President Volodymyr Zelensky left the White House early without signing a mineral deal with the United States following a heated exchange with President Donald Trump on Feb. 28.
Zelensky departed in his motorcade around 1:45 p.m. local time, without holding a joint news conference scheduled for later in the day, after the two leaders got into a heated argument while speaking with journalists in the Oval Office.
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CNN reported that following the exchange, Zelensky and Trump left to separate rooms, with the Ukrainian delegation wanting to continue talks with the Trump administration.
Trump later ordered his officials to tell the Ukrainian officials to leave the White House, despite protest from the Ukrainian delegation.
Ukraine’s mineral resources really aren’t even that considerable on a global scale. They’re not insignificant but their economic value at the moment, even setting aside the war, doesn’t have American companies salivating.
This minerals for protection thing apparently was floated by Ukraine first to the Biden administration and Trump campaign. The Biden administration didn’t do much with it because, among other things, the actual economic and practical value was questionable.
Trump, on the other hand, just wants to be seen making deals. Zelenskyy and Ukraine first floated the general idea because they knew Trump is highly transactional and it’d give Trump an easy “win.”
I highly doubt trillions in profits are anywhere in the mix.
And you don’t want to negotiate anything with Trump directly. If Zelenskyy did that intentionally, he dropped the ball. Trump is far too mercurial and often only grasps issues in the most basic of senses. Trying to get into a nuts and bolts negotiation with him is pointless. Hammer that out first, get something signable without too onerous of long term commitments, compliment him, sign, move on.
So there’s a huge deposit between Mariupol and Donetsk, which is in Russian controlled territory. It’s probably the easiest to mine and most economically viable… I think that was the original plan Zelensky was thinking. Get some American mining infrastructure there and then thr US has skin in the game.
Trump seems to have a survey of the entire countries rare earth resources and is just taking the entire estimated value and splitting in half. Which as you pointed out is stupid, because a lot of the deposits are smaller or would be much more expensive to mine.
I think this is why Putin also was quick to mention cooperating with the USA on minerals in Russia (which from his POV includes those regions). I’m sure Zelenskyy/Ukraine would want to try to use that as leverage but I don’t think Trump bites.
There are some substantial reserves of various minerals elsewhere but not sure how viable and valuable they really are.
You mean in Ukraine? There are tons of other stuff to mine and even some rare earth outside of controlled area… It just is probably less profitable to mine. Here is a map
Give me $10,000, because you know, on a global scale it’s not a lot of money, so you shouldn’t worry about handing it over to me. /s
For some people, $10,000 is a lot. A metric like “global scale” is so… Fuck, I can’t even think of a word. Assholic. You’re an asshole for using a word like that to describe this situation like it’s no big deal.
“Give me $10,000, because you know, on a global scale it’s not a lot of money, so you shouldn’t worry about handing it over to me.”
Hello strawman, someone put this ridiculous statement in a logic 101 course textbook. I mean, dafuq are you on about?
You see, it is a ridiculous statement. Which is why I’m bewildered that you were dumb enough to say it in the first place and you don’t see the sheer irony of calling what I said a strawman argument but not your own.
It’s like you don’t live in reality.
By god. I mean. Wow. Oof.
I am in no way (edit: nor have I ever even implied) devaluing Ukraine to mean that their only value is mineral resources. Why you concluded that is beyond me and baffling. Literally.
Ukrainians are certainly worth much, much than those resources in my view. Let’s say Ukraine’s natural resources literally magically disappeared overnight. So what? They still deserve justice and then some and we should protect democracies when and where possible.
Regardless, spinning minerals into some conspiracy theory with the USA extracting phantom trillions doesn’t advance Ukraine’s cause.
Dude I try to be polite here for its own sake but go touch some grass.
That’s interesting, because that’s not what I implied at all. Keep digging though. I have faith you’ll catch it eventually. I’ll give you a hint;
See it yet? The strawman that you yourself used, I used back at you in a different context that you were able to correctly identify as a strawman but called mine bad but still think yours is good? lol
lmao you’re just smashing dunning kruger my dude. If you have an actual point just come out and say it. You’re trying to bend logical fallacies in a way that doesn’t work and starts to veer towards narcissism.
TBH, I think you know you started out on a foundation of absurd bullshit and now painted in a corner you’re just lashing out, hoping that you can intimidate people by blatantly misusing arguements.
You’re welcome to try to prove me wrong
Best part is that these posts are public. So literally everyone can visually see your lack of awareness, your sociopathy and inability to see where you’ve gone wrong, and you continually digging yourself deeper.
Crazy times we live in.
So you got nothing, eh?