Putin Offers to Surrender Even More Territory This Time But he’s totally winning the war though.
Mon 11:04 am +00:00, 20 Oct 2025 2
Source: https://slavlandchronicles.substack.com/p/putin-offers-to-surrender-even-more
Do you remember who Arestovich is? I’ve written about him before. A cryptic figure and now a pro-Russian dissident (so he claims) hiding from Zelensky in America. He wants to run for president of Ukraine. Here is a primer:
I Hereby Endorse Arestovich For Imperial Xenocrat of the Galactic Ukraine Empire!
Our man with the plan, Aleksei Arestovich, was in the news again recently because of another one of his epic rants directed at the Ukrainian peasantry went semi-viral.
And another:
Big News! Rurik Has Been Hired to Work as Arestovich’s Campaign Manager*!
Yes yes, hold your applause.
He used to make post and vlogs a long time ago explaining that Putin is more than willing to trade Donbass away. He was one of the few at the time who really understood the mentality of the Kremlin. This is because he was personal friends with both Zelensky and Surkov at some point, the latter being the Kremlin’s top guy in charge of Ukraine policy, apparently.
I mention him because
brought him up and because Arestovich’s prescient predictions and analyses segue so well into the new bit of news about Putin offering more concessions to Trump/Zelensky. That was the latest news. Here:
Key developments on Oct. 18-19:
- Putin seeks full control of Donetsk Oblast as key to any deal with Ukraine, WP reports
- Ukraine peace deal should give no unoccupied lands to ‘terrorist’ Putin, Zelensky tells NBC
- European leaders push for Ukraine peace plan after disappointing Washington meetings
- Russia hits Kharkiv Oblast with new rocket-powered guided bomb for first time
Russian President Vladimir Putin demanded that Ukraine hand over full control of Donetsk Oblast to Russia as a condition for ending the war during a phone call with U.S. President Donald Trump this week, The Washington Post reported on Oct. 18, citing two senior U.S. officials.
According to the report, Putin indicated he was willing to give up parts of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, both partially occupied by Russian forces, in exchange for complete control over Donetsk.
Some White House officials described the proposal as “progress,” while a senior European diplomat cautioned that Ukraine would likely view the proposal in a very different light.
“It’s like selling them their own leg in exchange for nothing,” the diplomat said.
Notice how this is framed as Putin being tough and playing hardball?
That’s what all the headlines read.
But if you actually read the details of the leaked? phone call, the exact opposite is true. Putin is actually offering to surrender more land in exchange for Donetsk.
So this is actually Putin once again retreating and scaling back his demands!
He now just wants to limp out of this war with two provinces — Lugansk and Donetsk.
And that is why all serious fighting from the Russian side has been completely focused on this area, the most heavily fortified and well-defended and costly battle-line. By attacking in Donetsk, against the pre-prepared Ukrainian fortresses, Russia has been taking horrendous losses. The reason why this war is a grueling urban and trenchline meat grinder is because Putin made a political decision to fight this war in this way, for a limited objective. Instead of just going around these points and fighting in the wide open spaces in the north or the south that is.
Putin wants to say, when the dust has cleared and the true kill count is hushed up, that he achieved his objectives and liberated Donetsk, which he will retcon as having been the entire intention of the war.
Of course, the truth is that Putin never wanted any of Donbass.
And, because the UAF has been remobilized, reorganized and now heavily rearmed by Trump, Russia is going to start losing ground as soon as the UAF is allowed to go on the attack again. I don’t think that Putin will get any territorial concessions from Kiev, frankly. And why would Kiev abandon all of their fortresses in Donetsk? Russia can’t even touch them, they’re still mired in the little townlets and suburbs that are on the way to Kramatorsk and Sloviansk. Only if intense political pressure is put to bear on Zelensky can this occur and it would be political suicide for him to do so, therefore he will dig in his heels and refuse.
No, I think Putin is bluffing as usual and that, frankly, he’d even give up Donetsk if he was given a peace deal and a lifting of sanctions. Would it damage his image? Maybe, but then Putin boldly just shook hands with the literal ISIS #2 al-Jolani (who Shoigu once claimed had lost an arm in a Russian airstrike lmao) and spat in the face of the entire Resistance narrative by doing so. I am told that this has caused a minor schism in Z and Resistance media. But I am so banned and blocked by these people that I can’t really verify this for myself, nor do I particularly care to.
I hope that these people EAT EACH OTHER.
…
Anyway.
Mostly though, no one is even reporting on it and therefore it hasn’t really happened. No seriously, go on any alt-media website and they are completely silent on the Jolani thing and the rumors that he was in Moscow to ask for the handover of Assad. The kind of propagandists that you would see posted on Unz Review haven’t mentioned it. And the silence makes sense, this is completely indefensible on Putin’s part. No one has covered the Azeri story either for that matter.
To my mind, this proves that PR isn’t Putin main concern and that any betrayal can be either ignored or spun into a great moral/metaphysical victory.
Thus: there is really nothing stopping him from abandoning even Donetsk.
And each time we hear about the negotiations, we see that Putin has retreated a bit. What happened to regime change in Kiev? Total demilitarization and denazification? Reaching the Dniepr? Odessa? Freezing the fighting along contact lines or creating a DMZ buffer zone? Now, apparently, Putin is OK with handing over the land bridge to Crimea in exchange for Donetsk. Soon, we will hear that he is OK with all of that PLUS just freezing the contact line where it is now in Donetsk. Then he will offer some sort of special administrative status for the city of Donetsk like Berlin or something.
Putin’s best chance for limping out of this is a war in Iran or against China that distracts Washington for a time.
Trump is now playing hardball with Zelensky, apparently. But I’m pretty sure that this has very little to do with forcing Zelensky to give up Donetsk to Putin and more to do with scaling back the Energy War being fought in the skies against the refineries and factories of powerful oligarchs, who are petitioning Trump’s people to broker a ceasefire on that front.
Trump, for his part, thinks that he has achieved peace between Russia and Ukraine for some reason.
In fact, both Zelensky and Putin have stated that they believe that Trump deserves a Nobel Peace Prize for the peace that he has ushered in.
This seems a bit surprising given the fact that there’s still a war raging in Ukraine. But, as I believe, the real negotiating that is going on behind the scenes is in regards to the energy strikes. If the parties can agree to end those strikes, then they will consider it a ceasefire. The fighting in Donbass seems almost entirely inconsequential. I don’t think any of them really care about it one way or the other outside of the leverage that it can provide in other, more important negotiations.
There are several facts on the ground worth understanding though:
- Putin can’t take the rest of Donetsk with military force
- Putin will need to figure out a way to mobilize more men without announcing a mobilization by year’s end
- Russia’s energy infrastructure has taken a serious pounding and this will translate into even more pressure on the Kremlin as prices soar again and oligarchs’ assets go up in flames
- The importance of PR and “soft power” are drastically overstated; with good media psyops you can create any kind of fantasy reality
- Putin’s position continues to weaken; NATO continues to prepare for a full-scale war with Russia in two years time; Moscow has no allies thanks to Putin’s policies
By making these concessions, Putin just encourages NATO and Kiev to put on more pressure.
It is what it is, folks.
No reason to get all worked up about it though.
I stopped reading when he said that President Putin was planning to trade parts of the Donbass for peace. This is an old chestnut and all of a part with the notion that Russia is weak, Putin is losing his hold and the country has no friends. Wishful thinking indeed.
Fair enough and you might be right Belyi, time will tell
I posted this because it is so counter to the standard “alternative” narrative. This guy seems to have close links with the Russian “alternative” people too. We rarely get to hear about that view in the west do we. You would have seen plenty of evidence of that had you chosen to read on
For example, I find it puzzling that I keep hearing western alternative commentators saying that Ukraine lost. But it clearly hasn’t the meat grinder grinds on and on, consuming young Eastern Europeans all the time. I’ve no faith in the casualty figures that EITHER side claim. Truth is always the first victim of war
Something doesn’t smell right to me