ben-Gvir’s extremism won that day and have been winning every day since.

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

We’re Seeing an Increase in the Number of North Koreans, Not an Increase in Our Partners’ Response – Address by the President

4 November 2024 – 20:38

I wish you health, fellow Ukrainians!

Briefly about this day.

Military briefings were given by Commander-in-Chief Syrskyi, Chief of the General Staff Barhylevych, and Ukraine’s Defense Minister Umerov. The current combat situation across all fronts was discussed, with particular attention, of course, to the Donetsk directions. Although we are also seeing Russian activity in the south of Ukraine. The Defense Forces must ensure a response. Today, we discussed the Kursk operation separately. It will soon be three months of our active operations in the Kursk region. And this is important, as we keep this “sanitary zone” in designated areas near our state border. It is essential to recognize the significance of this operation – Kursk operation – in replenishing our “exchange fund.” It helped a lot to liberate our people from Russian captivity. I thank all the soldiers, sergeants, and officers involved in our active operations in the Kursk region. Today, there was also a separate report from the Defense Intelligence of Ukraine and the Foreign Intelligence Service on the North Korean troops in the territory of Russia. There are already 11,000 of them in the Kursk region. We are seeing an increase in North Koreans but, unfortunately, not an increase in our partners’ response.

Today, I also held a meeting of the Staff. A key issue discussed was air defense. Everyone can see how much more the Russians are using “Shaheds” and aerial bombs. This terror is increasing every month. We need more countermeasures. This includes strengthening mobile fire groups, introducing the real practice of shooting down “Shaheds” with drones, and developing our forces in such a way as to finally solve the problem of Russian aerial bombs. There are urgent decisions that need to be implemented. And there are also more strategic matters that will be taken into account in Ukraine’s internal Strengthening Plan, in the relevant defense clause. Today, there were also many questions about increasing the production of our weapons, primarily drones and missiles. We are expanding contracts for Ukrainian manufacturers and creating long-term opportunities for them to produce these weapons and invest in developing such manufacturing. Relevant instructions have been given to the Defense Minister and the Staff.

And a few more things.

I had a conversation with the President of Moldova. I congratulated Maia Sandu on winning the election and, in general, on the fact that Moldova’s commitment to true sovereignty has stood the test. For all the countries in our region, real security, real social justice, and real poverty alleviation are only possible through true integration into the common European space. The European Union is a global actor, one of the most attractive markets in the world, and a genuine defender of human rights and opportunities for every community. Of course, there are various internal issues and contradictions in Europe as well. But a choice – when it is a European choice – is always a choice in favor of a normal life. Something that has never existed and will never exist under regimes like the one in Moscow. Therefore, it is important that Moldova remains with Europe, and we in Ukraine are always ready to support our friends on the path of integration.

Today I spoke with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. I thanked him for supporting our country and our people. Recently, our team presented the details of the Victory Plan in Canada. Canada supports the Victory Plan – both the motives of Ukraine and the urgency of this plan. I thanked him for the conference held in Canada on the return of all our prisoners and deportees. Adults and children.

I also had a meeting in Kyiv with German Foreign Minister Baerbock. I thanked her for all of Germany’s support for Ukraine. We discussed the current situation in Europe as a whole and in our region, focusing on how to put pressure on Russia to bring peace closer.

And one more thing. Today is a professional holiday for almost two hundred thousand Ukrainians – all employees of Ukrainian Railways. I had the opportunity to congratulate them and thank them. Please, let’s not forget to always express gratitude to people like them – those who work in such essential sectors that keep everything else in the country running. I am proud of our people!

Glory to Ukraine!

Thanks to the excellent reporters at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and at Meduza, we now know what Putin’s terms were in 2022:

That’s a remarkable document. Essentially, a blueprint for Ukraine’s destruction as a state: no army, no weapons, communist symbols, Russian as state language and UA pays for the reconstruction of Donbas that then goes to Russia. Full control, but for freehttps://t.co/MNN1FjYTJJ

— Eugene Finkel (@eugene_finkel) November 4, 2024

Here’s some excerpts:

RFE/RL’s Russian investigative unit Systema has obtained a copy of Russia’s initial proposal for a “peace agreement” with Ukraine, which the Kremlin drafted shortly after launching its full-scale war against the country in 2022. The document reveals exactly what Russia was seeking in the full-scale war’s first weeks and how it envisioned Ukraine’s future if it surrendered. Meduza shares an abridged translation of Systema’s report on the previously unpublished proposal, what it shows about Putin’s intentions, and how Russia’s demands evolved in the subsequent months as it failed to achieve its goals on the battlefield.

Journalists from Systema have obtained the earliest known document in which Moscow laid out its demands for Ukraine after launching the full-scale invasion. Russia presented the proposal, which contains a list of conditions for a ceasefire and peace agreement, to Ukraine’s delegation during the countries’ third round of talks in Belarus on March 7, 2022. Systema received the document from a Ukrainian source familiar with the course of the negotiations and a source from the Russian side verified its authenticity.

The first official meeting between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators took place just a few days after the start of the full-scale war. The Ukrainian delegation, led by Verkhovna Rada deputy Davyd Arakhamia, traveled to Poland before taking a helicopter to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko’s Lyaskovichi Residence near the Polish-Belarusian border. There, the group met with a Russian delegation led by Putin aide Vladimir Medinsky.

The document consists of six pages containing the draft agreement’s main text and four pages of attachments. The proposal’s 18 articles touch on a wide range of issues, including requirements for Ukraine’s neutrality, border placement, and humanitarian concerns such as language, religion, and history.

The proposal was written long before Russia’s annexation of four Ukrainian regions in September 2022 and does not include the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. However, it does include Russia’s long-standing demand for Ukraine to fully forgo any claims to Crimea and Sevastopol as well as the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

In the initial version of this “peace agreement,” Russia also insisted on the near-total disarmament of Ukraine under Moscow’s supervision, the country’s isolation from Western assistance, and the long-term stationing of Russian troops on the territories captured in the war’s first weeks. Some of these demands remained unchanged throughout the entire negotiations process.

In early March, the Ukrainian delegation tentatively agreed to what appears to have been Russia’s main demand: to become a “permanently neutral state” that would never join NATO or allow foreign troops to be stationed on its territory. Throughout the negotiation process in 2022, until its suspension in April, this point remained unchanged and was not disputed by either side.

After comparing this version of the proposed agreement with later ones, Systema’s journalists were able to identify multiple points that either disappeared from the document, were heavily modified, or that Ukraine’s delegation began refusing to discuss altogether. These details make clear just how extensive Russia’s demands were.

Russia’s initial demands

• The Ukrainian army must be reduced to a minimum: 50,000 people, including 1,500 officers (five times smaller than Ukraine’s existing army in 2022).
• Ukraine must not “develop, produce, invent, or deploy on its territory any missile weapons of any type with a range greater than 250 kilometers.” Russia also reserves the right to ban Ukraine from using “any other types of weapons that may be developed as a result of scientific research” in the future.
• Ukraine must “recognize the independence” of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics,” including all of the territory within the borders of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions (despite the fact that Russia controlled only part of these territories, as is still the case today).
• Ukraine must assume the costs of repairing all of the infrastructure in Donbas that had been destroyed since 2014.
• Ukraine and its partners must lift all sanctions against Russia and withdraw all lawsuits filed against Russia since 2014.
• Ukraine must make Russian an official state language and restore all of the property rights of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.
• Ukraine must “repeal of and permanently ban any prohibitions of symbols associated with victory over Nazism”; in other words, it must re-legalize Soviet and communist symbols.

Essentially the only things Russia offered Ukraine in this initial proposal were a “ceasefire regime” and “measures to halt combat operations.” There was no mention of any withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukrainian territory; Russia only committed to not occupying territory beyond what it already controlled.

At the same time, Moscow wanted Ukraine to withdraw all its forces to their permanent bases (or to places “designated by Russia”), and for Kyiv’s foreign partners to immediately end all assistance to Ukraine and withdraw any personnel involved with Ukrainian troops, including military advisors.

Russian troops, as well as national guard forces, were to remain in place until “all of the requirements of this agreement” were fulfilled. Since these requirements included large-scale legislative changes, disarmament, and international guarantees, the agreement could feasibly have seen the Russian army stationed near Kyiv for years. Russia also proposed taking control of the troop withdrawal process, allowing for the involvement of Ukraine and, if necessary, the U.N. Secretary-General.

Much more at the link.

What Putin was trying to achieve her was capitulation providing Russia de facto control over Ukraine. This fits with what was observable in February 2022. Specifically, that Putin had wagered that Russian forces could make a speed run to Kyiv, seize, and hold it very quickly while his special forces captured as many Ukrainian national, regional, and municipal officials possible. These officials would be needed to sign the very official documents placing Putin’s Ukrainian surrogates into power and establishing the de facto devolution of Ukrainian sovereignty to Russia. All done in front of US and European news media. When that failed, he then tried to achieve those goals through negotiations in the late winter and spring of 2022.

Which brings us to now:

There’s no such thing as the “goals of the special military operation,” according to a source familiar with Putin’s position on the negotiations process: these “goals” will be whatever Putin decides is necessary for him to declare victory at the moment he decides to end the war. “If he wants, he’ll say he created a land corridor to Crimea and reclaimed ’Novorossiya’; if he prefers instead, he’ll say that he destroyed all of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. He can declare any outcome he chooses to be his victory and the achievement of his goals, at any moment.”

The only question is when Putin will decide to end the war — and what battlefield conditions are necessary for this to happen.

In the summer of 2024, the Russian president said that for any negotiations to begin, Ukraine must agree that Crimea as well as the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia regions are part of Russia. A source familiar with Putin’s current position on negotiations told Systema that after the Ukrainian military’s cross-border offensive in Russia’s Kursk region, Putin has been actively conveying to his inner circle that Russia will fight until Ukraine capitulates completely.

That’s never going to sell in Ukraine.

Russia’s “peace plan” demands Ukraine reduce its military to 50,000 (ask yourself why), adopt Russian as official, and pay reparations for Donbas. The West to lift post-2014 sanctions. It’s easy to call Zelensky’s plan unrealistic, but where’s the same scrutiny for Russia’s plan?

— Tatarigami_UA (@Tatarigami_UA) November 4, 2024

Okay, @RFERL has obtained a doc describing a “peace treaty” that Russia offered to Ukraine in March 2022, namely on March 7 — on the full-scale invasion’s day 10, when it became crystal clear that the initial blitz plan was going off the rails and that Russian invasion forces…

— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) November 4, 2024

Okay, @RFERL has obtained a doc describing a “peace treaty” that Russia offered to Ukraine in March 2022, namely on March 7 — on the full-scale invasion’s day 10, when it became crystal clear that the initial blitz plan was going off the rails and that Russian invasion forces had stalled at Kyiv.

Here’s what they demanded:

– Ukrainian armed forces of just up to 50,000 (including just 35,000 in the ground – forces), including 1,500 commissioned officers.
– No more than 300 tanks and 700 IFVs and APCs
– No more than 400 artillery pieces, rocket systems, and tubed pieces, and mortars.
– No more than 70 airplanes and 55 helicopters
– No more than 4 warships
– No missiles with an effective range of over 250 km
– Ukrainian “neutrality”
– Reparations to Russia for ruined infrastructure in Ukraine’s Donbas, where Russia had waged an undeclared war on Ukraine since 2024
– Ukraine recognizing the ‘independence’ of Russian-controlled puppet pseudo-states in Donbas
– Russian as an official language in Ukraine
– All assets held by the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine reinstated
– Permanent Russian occupation and military presence in all territories seized after February 2022, including the close outskirts of Kyiv, until Russia considers that all of its demands are fulfilled
– No international sanctions
– No Western defense aid to Ukraine

What Ukraine would have gotten in return:

– Nothing.

No Russian formal obligations other than assurances of no further advances in the occupation of Ukrainian territory as long as Russia considers the “ceasefire treaty” carefully fulfilled by Ukraine.

Let me tell you what this all is called: unconditional surrender. And turning Ukraine back into a Kremlin-controlled, defenseless client state, with a Russian soldier boot pressing its throat.

Moreover, this had been a Russian demand for unconditional surrender 22 days before Russian forces were eventually withdrawn from the Kyiv area as a result of a military defeat and the failure of the “special military operation’s” foremost objective.

To call THAT “just peace” or say “Ukraine had a chance for peace” over THAT, one needs to be simply extraordinarily incompetent or just full of shit.

Or both.

Unfortunately, Olaf Scholz has an even worse peace proposal:

2/ The (unofficially) voiced proposal comes amid talk in Berlin of setting up a “contact group” together with China, India and Brazil to negotiate a peace solution with Russia.

Giving Ukraine a NATO membership perspective would make such peace talks impossible, the thinking goes

— Hans von der Burchard (@vonderburchard) November 4, 2024

4/ Notably, Finland’s ambassador in Berlin, Kai Sauer, speaks up to oppose the idea: “It is not in our interest to restore any artificial spheres of interest”, he told me.

We are “obliged to respect the freedom of choice” of Ukraine, “as well as its territorial integrity.”

— Hans von der Burchard (@vonderburchard) November 4, 2024

Scholz is so afraid of taking necessary action that he won’t call the fire department while his own shoes are on fire. Yes, Ukraine should “be like Finland” — Finland just joined NATO! https://t.co/P0l5IDUhfL

— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) November 4, 2024

By all means, let’s have Ukraine capitulate to these fine folks:

Russia is increasingly deploying unidentified gas in its latest chemical warfare tactic against Ukrainian troops, who are losing ground across the hotspots of the eastern front line, writes @AsamiTerajima. https://t.co/IAGQZW3fDY

— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) November 3, 2024

From The Kyiv Independent:

Russia is increasingly deploying unidentified gas in its latest chemical warfare tactic against Ukrainian troops, who are losing ground across the hotspots of the eastern front line.

Ukraine is currently unable to identify the majority of the gas used on the battlefield, compared to previous months when it could diagnose about half of the chemicals, according to Ukrainian Colonel Artem Vlasiuk.

Russian troops have used chemical agents banned in warfare as a psychological operation to sow panic among the Ukrainian forces, said Vlasiuk from the Support Forces’ Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Command, a branch of the army responsible for inspecting chemical warfare.

Russian drones throw gas grenades into dugouts or trenches in a brutal tactic to force Ukrainian soldiers out into the open field, making them easy prey for drone or artillery attacks.

Of the 323 recorded cases of Russia’s chemical attacks in October, nearly all except 15 incidents were “unidentified,” Vlasiuk told the Kyiv Independent on Oct. 28.

The officer said that Ukraine struggled to identify the new types of gas because it lacked sophisticated high-end detector technology to diagnose beyond the few prototypes in its library.

“It is dangerous both for our troops and for Ukraine as a whole, which will not be able to prove anything at the international level,” Vlasiuk said.

Ukraine needs “hundreds” of complex detectors that cost $100,000 to $600,000 each to better identify what exactly is being used by Russian troops, according to the colonel. Kyiv also needs additional simpler ones already being used to identify whether there are “dangerous chemicals,” he said.

The insufficient number of detectors to identify gas makes it harder for Ukraine to record what Russian troops are deploying, in what quantity and in which parts of the front line, Vlasiuk added.

The colonel said gaining Western interest in providing these sophisticated detectors to Ukraine has proven difficult. Other resources seen as more crucial, such as ammunition, are usually considered the priority.

Discussions are held at venues such as the Ramstein format meetings, also known as the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, which are held nearly monthly, he added. The upcoming one, delayed last month, is scheduled for November in a virtual conference call format.

Identifying chemical agents is “very easy” with the right detectors, according to Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, former commanding officer of the U.K.’s Joint Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Regiment. He estimated that Ukraine might need “a few hundred” hand-held detectors that cost roughly $10,000 to $50,000 each.

More at the link.

Moldova:

Moldova, today you are victorious. Together, we’ve shown the strength of our unity, democracy, and commitment to a dignified future.

Thank you, dear Moldovans, at home and abroad. Walk with pride—you are freedom, hope, and resilience. I am proud to serve you all. pic.twitter.com/yGGlrjAMEC

— Maia Sandu (@sandumaiamd) November 3, 2024

Kyiv:

When Ukrainians say that the war has changed their daily routine, they mean it.

When Ukrainians say that the war is still ongoing, they also mean it – Russia’s attacks against Ukrainian people continue every single day. pic.twitter.com/HZuxnnNaLz

— MFA of Ukraine 🇺🇦 (@MFA_Ukraine) November 3, 2024

Kharkiv:

These minutes Kharkiv is under massive russian aerial attack!!! Multiple explosions reported in the city!

— Iryna Voichuk (@IrynaVoichuk) November 4, 2024

These new ones flew into Sumy

— Kate from Kharkiv (@BohuslavskaKate) November 4, 2024

Here’s the full text of the first tweet:

Two barrages of Russian glide bombs just struck Kharkiv, and they are going to fire again in a couple of seconds, according to monitoring channels. We are powerless to do anything, including reach the shelter in such a limited time. So we are just hiding in our bathrooms or corridors, hoping to survive.

Russia is trying to turn Kharkiv into a ghost city, forcing us to leave. They are bombing our homes, destroying our infrastructure, killing people in their beds and on the streets, and bombing our food stores and markets. Yet, as every day before, we got up, cleaned the rubble,… pic.twitter.com/MQbbVGcwGv

— Kate from Kharkiv (@BohuslavskaKate) November 4, 2024

Russia is trying to turn Kharkiv into a ghost city, forcing us to leave. They are bombing our homes, destroying our infrastructure, killing people in their beds and on the streets, and bombing our food stores and markets. Yet, as every day before, we got up, cleaned the rubble, and carried on.

Last night:

Yesterday evening in Kharkiv. Police pov. pic.twitter.com/3AgnUDCsGk

— Kate from Kharkiv (@BohuslavskaKate) November 4, 2024

Video of one of Kharkiv’s supermarkets after tonight’s russian glide bomb attack. At least 14 people got injured pic.twitter.com/MUpEZFttCP

— Kate from Kharkiv (@BohuslavskaKate) November 4, 2024

Kupiansk, Kharkiv Oblast:

Last night, russian forces targeted an apartment building in Kivsharivka, Kupiansk district of Kharkiv Oblast, with an aerial bomb. Three lives are feared lost, buried under rubble as relentless shelling stalls rescuers. pic.twitter.com/RodTx0ZZWM

— Iryna Voichuk (@IrynaVoichuk) November 4, 2024

Vovchansk:

Ruins of the 350-year-old city of Vovchansk, completely destroyed by the so-called Russian army during their unsuccessful offensive in the Kharkiv region. Just six months ago, this thriving town was home to thousands of people. pic.twitter.com/F7z81KJiZJ

— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated) November 3, 2024

Not sure where in Ukraine this is:

Rare footage of eight GBU-39 Small Diameter Bombs launched by Ukrainian MiG-29 on Russian positions. https://t.co/RGfOJ1yLJZ pic.twitter.com/T4bHTrm8zJ

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) November 4, 2024

That’s enough for tonight.

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