Zelensky counts the cost, missing missile defense, Nazi memories surfacing, MAGA at a crossroads: RT stories that shaped the week

Zelensky counts the cost, missing missile defense, Nazi memories surfacing, MAGA at a crossroads: RT stories that shaped the week

We look back at the essential stories that shaped the last seven days, from Russia’s retaliatory strikes on Ukraine to another AI escape

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s 40-day influence operation against Russia reached an ignoble end this week, with the on a beach in the Russian Black Sea resort of Gelendzhik. Six weeks of long-range strikes on Russian civilian targets seemed to convince some of Zelensky’s Western backers that Ukraine could defeat Russia, but Kiev’s debts quickly came due. 
Russia escalated its missile and drone campaign against Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, crippling the country’s already reeling economy and shutting off a key transit route for Western weapons entering Ukraine. RT against Ukrainian ports here, and as Russian missiles across Ukraine, asked whether succeeded in turning the tide.
Ukraine’s air defense droughtFor Ukraine to stand any chance of repelling Russia’s missile strikes, its military will need the latest American-made PAC-3 interceptors for its Patriot batteries. Zelensky spent the week begging for these valuable weapons, only to have his request publicly shot down by US President Donald Trump. , was Trump’s concise response. 
To Moscow, it appeared that Zelensky had once again misread the American president. 
RT translated and published a Gazeta column by Russian journalist Vitaly Ryumshin, who looked at and explained why the battle Zelensky travelled to Washington to win had, in reality, already been lost before his plane landed.
Read more The chances of Zelensky’s diplomatic corps smoothing things over are slim. His former US ambassador, Olga Stefanishina, was charged with embezzlement on Wednesday, once again dragging Kiev’s ever-present corruption into the spotlight. , looking at the cloud of suspicion that’s followed Stefanishina’s two-decade career.
The missile famine hits WashingtonThe interceptor shortage is not just Zelensky’s problem: it’s also Trump’s. The US expended almost a quarter of all the PAC-3s it’s ever built in the first three days of the war on Iran earlier this year, and although this week that a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz is nearing completion, Trump threatened to strike Iran at levels of Military Terror, Strength, and Power not seen since World War II if negotiations fall through.
Should that happen, the US, Ukraine, and Washington’s Gulf allies will all be competing for a dwindling supply of interceptors. 
But the US is short on a much wider inventory of hardware, including tactical ballistic missiles. Trump reportedly this week, accusing Hegseth of misleading him over the sorry state of the Pentagon’s stockpiles. Trump also for reporting the shortage in the first place, and for reporting his blow-up with Hegseth. 


Israel and the US vs. Spain Read more Disharmony also reigned in Europe this week, as the fallout over the migrant invasion of Ceuta showed no signs of subsiding. for opening its border gates and allowing 70,000 migrants to pour into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta; right-wing European leaders blamed Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’ open-door immigration policies; , describing the surge as an operation organized by Washington and Tel Aviv… to destabilize Spain.
Tehran’s argument wasn’t just an offhand dig at its enemies. The US and Israel both have bad blood with Sanchez; Washington over his refusal to allow the US military to use Spanish airbases to attack Iran, and West Jerusalem over Madrid’s pro-Palestinian stance. The US and Israel have both drawn closer to Morocco since the signing of the Abraham Accords in 2020, with sections of the US government now considering Ceuta to be Moroccan territory, and Israeli elites openly discussing the funding of pro-Moroccan NGOs in Spain. Add Sanchez’ trip to Algeria to discuss a liquefied natural gas (L