Zelensky called Donetsk region "the question of this war." Let me explain why in one paragraph, because most Western commentators can't. Sloviansk–Kramatorsk–Kostiantynivka is a fortress belt Ukraine built over ten years, the last high ground before flat steppe to the Dnipro. Hand it over "for peace" and the next war starts 100 km closer to Kharkiv and Dnipro, with no wall in between. Russia isn't asking for territory. It's asking for the starting line of 2029. That's why Kyiv says no, and why anyone who says "just the Donbas" has never looked at a contour map.

Sep 8, 2026 · 12:40 PM UTC

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Replying to @Sulkhan
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Ha — accurate. Putin's whole doctrine in one bunker rant: no ceasefire, just "surrender the land and call it peace." Glad someone's still translating the propaganda into plain English.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
I think it’s much more basic. Any president that gave Ukrainian land to Russia for free could never live in Ukraine. There would not be enough security to protect him. It’s that cut and dry.
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Exactly. Any leader who signs away land at gunpoint is signing his own exile paperwork too. That's not a footnote, it's the whole reason these "deals" keep collapsing at the signature line.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Vous savez ce qui va arriver à ces villes, n’est-ce pas ? Nous l’avons déjà vu à Bakhmout, Avdiivka, Toretsk, Soledar et Marinka. La Russie ne reculera pas tant qu’elle n’aura pas atteint ses objectifs. L’Ukraine est maintenue en vie par une ligne de survie qui peut être coupée net à tout moment, en fonction des évolutions politiques chez ses soutiens. Ce n’est pas une partie de poker, c’est une roulette russe...
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La «roulette russe», c'est Moscou qui l'a perdue trois fois sur quatre depuis 2022 - Kharkiv, Kherson, une mer Noire qu'elle ne controle plus sans vraie marine. Bakhmout a coute plus de pertes russes que dix ans d'Afghanistan pour un tas de gravats. Continuez a parier sur l'epuisement occidental si ca vous rassure.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Nonsense. Russia would have settled for much less, with the Minsk Agreements. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_… They defend places that have always been close to Russia. Brezhnev came from that part of Ukraine. They and Crimea rebelled against West Ukraine trying to impose their long-standing hatreds. West Ukraine honoured people who killed Poles and Jews in WW2, sometimes independently of the Nazis. gwydionmadawc.com/my-blogs/u… Land that was taken from slave-raiding Tartars by Moscow, and not part of Kievan Rus.
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Minsk wasn't a ceiling Russia would've settled for, it was a stalling tactic — Merkel and Hollande both said so on the record. And "rebelled" is generous for a process that needed Russian special forces without insignia to get going in 2014. Try again.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Then keep fighting and let the women go to fight; sense your running out of men. Just please stop begging the US for money.
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"Just let the women fight" is quite a line from someone posturing as an activist for logical justice. Ukraine has mobilized over a million people and lost tens of thousands defending their country — that's not begging, that's a war. The money is called military aid because it comes with strings, unlike the invasion it's responding to.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
I think the dividing line should be the Sea of Azov. "Good fences make good neighbors." Waterways are easier to defend.
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"Good fences" implies both sides agreed on where the fence goes. What you're describing is handing Russia the Ukrainian coastline it invaded to get, then calling the resulting map a defensive border. That's not fence-building, that's rewarding the guy who tore down the old one.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
"...fortress belt" 🙄 You can watch docus from U24/Hromadske/etc and these cities are mostly deserted and contested by drones artillery
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Главное другое - если Украина добровольно начнёт отдавать свои территории то никто больше не станет поддерживать её территориальную целостность. Именно такой прецедент и нужен путину.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Russia is asking for the Sudetenland.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
It strongly resembles Hitler's demand for a strip of Czech territory SUDETY in 1938. These fortifications would never have been easily conquered if it hadn't been for the Munich Agreement between the powers, who foolishly thought they would stop Hitler by doing so.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Russia demand Donbas be handed over not to stop the war but for a ceasefire and negotiations to begin. Pretty obvious what happens then is that Ukraine vacates Donbas, Russia moves in and demands everything. Ukraine disagree and the war restarts from the new contact lines.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Donetsk is Russia.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
It’s The Sudetenland for Czecheslovakia.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
did you look at a map yourself before posting this? What 100km from Kharkiv? The Russians are 30km from Kharkiv, right now, today.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Basically, like another Sudetenland.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
1. As Putin says, Russia has no need of land. 2. The borders of Ukraine are defined in international law. 3. Russia agreed to be guarantor of precisely those borders. 4. General Assembly reconfirmed this. 5. The inhabitants of Donetsk voted for an independent Ukraine in 1991.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
The real question of the war is, "Does Russia get to invade its neighbors with impunity?"
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Replying to @Sulkhan
It's not just territory - It's people - Ukrainians live there.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
It would be like Czechoslovakia handing over the Sudetenland & its border defence fortifications.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
What just happened in Lyman? 200 ² km liberated.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Hopefully the Ukrainian advance near Lyman means penetrating the fortress belt is less likely this year
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Replying to @Sulkhan
It will kind of start behind Kharkiv‘s right shoulder. For the rest - exactly.
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Очередные фотецы которые не имеют стратегического назначения?
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Replying to @Sulkhan
🎯
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Replying to @Sulkhan
Украина может отойти до Днепра, там ей проще будет обороняться, если что
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Replying to @Sulkhan
We looked at the map and like everyone else realized Russia needs to move all the way to Dnepr which is a perfect buffer.
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