Russia Dismisses Zelenskiy’s ‘Victory Plan’ as Gambit to Keep West Onside 

A view shows a site of a Russian air strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine September 15, 2024. (Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy via Telegram/Handout via Reuters)
A view shows a site of a Russian air strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine September 15, 2024. (Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy via Telegram/Handout via Reuters)
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Russia Dismisses Zelenskiy’s ‘Victory Plan’ as Gambit to Keep West Onside 

A view shows a site of a Russian air strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine September 15, 2024. (Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy via Telegram/Handout via Reuters)
A view shows a site of a Russian air strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine September 15, 2024. (Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy via Telegram/Handout via Reuters)

Russia on Friday dismissed a "victory plan" elaborated by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy as a gambit to keep the West onside and said it had nothing to do with the search for a diplomatic or political solution to end the war.

Zelenskiy said on Wednesday that his plan, full details of which he has yet to disclose, was complete after much consultation.

He is due to present it to US President Joe Biden and to address a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday.

Zelenskiy has said his initiative is designed to create terms acceptable to Ukraine, now locked in conflict with Russia for more than 2-1/2 years.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters that the plan looked like a self-interested gambit from the Ukrainian leader whom Moscow accuses of trying to drag the West into a full-blown war against Russia.

"The only goal is to forge or prevent the collapse of the anti-Russian coalition, and of course this has nothing to do with the task of finding a political and diplomatic settlement of the situation around Ukraine," said Zakharova.

She repeated Moscow's view that the West should stop financing and supplying arms to Kyiv and said any initiative purportedly aimed at reaching a peaceful settlement which did not include Russia was pointless.



Trump Orders Planning for ‘Iron Dome’ Missile Shield for US 

An Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system is seen in position near Ashdod, Israel May 13, 2023. (Reuters)
An Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system is seen in position near Ashdod, Israel May 13, 2023. (Reuters)
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Trump Orders Planning for ‘Iron Dome’ Missile Shield for US 

An Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system is seen in position near Ashdod, Israel May 13, 2023. (Reuters)
An Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system is seen in position near Ashdod, Israel May 13, 2023. (Reuters)

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order to start planning for an "Iron Dome" air defense system for the United States, like the one that Israel has used to intercept thousands of rockets.

Trump ordered the defense secretary to submit within 60 days an implementation plan for the "next-generation missile defense shield" designed to guard against ballistic, hypersonic and advanced cruise missiles, including by the development of space-based interceptors.

During the 2024 election campaign Trump repeatedly promised to build a version of Israel's Iron Dome system for the United States.

However, he ignored the fact that the system is designed for short-range threats, making it ill-suited to defending against intercontinental missiles that are the main danger to the United States.

"Over the past 40 years, rather than lessening, the threat from next-generation strategic weapons has become more intense and complex," Monday's executive order said, citing unnamed adversaries' development of missile launch capabilities.

Trump had earlier told a Republican congressional retreat in Miami that the system would be built in the United States.

Israel has used its "Iron Dome" system to shoot down rockets fired by its regional foes Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon during the war sparked by the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel.

"They knock down just about every one of them," Trump said at the Miami meeting. "So I think the United States is entitled to that."