FT: “Trump showed interest in Zelensky’s Victory Plan”. According to the Financial Times, former U.S. President Donald Trump recently expressed interest in two key aspects of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s “Victory Plan” during a meeting in New York. The first proposal involves replacing American troops in Europe with Ukrainian forces once the war concludes, a move designed to reshape military deployments on the continent. The second aspect suggests sharing Ukraine’s natural resources with Western allies, providing a foundation for post-war economic cooperation. Sources familiar with the plan suggest these elements were crafted specifically with Trump’s policies in mind, particularly his approach to economic “investment screening,” which aims to restrict foreign investments from countries such as China.
Russians use Ukrainian children in occupied territories for propaganda and military training. According to Ukraine’s National Resistance Centre, Russian authorities in the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories continue their policy of “re-educating” Ukrainian children, using schools as instruments of propaganda. The NRC reports that at the Luhansk Cadet Corps, now controlled by Russia’s so-called “Investigative Committee,” 47 students from the 8th and 10th grades recently took a cadet oath for the first time, pledging allegiance to the ideals of the aggressor state. Local authorities have also announced plans to increase the number of cadet classes, thereby stripping these children of their futures by grooming them for service in a totalitarian, repressive system.
Additionally, the NRC reported that Russian forces plan to hold winter training sessions for members of the militarised “Yunarmiya” movement at military grounds in Crimea alongside their contract soldiers. Yunarmiya, or the Young Army, is a Russian government-funded youth military organisation. While the official purpose is to familiarise participants with army life and make training feel more realistic, in reality, the occupiers are using Ukrainian teenagers as human shields for their own soldiers. Notably, these winter sessions in Crimea will be directed at Yunarmiya members from Ukraine’s temporarily occupied territories, as Russia is unlikely to send its own teenagers into the war zone.
Ukraine boosts defence budget for 2025. At a recent government meeting, the Ukrainian Cabinet approved a draft state budget for 2025, allocating more than 55 billion hryvnias for arms production and defence technology development. This funding marks an increase from the 51 billion hryvnias allocated in 2024 and is directed toward expanding production capacities and advancing military technologies. In addition, 500 million hryvnias have been designated for a defence industry loan programme, which will allow manufacturers to obtain loans at a 5% interest rate, with the remainder subsidised by the state budget. This initiative, supported by Herman Smetanin, Ukraine’s Minister of Strategic Industry, is set to proceed to parliamentary voting for final approval.
Poland’s Chief of Staff warns of the real threat of a Russian attack. Poland’s Chief of the General Staff, Wiesław Kukuła, views the threat of an attack on Poland as real but believes that the aggressor would not dare to strike a well-prepared country. In an interview with Rzeczpospolita, Kukuła emphasized that the key issue is whether Poland can build long-term resilience and strengthen its military to counter the threat. He added that aggression always exploits weaknesses, and attacking a well-prepared nation with a strong societal response is a high-risk move. Kukuła also agreed with NATO command and the assessment of German General Carsten Breyer, who suggested that Russia would need time, potentially until 2029, to develop the potential for war with NATO. Kukuła noted that Russia’s demographic and resource potential, alongside its still-functioning defence industry, could expedite its military expansion if the war in Ukraine ends, significantly shortening the timeline Breyer proposed.
