"The New Joule Order”

Super-smart Tesla-killers.

---

“If I could only open one thing each morning it would be John Ellis’s News Items newsletter.” — Larry Summers, President Emeritus of Harvard University and former Secretary of the Treasury of the United States.

---

1. Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected the ceasefire proposal that the United States and Ukraine recently agreed upon in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and offered an alternative proposal that undermines US President Donald Trump's stated goal of securing a lasting peace in Ukraine. Putin claimed on March 13 that he "agrees" with the temporary ceasefire proposal and that the "idea itself is correct" but that the cessation of hostilities "should be such that it would lead to long-term peace and eliminate the initial causes" of the war. Putin thus rejected one of the main principles of the US-Ukrainian proposal — that the temporary ceasefire precede formal negotiations to end the war. Putin also claimed that there are questions that "require painstaking research from both sides.” (Source: understandingwar.org, a website that provides the most comprehensive coverage of the Ukraine war, on a daily basis)

---

2. Classified U.S. intelligence reports, including one earlier this month, cast doubt on Vladimir Putin’s willingness to end the war against Ukraine, assessing that the Russian president has not veered from his maximalist goal of dominating his western neighbor, according to people familiar with the analysis. One of the secret assessments distributed to Trump administration policymakers, dated March 6, says Putin remains determined to hold sway over Kyiv, a person familiar with the document said. Like others in this article, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss classified intelligence. The reports are not intended to assess President Donald Trump’s high-stakes diplomacy to end the three-year Ukraine war or the prospects of a 30-day ceasefire proposal that U.S. and Ukrainian officials agreed on this week. But they underscore the tough task Trump and his national security team face, and raise the question of whether the White House is misreading Putin’s willingness to seek peace. (Source: washingtonpost.com)

---