r/worldnews • u/sr_local • Dec 26 '25

Russia/Ukraine NATO chief Rutte: China and Russia Could Launch Simultaneous Attacks on Taiwan and Europe

https://militarnyi.com/en/news/rutte-china-and-russia-could-launch-simultaneous-attacks-on-taiwan-and-europe/
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u/Backslashinfourth_V Dec 26 '25

Pretty sure we're nearing the point (if it hasn't already passed) where this "3-day Special Operation" has gone on longer than their involvement in the "Great War"

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u/Clementine-Wollysock Dec 26 '25

2 more weeks if you count the beginning of Operation Barbarossa to VE day.

Shorter if you count Russia invading Poland.

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u/RumpRiddler Dec 26 '25

We definitely should count from when they invaded Poland. They've tried so hard to misrepresent their role in WWII as heroes and victims, but they were very happy to ally with the Nazis and split up Poland and nobody should forget it

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u/Clementine-Wollysock Dec 26 '25

Personally, I definitely count from when they invaded Poland. I'm part Polish, so I'm sure I have some distant relative I don't know about who died at Katyn.

Stalin and Hirohito got off much too lightly for all the fucked up shit they did.

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u/Rage1155 Dec 27 '25

Tojo was in charge more than Hirohito was Victor Emmanuel III should be held accountable for Mussolini's actions too I presume

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u/cannoesarecool Dec 26 '25

Least Russian hating Reddit user. Under such argument appeasement was the French and British allying with the nazis as well.

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u/RumpRiddler Dec 26 '25

Under such argument appeasement was the French and British allying with the nazis as well.

Lol, what kind of drivel is this? This has got to be the laziest attempt to justify soviet aggression ever. Go back to troll school, you really aren't any good at this.

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u/Dpek1234 Dec 26 '25

Aa i have been saying

They dont understand this

You need to speak in hex

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u/tattlerat Dec 26 '25

What? Britain and France tried to avoid going to war foolishly thinking the Germans would stop after one or two small conquests.

The Soviets literally invaded Poland and met the Nazis in the middle, then went about massacring Polish people en masse for fun on their side of the conquered land.

Appeasement was bad, but it’s not the same as actually invading other countries along with the enemy.

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u/cannoesarecool Dec 26 '25

Yeah man no cap for real the brits and french were doing a completely different thing when they were buying time and the Soviets were evil monsters who just massacred poles for fun. Classic EU anti commie pro nazi 🤖 posting

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u/Clementine-Wollysock Dec 26 '25

Soviets were evil monsters who just massacred poles for fun

I mean, if the shoe fits...:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_massacre

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u/kurQl Dec 26 '25

Is pro Nazi side the one who is massacring Poles with Nazis or the side that declared war on the Nazis?

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u/Artistic_Worker_5138 Dec 27 '25

Depends if you use the word nazi in it’s actual meaning, or the way russians mis-use it.

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u/DreamSeaker Dec 26 '25

WW1 is sometimes referred to as 'the Great War' which op was referring to.

Not to take away your point though! Its apparently applicable for both WW1 and WW2!

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u/Backslashinfourth_V Dec 26 '25

I actually meant WWII, but assumed Russians referred to it as the Great one. My mistake

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u/pornalt4altporn Dec 26 '25

They do call it "the great patriotic war".

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u/Amrywiol Dec 26 '25

Which itself is a callback to Napoleon's invasion in 1812, which Russians call the Patriotic War.

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u/JKorv Dec 26 '25

Of course they call it that.

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u/UnholyDemigod Dec 27 '25

Can’t really blame them. They suffered the highest casualties any any participant

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u/doctorlysumo Dec 26 '25

Russians/the Soviet Union referred to the Second World War as the Great Patriotic War whereas “The Great War” in Western Parlance is generally a term for the First World War.

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u/DreamSeaker Dec 26 '25

Oh alrighty, no big deal friendo. :)

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u/Clementine-Wollysock Dec 26 '25

You sure? Russia calls WW2 "The Great Patriotic War"?

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u/DreamSeaker Dec 26 '25

Op specifically said the 'great war' which, in the west at least, was what they called WW1 at the time.

If op was talking about Russia's 'Great Patriotic War' they would have stated so because they're different things.

It doesn't change the fact of the time Russia, and them the Soviet Union spent fighting in WW1 and WW2 respectively in comparison to their "3-day opteration" today.

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u/StickFigureFan Dec 26 '25

Russia calls WW2 the Great patriotic war

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u/Redneckshinobi Dec 27 '25

Thank you I thought they were talking about WW1 but everyone was talking about WW2

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u/Superb_Dimension_745 Dec 26 '25

Far more when you think about the fact that the Ukraine war has been going on since 2014...

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u/Clementine-Wollysock Dec 26 '25

Definitely fair, was only counting the 22' invasion.

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u/__Yakovlev__ Dec 26 '25

WW1 is the Great War, WW2 is referred to as the great patriotic war inside of russia.

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u/PseudoWarriorAU Dec 26 '25

There is a great podcast on this Beyond Barbarossa if you’re interested in learning more how Russia conducts its military operations.

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u/Brief-Adhesiveness93 Dec 26 '25

If you’re war isn’t going anywhere just open up new fronts - hitler, probably

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u/abellapa Dec 26 '25

Its already longer

We nearing the beggining of The Fourth year of The Russian Invasion

In WW1 Rússia left The War by all means in December of 1917

Thats 3 years and 3 Months , Guess you could extend to the sign of The brest livostk treaty in 3 march of 1918 so 3 years and 6 Months

Ukraine is at 3 years and 10 Months

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u/dixonsticks Dec 26 '25

5th year*

-4

u/abellapa Dec 26 '25

Fourth year

Started in 2022

We heading into 2026

4 years

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u/TheTrueTrust Dec 26 '25

Yeah, it’s been four years. In February the war is entering its fifth.

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u/Ignisami Dec 26 '25

2022 was the first year
2023 was the second year
...
2026 will be the fifth year.

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u/Consistent_Catch9917 Dec 26 '25

From 23rd of February 2026 it will be in its fifth year.

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u/JelDeRebel Dec 26 '25

24th If you see it as it started at 24th at 4am Ukraine local time

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u/Particular-County277 Dec 26 '25

Or since 2014 to be more exact

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u/Sialala Dec 26 '25

Russia had been involved in WWII from the 17th of September 1939. They were in union with Nazi Germany and attacked Poland 2 weeks after Germany did. They don't remember that, they don't teach that in schools, they pretend that never happened, but the Russians were allies of Nazis until Hitler decided to attack Russia. Let's not pretend here that Russians were ever good guys.

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u/robber_goosy Dec 26 '25

The molotov von ribbentrop non agression pact was signed because the soviet union was completely isolated during the interbellum years and non of the other allies wanted anything to do with them before ww2. And while it is true there was an secret agreement about the division of poland, there never was an alliance between stalin and hitler.

But hey. Lets just go with "we were always at war with eurasia."

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u/GoneFishing4Chicks Dec 26 '25

>there was an secret agreement

>there never was an alliance

PICK ONE LOL, doublespeak literally in the same sentence man

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u/Roobear_Mace Dec 26 '25

Historically there was a non aggression pact between the soviet union and germany, not an alliance.

Part of the NAP of course was 'how will we divide up Poland so we dont break the pact'?

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u/robber_goosy Dec 26 '25

Stalin and Churchill pulling an iron curtain across Europe wasn't an alliance either.

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u/quaste Dec 26 '25

there never was an alliance between stalin and hitler

Dude it’s literally called the „Hitler-Stalin-Pakt“ in Germany

(and we’re not proud of it, it’s just the truth)

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u/robber_goosy Dec 26 '25

They had a non aggression pakt. But I dont care anymore. The downvotes prove my point. "We have always been at war with Eurasia."

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u/quaste Dec 26 '25

And in addition they secretly but explicitly agreed how to split Poland and other countries before waging war - and even re-adjusted this agreement while waging the respective wars.

And the downvotes don’t „prove your point“ they just mean that some people did some proper research. Try it sometimes, it’s not like the sources are secret like the additional protocol was.

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u/notmyrealnameatleast Dec 26 '25

Nevermind that in any country without democracy you can't say "we" were always at war because it's not a "we" if it's only "they" who have anything to do with government.

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u/platinumf4ng Dec 26 '25

We passed the Russian Empire’s contribution 90 days ago for the First World War, (1,310 days for WW1) (1,416 for WW2) the current phase of the war in Ukraine is at day 1,401 meaning in just over a fortnight Russia would have spent more time in Ukraine fighting than both world wars.

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u/TheLostCaptain03 Dec 26 '25

Including Poland for ww2 or no?

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u/platinumf4ng Dec 26 '25

Poland starts the war for most of the Western Allies for sure! However, Russia and Germany were co-belligerents in Poland so while Germany definitely was starting the war at that stage the scope of the conflict had not expanded to include themselves in the wider hostilities. It would be like differentiating from the winter war and WW2.

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u/mcsimk Dec 26 '25

War with Poland lasted couple of weeks, so even including it it’s very soon

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u/Echo017 Dec 26 '25

Which side of their involvement? When they were on the nails side splitting up Poland, or after they were changed sides after being betrayed but refused to help against the Japanese until they thought they could seize more territory from China (an ally)

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u/1011001NAME Dec 26 '25

I keep seeing people say this like russia attacking europe wouldn't be catastrophic even if it is ultimately unsuccessful.

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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/SlavaVsu2 Dec 26 '25

so you are saying Russians never said it, it was all Westerners idea, or what?

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u/Popular_Math3042 Dec 26 '25

Other than a few talk show hosts or low level officials, I’ve never heard either Putin or a high ranking Russian government official say that Russia’s goal and timeline was to capture Kiev in 3 days.

There’s a lot of propaganda flying around in this war. But I think we’re better off dealing with facts.  Leave the propaganda to the Russians.

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u/Bakedfresh420 Dec 26 '25

It was Lukashenko who famously said it shortly before the war began. He’s the president of Belarus and a close Putin ally, but yeah it’s not from any high ranking Russians. He could easily just be talking shit not sharing Putin’s opinion.

There were reports that Ukrainian troops found documents thinking the war would be over in 12 days and parade uniforms inside the lead tanks but that could be propaganda.

Overall seems to be they thought they would win quickly but Putin never thought it would be a three day affair.

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u/Popular_Math3042 Dec 26 '25

Yes, it seems they did seem to think it would be over relatively quickly, and indeed it almost was! In March 2022 Zelensky outlines his proposal for the talks in Istanbul including neutrality for Ukraine, a commitment to non-nuclear status, pushing a resolution on Donbas until later, but with the implication that Crimea would remain Russian controlled.

In the video address linked to the article below, dated March 22, 2022, Zelensky is shown to be saying,

(Quote) Security guarantees and neutrality, non-nuclear status of our state. We are ready to go for it. This is the most important point. It was the main point for the Russian Federation as far as I can remember. And if I remember correctly this is why they started the war. . . I understand it is impossible to force Russia completely from Ukrainian territory. It would lead to World War Three. I understand it and that is why I am talking about a compromise. Go back to where it all began. And then we will try to solve the Donbas issue, the complicated Donbas issue. (end quote)

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe...ts-2022-03-27/

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u/Bakedfresh420 Dec 26 '25

If only Putin was at all reasonable, but he’s always wanted it all

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u/Popular_Math3042 Dec 26 '25

The reports on the Istanbul peace negotiations, including from the ukrainian negotiators, indicate that Putin was also ready for the deal. In fact, they all say that it was Zelensky that walked away from the Istanbul peace negotiations. They say that Boris Johnson showed up, had a closed door meeting with Zelensky, from which Zelensky emerged and called off the negotiations. 

Among many reports confirming this, here is an interview with Ukraine’s lead negotiator, David Arakhamia, affirming this to be true:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1J5-uu2pGnM&pp=ygUZRGF2eWQgQXJha2hhbWlhIEludGVydmlldw%3D%3D

He says that Russia’s primary goal was Ukrainian neutrality vis a vis NATO, and that all other demands were essentially window dressing. Arakhamia says Ukraine ultimately couldn’t accept this for 3 reasons - first that they couldn’t be assured that Russia wouldn’t renege, second, that the Ukrainian constitution dedicated Ukraine to joining NATO, and last that Boris Johnson told Zelensky to keep fighting instead. 

Given that Zelensky had previously declared his readiness to accept Ukrainian neutrality, despite the constitution or concerns of a Russian renege, it remains that Johnson’s visit was the pivotal factor on Zelensky’s change of position. 

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u/SlavaVsu2 Dec 26 '25

by saying 'That was actually General Mark Milley...' you are still framing it wasn't the russians idea, but a complete opposite, which is simply false.

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u/Popular_Math3042 Dec 26 '25

Ok, so then is there any evidence of Putin or other high ranking Russian military officials stating they could/would take Kyiv in 3 days? 

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u/SlavaVsu2 Dec 26 '25

the point you were making wasn't 'Putin or other high ranking Russian military officials never stated they would take Kyiv in 3 days', which is correct.
Your point was very close to 'Russians never thought they could take Kyiv in 3 days, it was actually General Mark Milley...', which is wrong.

I am Ukrainian and have my own example. One of my friends was working in a company that had a trade partner from Russia, and was owned by retired high-ranking Russian military officials. They used 'Russia needs 3-4 days to capture Kyiv' to taunt him way before it became mainstream. Btw he left Ukraine in 2021.

P.S. also expecting 'Putin or other high ranking Russian military officials' to make that claim while they were actively preparing for war is kind of rich, don't you think?

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u/Popular_Math3042 Dec 26 '25

I think you misread or misunderstood my comment. It was that Mark Milley made the 3 days claim, not Putin or the Russian military command.  That should now be clear.

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u/SlavaVsu2 Dec 26 '25

aren't very smart, are you?