May 5, 2025
This week the U.S. and Ukraine signed a 'mineral deal'. It will allow the U.S. to profit from all future explorations of minerals and hydrocarbons in the grounds controlled by the Kiev regime.
The deal grew out of a scheme the (former) President Zelenski had peddled within the framework of his 'victory plan' last year. He had hopped to entice further support in form of weapons and even direct military intervention against Russia in exchange for some access to rare earth minerals in Ukraine. With the current deal Trump took the second part without offering any guarantee for providing the first.
What the now signed deal really entails is still unknown. The text of the framework agreement was published (in Russian) by the Ukrainian government. There are however two additional agreements which define the all important details.
The Ukrainian government claims that only the first part has been signed. The other two will follow only after the Ukrainian parliament, the Rada, has ratified the main one. Several 'western' media have contradicted that claim. All three parts of the agreement were signed. But the Ukrainian government is keeping the details of the second and third part secret because the conditions imposed by them are extremely bad for Ukraine.
As Strana has summarized (machine translation):
The document published by the Ukrainian government and signed yesterday does not contain any specifics on the fundamental aspects of the fund's activities.
In particular, the details of the fund's management and the decision-making mechanism for disposing of funds received by the fund are not specified.
...
There is only a reference to the fact that the distribution of shares in the fund, its management principles and other specific issues will be regulated by an additional limited partnership agreement, which, according to the Ukrainian authorities, has yet to be signed (recall, the American media write that it has already been approved).
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In the published text of the agreement, the goal of the fund (Partnership) is extremely vague: "to become a flagship mechanism for encouraging transparent, accountable and future-oriented investments in critical sectors of the Ukrainian economy in support of the country's recovery strategy."
At the same time, the text of the agreement contains clear commitments on contributions to the fund from Ukraine (50% of the cost of new mineral development licenses), but does not contain specific commitments on contributions from the United States. There is also no commitment from Washington to continue military assistance. It is only written that if there are still arms deliveries, they will be counted as an American contribution to the fund.
The agreement will without doubt be used by the U.S. to rob Ukraine of whatever valuables it has left.
At the same time it does not commit the U.S. to do anything.
With this capitulation Zelenski has fulfilled everything the Trump administration had demanded from him for a ceasefire. The U.S. has, however, no means to press Russia into a ceasefire. President Putin and other Russian officials have made it clear that they have no interest in just stopping the fighting but want a long lasting peace agreement.
The Trump administration has neither the will nor the capabilities to negotiate and enter into long term peace agreement with Russia.
That is why it is now, on one side, washing its hands over the whole issue:
Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated Thursday that a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine is still on the horizon but noted the eastern European nations are still very much at odds with "no military solution."
"I think we know where Ukraine is, and we know where Russia is right now and where [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is. They're still far apart," he told Fox News's Sean Hannity. "They're closer, but they're still far apart."
Rubio essentially says: 'We got what we wanted. Now lets get out of here':
"There does come a point where the president has to decide how much more time at the highest levels of our government do you dedicate it, when maybe one of the two sides or both aren't really close enough, when we have got so many, I would argue, even more important issues going on around the world, not that a war in Ukraine is not important," the secretary of State said Thursday.
Vice President Vance confirmed that take:
U.S. Vice President JD Vance said Thursday evening that the Kremlin's war in Ukraine is far from over and that it's now up to Russia and Ukraine to end the fighting with Washington mulling a step back from peace talks.
"It's going to be up to them [Russia and Ukraine] to come to an agreement and stop this brutal, brutal conflict," Vance said during an interview with Fox News' Bret Baier.
"It's not going anywhere, Bret. It's not going to end anytime soon," he added.
Now, as the mineral deal is signed, the U.S. says it has no more responsibility for what happens in Ukraine.
But the mineral deal is also, on the other side, a trap to keep the U.S. committed to the war. As Yves Smith explains:
[O]ur prediction that this deal would be a spoiler as far as normalization of US-Russia relations look every bit as operative as we predicted from the get-go.
We had warned from the outset that the so-called Ukraine "raw earths" deal conflicted with the US agreeing to a settlement of the Ukraine conflict by creating an economic incentive for the US to support Ukraine in retaining as much territory as possible.
... To put it another way, the minerals pact was certain to be a source of conflict with Russia were it ever to get done. The fact that the Administration pursued the deal so aggressively said it valued a splashy but low to no value win over normalizing relations with Russia.
The U.S. may already be back to be fully committed to the war. As soon as the mineral deal was signed the State Department gave notice to Congress about a $50+ million weapon sale to Ukraine.
During the night from Thursday to Friday a large scale drone attack from Ukraine took place in Crimea. Last night another, ever larger attack took place. During the attack Ukraine used Storm Shadow cruise missiles which need U.S. intelligence based coordinates to reach their targets (machine translation):
For the first time since January, Russia announced a strike by British Storm Shadow missiles.
This is reported by the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.
The ministry announced the downing of eight such missiles over the Black Sea.
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The last time the Russian Federation officially reported on the Storm Shadow strike was almost three months ago-on January 15.
Also in Russia, a mass drone raid was reported on the Crimea (96 were shot down) and the Krasnodar Territory (47 UAVs were shot down). In addition, it is stated that 14 Ukrainian unmanned boats were destroyed in the Black Sea.
Recall that on the night of May 2, the Crimea was also under a massive drone attack. Explosions were, in particular, in the areas of military airfields.
Without U.S. (and British) intelligence support the recent attacks by Ukraine would not have been possible.
This points to not yet public Trump decision to continue the war even though the U.S. has no chance to win.
Michael Brenner explains how Trump's 'malignant narcissism' has led to this outcome.
When Russia will launch its big Summer offensive after Victory Day on May 9, it will become very obvious that making peace with Russia would have been the more difficult but also more promising way to proceed.
Reprinted with permission from Moon of Alabama.