Updated 00.42 | Published 00.34
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One day.
Bang after bang.
At the same time, a satisfied Putin looked at a mushroom cloud through a window.
Ukraine and its President Volodymyr Zelenskyy went through a black Monday.
The money is gone and the setbacks on the battlefield many.
The president is at loggerheads with both his top military command and his most famous mayor.
Alarm from the White House
In addition, diplomats in the West are beginning to question whether Ukraine should give up the war and enter into negotiations with Russia instead.
All according to data during the first day of the week.
White House Budget Director Shalanda D Young writes in an alarm letter to Congress that the US will soon run out of cash to send weapons to Ukraine.
She states that the arms shipments will end by the New Year unless the House of Representatives and the Senate decide on a new aid package soon.
“We’re out of money – and out of time,” writes Young.
“If the flow of weapons and equipment stops, it will put Ukraine on the battlefield, risk the successes already achieved and increase the risk of Russian military victories.”
Power struggles at the top
New House Speaker Mike Johnson responded that Biden and the Democrats had not done enough to win Republican support on the issue.
At the same time, there is a storm in Ukraine with serious power struggles at the top.
According to the newspaper Ukrainska Pravda, Zelensky freezes out his commander-in-chief Valery Zaluzhny and instead communicates directly with his favorite commanders, says Sky News.
Among other things, according to the newspaper’s sources, the president will choose to take strategic questions directly with the commanders of the ground troops and the air force.
– It is very degrading for the commander-in-chief and prevents him from commanding the entire armed forces, says the source to Ukrainska Pravda.
The rift between Zelenskyj and Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko also appears to be widening.
Want negotiations
Klitschko harshly criticizes the president’s way of running the country in an interview with German Der Spiegel.
– Sooner or later we will not separate from Russia, where everything depends on one man’s mood, says the mayor.
As if all this were not enough, top diplomats in the West are said to have grown weary of Ukraine’s demands for more aid – and doubt the possibility of defeating Russia.
This is stated by Politico’s political reporter Jack Blanchard in a podcast with his colleague Sam Coates from Sky News.
– So far there are only whispers, Ukraine’s major counter-offensive has been anything but the success people were hoping for and it raises serious questions about Ukraine’s ability to win the war in any meaningful military way, says Blanchard according to Sky News.
– Now there is talk in diplomatic circles about putting pressure on Kiev to sit down and negotiate.
Ceremony in the Kremlin
At the same time, Zelensky’s top advisor Mychajlo Podoljak states that they are making “tactical changes” to the counteroffensive due to the winter and investing in “effective defense” in certain places along the front.
Putin then?
His Monday was better.
The president swore in around twenty new ambassadors from, among others, Great Britain, Germany and Sweden in a ceremony in the Kremlin.
Vladimir Putin lamented the poor relations with the West.
– Since the Second World War until recently, our countries have built relationships. But the current state is well known and we hope that the situation changes for the better in the interest of all our countries, he said according to The Moscow Times.
Watched mushroom clouds
He also brought up the “non-existent communication with Stockholm”.
Earlier on Monday, Putin toured an exhibition in Moscow dedicated to Russian achievements and achievements.
He was given a briefing on a Soviet atomic bomb, shown a replica of the control panel for a nuclear test, and saw images of an explosion and subsequent mushroom cloud through a window, writes Reuters.
However, Putin chose not to press the fire button, the news agency said.
The president also met school students and got to choose from hopes for the future that children had put up on a Christmas tree.