Putin BETRAYED from Within… Russians Just Crippled Kremlin's War Machine

this war is spinning out of control for vladimir putin some of the biggest banks in russia are now restricting withdrawals for their own customers and you guys know when banks start telling depositors they cannot withdraw their own money well next comes bank runs and that's something kremlin cannot afford this situation is so bad that we have one of the most powerful oligarchs on russia just give a public interview warning that a bank crisis is imminent if ukraine doesn't stop striking so in this video i want to show you why ukraine already saw all of this coming and why ukrainian intelligence quietly picked a specific target that they knew would put pressure on the russian banking system and that's just the beginning even ordinary russians are now turning against putin filming videos on their own phones openly begging ukrainian army to march to their cities these russians want ukraine to liberate them from putin's rule situation is getting so bad that putin is now in a position where he can't control his own money and he's trying to do something about it but putin is once again begging north korea for help just like how he did last time when ukrainian soldiers took over russian territory so as you guys know my name is sam and you're watching business basics let's get into all of this starting with the biggest one of all the bank run some of the biggest state banks in russia are on the edge of collapse and russian oligarchs are now publicly coming out and warning the kremlin that this is not gonna last here we have a powerful oligarch named oleg der spaska and he just publicly said that if wildberries collapses the russian banking system will collapse with it take a listen to this short clip and then we'll get into how this is all related the bankruptcy of wildberries will destroy the banking system as the saying goes if you owe the bank a million that's your problem but if you owe a billion that's the bank's problem and wildberries doesn't owe a billion it owes billions i won't give any advice to bank depositors they are all adults and will figure out what to do themselves but on a human level i feel for them now here are all the numbers and the situation has only gotten worse in 2025 last year alone russia's five largest technology companies collectively borrowed 27 billion dollars in debt this number was already 53 more than what they had borrowed the year before and roughly 18 billion dollars of that entire debt pile belongs to just one company that company is wildberries now even before ukrainian strikes begin on wildberry warehouses this was a problematic thing because wildberry is a big company but the debt they had was a lot bigger than a healthy company should have and that's exactly why we had the russian central bank publicly flagged this issue as a danger to the economy and now that we know that wildberries warehouses are on fire and i mean that literally banks that were holding this debt have started doing something they promised they would never do take a look at this report vtb one of russia's largest state-owned banks have started restricting client access to their own funds meaning no more russians who have an account with this bank cannot withdraw the cash that belongs to them now of course bank says that the official explanation for this problem is network congestion but the reality is that putin needs money for the war and it seems like he's getting it from the banks that people put their money in and when you start looking at this bank's balance sheet you realize that it has another problem you know that 18 billion dollar that we talked about that wildberries owes well guess what 10 billion dollar on that loan comes from this bank vtb the exact bank that's now telling russians that hey maybe don't withdraw your cash today come back again tomorrow now to me personally the most interesting part of this story is that ukraine kind of knew this would happen ukrainian intelligence quietly identified this weakness long before wildberry strikes actually begin and that's exactly why i'm guessing they started striking these warehouses now i'm sure there were other advantages like hurting russia's logistics on the front line but one of the biggest advantages is of course pressure on the russian banking system here's the proof in this next clip you're going to hear from firepoint ceo firepoint is kind of like lockheed martin of ukraine it's one of the biggest defense company that was founded during this war and now it's producing like a big portion of ukrainian drones and here we have the co-founder explaining this strategy publicly take a listen finishing off wildberries and ozone is a must this will lead to the collapse of the banking system as they are among the main borrowers by the way let's pause on this for a minute right now we'll finish talking about wildberries and ozone wildberries why are we doing this and what will happen next well wildberries is the biggest borrower in russia and if we bring it down it will inevitably lead to the collapse of a huge number of banks at the very least vtb vtb placed its entire bet on wildberries they were expecting to get this whole 70 million customer base of wildberries i don't remember 60 million i think the wildberries base as their own customers automatically and vtb wasn't doing very well anyway and now trillions trillions of rubles in loans will be irreversible and they're not going to be able to get rid of them so we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and we're going to have to figure out how to get rid of them and this needs to continue plus it's a disruption of everyday life plus it's the collapse of a huge tens of thousands of businesses which with their taxes support this army support this madman and cater to these imperial ambitions of russia and that's why it's a very very important measure an extremely important measure so ozone will follow wildberries right i think so because now of course these ukrainian strikes are also hurting kremlin's bank account aka kremlin's budget directly and that's something we'll talk about in just a second but before that i do want to talk a little bit about this clip that we just listened to because i'm kind of split about why senior officials or i guess high-ranking officials are publicly explaining ukrainian strategy on a podcast now we do run a podcast so we appreciate him giving us content to talk about but when you're in a war wouldn't it make sense to keep your plans a secret that way russia is more surprised about what ukraine is actually aiming for but that's at least my thinking but just to play devil's advocate to my own point it kind of makes sense in this situation because banking is a system that's built on trust russian people trust that these banks are not just going to get run over you know their money is going to be safe the next day and by saying something like this publicly talking about the banking crisis that could result from these ukrainian strikes ukraine is kind of hoping that maybe that trust becomes weaker that way more russian people stop pulling their money out of state banks and that puts more pressure on the banking system and of course that kind of helps ukraine achieve what it's aiming for create a banking crisis inside of russia so maybe in this situation it makes sense to share this publicly but i feel like in any other situation it's probably not a good idea for a ceo of a major defense company to go out publicly and talk about what ukraine is doing and what they're aiming for now as i said earlier this crisis is spreading to other industries inside of russia and that's hurting kremlin's bank account we're now seeing russians publicly declare that because of the losses they are suffering due to these strikes they're not going to be paying taxes anymore and as napoleon once said you need three things to win a war money money money and that money that putin needs has to come from taxes because ukraine has made it harder for him to export the oil that he so desperately depended on take a listen here we have a russian movement who used to be a former wild berries seller explaining that she's not going to be paying taxes anymore you need to understand what's coming wild berries is not going to refund the money they simply won't they've even blocked people from withdrawing that money loans debts employees how am i supposed to pay anyone i'm already thinking about laying people off how am i supposed to pay them that's it end of the month goodbye as they say because this is fucking hell taxes what am i supposed to pay fucking taxes with i'm not going to pay taxes go fuck yourselves loans are the same fucking thing i don't care about that anymore either if nobody gives a fuck about my problems then now i also don't give a fuck about the problems of the banks and everything else this is exactly why putin right now is begging kim jong-un of north korea for more soldiers and i'll walk you through the new deal in just a second but it's not just putin who's begging putin's own spokesperson dimitri peskov has his wife publicly begging too and this time she's begging from the eu by the way this story tells you everything you need to know about how hypocritical the ruling elites of russia have become take a look for years dimitri peskov has said that west and especially eu is out to destroy russia and they're not going to do anything about that and now we have his wife suing the eu for sanctioning her and demanding that she be granted 2.3 million dollars in reputational damage now just let me give you a quick background on this story she was sanctioned back in june of 2022 so a few months after putin started this special military operation because of the sanctions she has been banned from traveling into eu countries and now she is publicly suing the sanction committee in an eu court hoping it overturns the ban because in her words eu is not explaining exactly why she was sanctioned i feel like it has to do a little bit with this picture maybe she should look at who her husband is this is the good old russian cope right all the while russian elites politicians themselves are blaming west for all the problems that are happening inside russia they have their money parked in the west they have their kids going to western universities and they even have their family members their wives living in the west they want to live in the west so badly that they're suing in an eu court publicly all the while knowing that this is going to do a lot of reputation and damage for everyone involved and by the way this reminds me of this picture from russian foreign minister sergey lavrov take a look this was a video he published where he was talking about how much he hates the west all the while wearing a t-shirt that was designed by a new york artist wearing an apple watch again an american company and of course using an iphone for all this he was dripped out in western products all the while talking about that hey i hate the west now unfortunately this is one of the problems with sanctions oligarchs are usually never actually suffer it's the regular people who end up suffering and the hope is that that puts pressure on the people who are going to suffer and that puts pressure on the people who are going to suffer and that puts pressure on the people who are going to suffer and that puts on oligarchs to do something so they can stop this war but unfortunately, they're not doing anything. But luckily for us, normal Russians are speaking up publicly and expressing what they really think about Putin's decisions. And today I want to show you guys one of the most shocking clips I have seen in this war. It's a young man living in St. Petersburg publicly calling on Ukraine, the Ukrainian army, to come to his city and liberate him from Putin's rule. Take a listen. I, Mikhail Danilovich Sinitsyn, a citizen of the Russian Federation, born on December 9, 2007, registered and residing in St. Petersburg, would like to address the new Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Mikhailo Drapati. On behalf of myself, all my friends, and all my acquaintances, except for my Vatnik parents, and in essence all the people of St. Petersburg, I want to say that we are waiting for the liberation of our city. We are ready to welcome the Ukrainian army with flowers and Ukrainian flags. By the way, for people who don't know, St. Petersburg is Putin's home city. This is where he was born. And this is where he started his political career after he left KGB. And the reason I say left is because we don't exactly know if he actually left KGB ever. He has told three different stories about how he left the KGB at three different times. If he actually did leave the organization, I feel like there would be one story that he would repeat every time. But he keeps changing it every time he's asked about it. So maybe he never actually left. But that's a topic from a different video. Coming back to this video, though, it's not just this guy who's complaining about Putin. We also have other people, Russian actors, publicly calling on Putin to step down. They're publicly saying that they don't respect Putin as a president. Everyone in Russia, everyone young in Russia actually hates Putin. Only reason people don't want to speak up is because they're afraid. Take a listen to this clip. Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. Hello. My name is Lisha. I am a theater and film actor. I don't want you to be my president. Dissolve the entire government. I don't want. I don't want to watch your TV. I want to listen to my songs. I don't want to use VK. I want to use Instagram because it's better. Yes, I'm a Zoomer. I rarely went to vote. I didn't pay any attention to politics at all. But when I turned 14, I came to English class at school. And my teacher told me that he had a falling out with his best friend over Crimea. I don't think that Crimea is ours. And this is not some great phrase. None of my peers think so. If perhaps people once thought so, then now, I don't even know what to talk about. My entire Instagram feed. All my friends are either leaving or are in shock or just don't talk about it. I don't know where these people are who love you as President and respect you. You are not my president. That's all I wanted to tell you. Now, it seems like all this pressure is actually getting to Putin because he's saying some things in public that just don't make sense. Now, I'm not really sure if it's because of the Russian economy, all the pressure he's feeling or because of the losses that Russia is experiencing on the front lines. Or is it because he's just getting old? But he's saying stuff that no dictator should ever be saying in public. He's talking about how he doesn't know what he's going to do or what the people are going to do once this war is over. So people are going to be lost. So he doesn't want to end the war and stuff like that. It really seems like a brain fart moment. But we know one thing. Putin does not want to stop this war anytime soon. And the reason we know this is because just yesterday, President Zelensky himself was here in the United States and he gave an interview where he talked about how this war is going to end, what he's hoping for and why he's hoping that Putin agrees to a ceasefire very soon. So let's go through the clips that we have from this interview. In this first clip, Zelensky is asked about Crimea and he's asked about if he wants Crimea back or is he open to just agreeing to some kind of ceasefire with Russia to stop the war. And his answer tells us a lot about what Ukraine is hoping for, what Ukrainian goals are and what Russian goals are. Take a listen and then we'll talk about it. I mean, is Crimea back on the table? It's a pity not or not yet. We will see. I don't know. So the most important between us, the land is very important. It's our territory. It's our history. So it's about our houses. But the most important, not to lose people. That's why we always say that we are ready to support the idea of our allies just to have ceasefire and then move this track to diplomacy. Ceasefire, not to lose people. This is where we are. But Putin, what we see, he gives absolutely opposite messages. He wants to make big mobilization, 500,000 new, 500,000 soldiers at the beginning of, from the very beginning of autumn. This is what's going on with him. So I think that he's really not adequate. They're crazy. They they lose 30,000 soldiers per month. When's the last time you spoke with Putin, either directly or indirectly? Directly, we spoke in, I think, 2019. We had meeting and then in 2020 we had some phone calls. That's all. I didn't have any possibility to make, to have dialogue with him after. Zelenskyy is happy with the ceasefire right now because he truly cares about saving Ukrainian lives and Russian lives. Putin, on the other hand, does not want to ceasefire because he wants more of Ukrainian territory. In fact, it should be Ukraine who should be the one asking for territory because Russia actually controls more of Ukraine right now than they did control before this war. But despite that fact, despite Russia being in control of Ukrainian territory, Zelenskyy is happy with the ceasefire because he knows that will mean people can go back to a normal life. People can stop fighting and people can stop dying. But Putin wants to continue this war because he doesn't care about how many Russians die. And of course, he doesn't care about how many Ukrainians die. All he cares about is fulfilling the goals that he had at the start of this war. Now, this is where I want to show you, yes, another clip from the same interview. And this is important because Zelenskyy points out himself that wars can change very quickly. If you guys have been following this war from the beginning, you remember that just at the start of last year, Ukraine was actually on the back foot. They were getting pushed back on the front lines. There was a lot of talk about manpower shortage on the front lines, and we knew Russia was moving forward. And then we are here today where Ukraine is actually on the front foot. Ukraine is hitting deep inside Russia, even on the front lines, Russian soldiers. Putin is losing so many Russian soldiers every single year. But despite all the successes that Ukraine is experiencing, Zelenskyy is very careful to admit that wars can change any time. And that's exactly why he would rather prefer a ceasefire than try to fight back all the territory that Russia controls. Take a listen. I think this is really a big problem for him. We understood that this is a big problem for him. We understood that this is really a big problem for him. We understood that this war is changing each three, six months. We have to change technologies. And that's why we have a real mil-tech, modern mil-tech platform. And we have a lot of companies. We change drones. Today, these drones can work on the battlefield. But after three, six months, it can't. So it cannot. So that's why you need to be strong each moment and change technologies and be quicker. Because we have to be quicker than Putin, because Putin has more people than we. And we have to save our people and use more technologies than people. That's what we do. Now, we are already seeing early signs of Russian mobilization preparations taking place. The only thing stopping Putin from announcing a mobilization right now is Russian elections that are happening late in September. He doesn't want to make the public unhappy before that vote, even though he kind of knows that he's going to win. He already is probably celebrating the victory. But nonetheless, many experts expect he'll announce the mobilization right after the election. And we can actually see the signs of preparations taking place already. Here's what it looks like. Russian universities have been officially instructed to tighten admission procedures for male applicants so those men can remain legally available for a mobilization when Putin does announce it. On top of that, some people are already expecting a mobilization, especially Russian men. So they're already looking for a way out or just leaving the country altogether even before Putin gets a chance to announce something like this. So they're looking for places in Armenia and other countries on the Russian border, which is exactly why Putin is now going hat in hand to North Korea, because if he can get North Korean soldiers instead of drafting Russian ones, he avoids domestic political backlash of forcing his own citizens to die. Take a look at this intelligence that's coming from Zelenskyy himself. Russia wants to receive another 30,000 troops from North Korea. Since June, preparations have been underway in Russia's Vrozhnev region to receive them. Vrozhnev is right next to Ukrainian border, so it's the region where they can cross into Ukraine if they want. North Korea is also preparing to transfer additional launchers for ballistic missiles to Russia. This is a threat not only to Ukraine. Russia is helping North Korea learn how to wage war, improve its weapons, and gain real combat experience in using them. All of this is a threat to everyone in Russia who's within the range of North Korean missiles. Now this is something we'll be keeping an eye on for the coming future for sure, because if North Korean soldiers do come to Russia, South Korea is going to keep an eye on it. And of course, the US intelligence is also going to keep an eye on it. Now this is where things get a bit interesting, because despite everything Putin is going through, despite all the problems that he's facing, it's very likely that he's going to get the soldiers that he wants. Because Russia is a massive country, 130 million people, and on top of that, he has help from North Korea. And Putin is really only aiming for, let's say, 300,000 men or maybe 500,000 men. So even with all these strikes that Ukraine is carrying out, Zelenskyy did talk about how Ukraine is going to deal if Russia does mobilize. So let's take a listen to that clip. Look, Putin is not ready to stop this war. I've got the brief from intelligence. He's preparing mobilization. He wants to do it after elections on 21st of September. He wants to increase mobilisation in his country. Not very openly, because he is afraid of his society, but he will do it the first days of October, if we will not bring him problems with logistics, weapons, petrol, diesel, and if our partners will not push total sanctions against his aggression. If he does mobilise though, that's potentially a lot of soldiers. That's going to be a big problem for Ukraine, no? It will be a big problem, because he will, I think, he will count on mobilisation about 300,000, from 300,000 to 500,000. So it's, I think it's not difficult for him to mobilise. Yes, these people, yes, he will have internal questions about it, because his society is, I saw the polls, his society is against the war. Yes, he is against the mobilisation and a big percentage is against the war, but, but they support him. The biggest problem, he will not be able to train them quickly. It means, again, he will push on the battlefield people who are not well-trained and mostly they will not be trained. It means that a lot of losses, but it's up to him to do it or not. So the Ukrainian strategy is pretty straightforward and they're already carrying it out. Go after Russian logistics, go after anything else that Russian soldiers need on the front lines. And here's an example of everything Ukraine has done in regarding to this in just last couple of days. On July 28th, Ukrainian drones hit the Tumen oil refinery. This refinery had the capacity to refine 2.6 million tonnes of gasoline and oil per year. And now it's offline. Now we don't exactly know how long it's going to take Russia to repair this, but until they repair this refinery, it's not going to be refining any more oil. Now talk about Russian refineries and repair. Russia is facing a very unique problem. Since Ukraine is hitting so many refineries, they now have to figure out where to put their resources first because they don't have enough resources to repair all these refineries at once. So they have to prioritize as to which refineries to rebuild. And if I was giving them advice, which of course I'm not, I would repair the ones that are farthest away from Ukraine first. Then let's move on to Wildberries. Just yesterday, Ukraine hit another Wildberries logistics hub in Ryazan. This is the fourth biggest refinery in the world. This is the fourth biggest warehouse that Wildberries has. And now it's basically offline. None of the products inside can be recovered, which is another major hit to the logistical footprint of this company who Russia actually depends on. And I mean, the Russian military actually depends on. Now, because of all these strikes, we're also seeing second order effects that's now starting to show up in daily Russian life. Russian fuel crisis has gotten so bad that now we are seeing signs of important Russian companies, important state-owned companies not having access to fuel. Prime example being Russian railways. This problem is a lot bigger than it seems. Now, as you guys know, Russia is a large country and they really depend on trains to get things from one place to another. Trains don't just transport people. They're also transporting cargo. And because of fuel crisis, I'm sure the military logistics is going to have some problem. Now, to be fair, the Russian military always gets first steps on any fuel that Russia does have access to. So it's unlikely that the military is going to suffer on the front lines. But nonetheless, because they are getting first steps, people are going to suffer because people are not going to have access to fuel that they want. And that's going to create more discontent against this special military operation. In fact, we are already seeing signs of this. Russians are now filming themselves saying they don't care about this special military operation. All they care about is being able to live in peace and sleep in peace. They want to be safe. They want to go back to life like it was before this war started. Take a listen. Dear authorities of the city of Rostov-on-Don and the region, could you please tell me whether our drone warning system will ever start working? Or do you seriously think that people sit by their phones at 2 am waiting for a text message, wondering if it's going to come or not? Fine. There's chaos happening in the SMO zone. It's just a complete mess there. Can't you set up a warning system here? Civilians are sleeping peacefully and then wake up to the sound of explosions. Where are our emergency alerts? Where are they? I live in the Miasnikovsky district of the Rostov region. There is a military unit nearby, and the warning system here goes off every day at around 7:40. It goes off three times, so the system clearly works. But when it comes to protecting civilians, somehow, it doesn't work for us. We don't even have proper bomb shelters. And the ones that do exist are locked. Maybe it's time to do something about this? I'm asking you to please pay attention to this issue. A lot of people are already suffering because of it. Now, this is where I want to talk about something interesting that's happening, especially related to Walbury warehouse strikes that Ukraine has been carrying out. Many Russians who are affected by these strikes, so Russians who are suffering because of the losses they have experienced or because they can't order something online. Well, guess what? They are blaming Russia. They're not blaming Ukraine, even though Ukraine is the one carrying out the strikes. And the reason for this is actually something you may not have thought of. This is coming from a Russian warblogger who has been analyzing the situation. This is a statement from Russian warblogger named Igor Dmitry, and he says, "The Russian leadership created this situation itself when they completely excluded the population, not only from decision making, but also from a realistic picture of what's happening. Now, they will be the one bearing all the negativity, and Ukraine has clearly grasped the situation. Ukraine has clearly grasped the situation. Ukraine has clearly grasped the situation." Now, the reason he's saying that everyone is blaming the Russian leadership, not Ukraine, is because all this time, Russian leadership has been hiding bad news from the Russian public. And on top of that, they've been basically lying to the Russian public, and sometimes public finds out the truth. And because of that, whenever the Russian public is now seeing something negative, even though Ukraine is the one causing it, they're blaming the leadership because they don't know who's telling the truth. They know the leadership is lying, so they just assume the negativity is fault of Russian leadership. I'm sure Putin is very happy about that. His three-day special military operation is going very well. Now, this is where I want to shift our focus to some satisfactory clips. We have Russian propagandists who are just losing their mind on live TV because of everything that's happening against Russia. Now, before I show you this clip, and trust me, it's a really good clip, let me give you a little bit of context. So, just yesterday, in honor of late Senator Lindsey Graham, the U.S. Senate voted to advance Lindsey Graham's Russia sanction bill with 86 senators, voting in favor and only 12 against. In the United States, that's probably as close as you're going to get to bipartisanship. So, that's pretty good. President Zelensky was actually present in the chamber during the vote. The legislation now allows President Trump to tariff up to 100% on major buyers of Russian oil and gas and introduces new restrictions on Russia's shadow fleet. Now, this is something Russia was very scared about for a very long time because every time it seemed like this bill was going to get passed, they would pretend to negotiate with Ukraine or the United States in hopes that the bill will not get passed. But now, it's finally passed. I think it's been through the House and it's been through the Senate. So, definitely good news for Ukraine, but Russia is not very happy about this. Just take a listen. Biden's war, as they used to call it, it's now Trump's war. Well, listen, you say we need to carefully look at the nuances of the adopted law, how it is being passed, the one that hasn't been adopted yet, the discussions about the law. You're right. The U.S. Senate has procedurally approved further consideration of the sanctions bill. But we have to understand in general that, what difference does it make to us whether it's procedural or not? This is, de facto, a continuation of Trump's logic. He was the president who at that time imposed the toughest sanctions against Russia. That is, de facto, this is a law on the severance of diplomatic relations, to which we must respond with a complete exit from the dollar zone. That is, then we must say, that's it, no more dollars. Leave the dollar zone. We won't be the only ones responding. That's how it will end. So this red button is in his hands, yes. They will hand him this red button. But whether to press it or not, he will think ten more times. Because who is the buyer of Russian oil, by the way? Well, China, actually. Well, that's again working at a second tempo. And now we're supposed to pray that he doesn't press it, or what? Let them pray that we don't press our red button so they don't all go to nuclear hell. They've completely lost their minds. They've decided they can behave so insolently. And we need to pass laws, completely confiscate everything here that belongs to America. All companies. Say, well, in response to this, if the law is adopted, we completely sever all relations. Economic, diplomatic, send the ambassadors to hell. Close the embassies, expel their people. That's it. Well, that's my view. We need to act extremely tough. And what are the alternatives? Wait until they learn to breathe through a thin tube while they're squeezing your throat and you just quietly keep going, "It's fine, it's fine." Now, this frustration on Russian TV looks like a coordinated response, because it's not just one show that's saying it. It seems like all of Russian state media is showing the same frustration. So maybe they are really pissed, or maybe this is something Kremlin itself approved. Here we have Russian newspapers saying the exact same thing, just in different tune. Take a listen. Once again, in the Russian papers today, what comes through very clearly is Russia's frustration, Russia's disappointment that the Trump administration pressured Ukraine, or has not been able to pressure Ukraine, into accepting Russia-friendly peace terms, and that the so-called alleged spirit of anchorage from the Trump-Putin Alaska summit last year has all but evaporated. Mind you, it was only Russian officials, not American, who were talking about a spirit of anchorage, but even so. In its editorial today, Nizavisa Magazeta wonders, is there an alternative to anchorage? Now, laid out here is what we're going to look at today. The first is what Moscow had been looking for from Donald Trump. Its logic was, and still is, that it is necessary to find a force that will force Zelensky to situation on the ground, abandon territorial claims, and put this in a document. Trump seemed to be such a force. That was the spirit of Anchorage. Now for Trump, either not everything is so clear cut, or the Ukraine issue is simply not a priority. It is unlikely that Moscow will reconsider its approach. In other words, the Kremlin still wants someone to put pressure on Kyiv. But who will become this force of pressure and persuasion? Trump's successor in two years' time? That's too long to wait. And it's too hard to predict the outcome of the US elections. Europe? It refused to take Moscow's concerns into account, both individually and collectively, even before 2022. But what's more, there's also an acknowledgement that Moscow is under strong pressure from its closest allies. We hear what both Lukashenko, in Belarus, and Tokayev are saying. This was not the case a year ago. It means something has changed. The task of the Russian authorities is to try to understand what exactly has changed and find an adequate response. Now there's an interesting detail at the end of that clip that connects back to something we talked about in the last video. Remember when Putin was sitting next to the president of Kazakhstan and the Kazakhstani president, Tokayev, publicly told Putin, to his face, that hey, you need to stop this war. He was very uncomfortable. Maybe he was even angry. He was not happy about being lectured by a former Soviet state while he was sitting next to the president. Now, many Russian experts are now speculating that this is not a message from Kazakhstan, but rather it's a message from China itself. The theory is that the message was coordinated or maybe even ordered by Chinese leader Xi Jinping. And Xi Jinping approved it and then the Kazakhstani president delivered it on his behalf. Now, of course, this is speculative. Of course, there are many other theories. Of course, there are other theories. Of course, there are other theories.