INTREP360 INTELLIGENCE REPORT
12.29.2025
December 29th, 2025
Greetings! You’d be forgiven if you thought Mar-a-Lago the past couple of days has a “Rick’s Place” kind of vibe going on from the classic 1942 “Casablanca” film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Humprey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman.
All of the usual suspects kept showing up.
President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu and even Russian President Vladimir Putin – twice by telephone – couldn’t stay away.
AI image generated by GROK.
War & peace were the common crossover themes. Yet, continued war is appearing to win out both in Europe & the Mideast.
Other global leaders were conspicuously absent but far from silent. Chinese President Xi Jinping launched a military exercise around Taiwan. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian announced his country is at total war with the U.S., Israel & Europe. North Korean leader Kim Jon-un tested long-range nuclear-capable ballistic missiles.
The Axis of Evil is humming.
Ditto their proxies. Hamas announced it is unwilling to disarm as it agreed to do in Sharm el-Sheikh. Hezbollah – likely at the direction of Tehran is refusing to withdraw its forces north of the Litani River in Lebanon & to disarm as well.
Meanwhile, tensions continue building in Venezuela. The U.S. is militarily striking back against another usual suspect – ISIS – in Syria and in Nigeria. Plus, Ukraine endured another heavy day of Russian bombing.
Lest we forget, Putin desperately played the victim card earlier today. No one – save our nemesis Kirill Dmitriev, the Kremlin’s special envoy to the U.S. – was long-fooled by it. That Putin played it is telling. More on that below.
Let’s get started putting it all together.
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NORTH AMERICA
On Saturday, Trump & Zelensky met at Mar-a-Lago. Optics wise, it was better than many of us fear. There was no repeat of the earlier February brouhaha in the Oval Office when Vice President JD Vance unleashed on Zelensky.
Photo credit: Jim Watson/AFP. Zelensky left, being greeted by Trump at Mar-a-Lago on December 28th.
It helped that Vance wasn’t there.
Predictably, Putin tried to set conditions ahead of the talks. Like he did in October when he talked Trump out of sending Tomahawks to Ukraine, Putin telephoned Trump before Zelensky arrived at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday.
This time it didn’t appear to work.
Trump’s welcome of Zelensky was warm. They joked about the February flare up. Trump said, “it was an honor to have Zelensky at Mar-a-Lago.” For his part, the Ukrainian president characterized it as a “great meeting.”
Substance wise, it is clear that peace in Ukraine remains as far away as it ever was. Zelensky said they were 90% there. Trump proffered 95%. As Michael McFaul, the former U.S. ambassador to Russia, said on Morning Joe, from Putin’s standpoint, we are in reality only “0%, 10% or 15%” there.
We’d argue it is closer to zero than 10%.
Putin, however, clearly was worried after the meeting that Team was buying into the revised 20-point peace plan that the White House, Ukraine and key European allies had hammered out in Berlin, Washington, Kyiv and Miami.
Especially point #4 that would allow Ukraine to maintain a post-war robust military with 800,000 soldiers. Ditto point #5 that would give Ukraine “security guarantees that mirror Article 5, the mutual-defence clause of NATO’s founding treaty.”
Ukraine keeping its strategic Fortress Donbas is the other deal killer that Putin fears most. As we warned in Sunday’s New York Post, the reason why is obvious. Putin doesn’t want peace. He wants every piece of Ukraine.
That’s why he can’t – and won’t – agree to an 800,000-strong Ukrainian army. Or Article 5-like security guarantees. Let alone ending the war along the current lines-of-contact.
Putin is telling us everything we need to know by maintaining his maximalist negotiating position. Even if he “agrees” to a peace deal, he is going to invade for a third time to achieve his original goal: the end of Ukraine.
To stop all that, he called Trump again today. This – principally – it was to fume that Ukraine had targeted his presidential palace in Valdai. The claim – echoed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov – is nonsense.
Zelensky vehemently denied it.
Trump, at least for now, appears to have bought into the Russian ruse. During a presser today, he said “I was very angry about it” after Putin told him. Moments later, Trump did catch himself saying if it is true.
It isn’t.
Local residents near Valdai stated that they heard no Russian air defense systems going off. 91 Ukrainian drones heading to the palace would have set off a firestorm. Putin – rather lamely – was just playing a fake victim card.
That tells us he’s desperate. As we pointed out Sunday in The Post, Ukraine – especially given the recapturing of Kupyansk – Zelensky gave Trump new cards to play against Moscow. Putin crying “wolf” proves to us that he knows it.
Team Trump should play them. Enough of Moscow setting negotiating conditions. Right now, Washington and Kyiv have the upper hand.
Rick’s Place – we mean Mar-a-Lago! – was back open for business on Monday. Today it was the Israeli prime minister meeting with Trump.
Photo credit: ABC News. Netanyahu, left, meets with Trump, right at Mar-a-Largo on December 28th.
Rumor had it Trump was going to blast Netanyahu over Israeli military actions in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.
That didn’t happen.
Instead, Iran likely changed the tone. Pezeshkian’s declaration of total “full-fledge war” against the U.S. and Israel put an end to that.
Instead, Tehran found itself on the receiving end. Trump told Iran that if they are “trying to build up again and if they are , we’re going to have to knock them down. We’ll knock them down; we’ll knock the hell out of ‘em.”
Reports that Iran is “developing biological and chemical warheads for the country’s long-range ballistic missiles” has rattled Israel. Doing so would be a clear red line to Israel and Jerusalem, with or without Washington’s approval, will act.
Hamas went down the same foolish path today. They announced that they “will not give up their weapons as long as the occupation remains.”
Trump’s response?
Hamas will have “hell to pay” if they don’t.”
Hezbollah made it a trifecta. They announced as well that they have no intention of disarming or withdrawing to north of the Blue Line in southern Lebanon despite the looming December 31st deadline they agreed to as part of a ceasefire with Israel.
Notice a pattern?
We do. Iran is up to its old tricks. Pulling strings with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to create chaos in the Mideast.
Until Trump permanently solves Iran, none of this will change. If he doesn’t do so soon, war on three fronts could break out again soon in the Mideast: Gaza, Lebanon and Iran.
Trump’s new National Security Strategy may envision pivoting away from the Mideast, but the very vacuum it is creating is threatening to draw the U.S. back into the region-wide conflict between Israel and Iran.
***
SOUTH AMERICA
CNN reported today that the “CIA carried out a drone strike earlier this month on a port facility on the coast of Venezuela.” During his presser with Netanyahu today at Mar-a-Lago, Trump confirmed the report, saying “We just knocked out — I don’t know if you read or you saw — they have a big plant, or a big facility, where the ships come from. Two nights ago, we knocked that out.”
U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) announced another strike on an alleged narco-trafficking boat operating in the Pacific off of Venezuela.
***
EUROPE
Poland is partnering with South Korea to manufacture “10,000” precision-guided missiles for [its] Homar-K launcher systems.” The deal is between Hanwha and WB Group and is valued at over €3.3 billion Euros.
Warsaw is continuing its aggressive military build-up to defend against any future Russian and/or Belarussian invasion. Presently, they are spending 4.7% GDP on defense which is the highest % in NATO.
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MIDDLE EAST
Saudi Arabia bombed Yemen again today. They struck a shipment of weapons in the southern port city of Mukalla that were headed to the separatist forces of the Southern Transitional Council (STC). The STC who are backed by the United Arab Emirates shouldn’t be confused for the Houthis who control western Yemen.
As we noted Friday, they seized control of the oil-rich Hadramout and al-Mahra governorates that are near Saudi Arabia and Oman borders. They are also logistically key regions for both Mideast countries.
***
AFRICA
Calendar note: On New Year’s Day, our regular national security column at The Hill on Thursdays at 7AM ET will focus on Nigeria.
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INDO-PACIFIC
China launched a massive military drill today that is completely surrounding the islands of Taiwan. The People’s Liberation Drill is called “Justice Mission 2025.” On the surface, it is being touted by Beijing as a “stern warning” to Taipei about the $11 billion arms deal they struck with Washington last week.
Photo credit: Chinese Embassy, Washington D.C.
In reality, it is likely about a lot more. Messaging to Japan given a recent flare-up of tensions between the two countries. Plus, Beijing is trying to learn from how the U.S. and Taiwan react militarily to the PLA build-up.
We will take a deep dive into this tomorrow as we are running out of word count for this email update.
***
WHAT WE ARE READING!
Netanyahu, Trump project unity as Middle East tensions rise. Cat Zakrzewski, Shira Rubin, Loveday Morris and Isaac Arnsdorf reporting for The Washington Post.
Zelensky splits with Trump and doubts Putin wants peace in Ukraine: ‘I don’t see it’. Ryan King reporting for The New York Post.
Zelensky agrees relationship with Trump has ‘evolved’ over time. Tara Suter reporting for The Hill.
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Thanks for reading! We will see you tomorrow. Or in Casablanca terms, we will play it again! No need to ask Sam!
Please subscribe, comment and share. We truly appreciate it!
Jon & Mark
Follow Jon on X at @JESweet2022 or on Bluesky at @JonSweet.bsky.social.
Follow Mark on X at @MCTothSTL or on Bluesky at @MarkToth.bsky.social.
Maryanne, thank you for reading & commenting.
Re: President Zelensky, two of the publications that we first began writing for in 2022 — The Hill in Washington DC & the Kyiv Post in Ukraine — spell his name in English with one “y.”
Other outlets use two.
For style & consistency purposes, since we frequently link to our columns in The Hill & Kyiv Post, we elected to use one “y” to avoid a reader seeing it spelled one way in our Substack & then another way in one of our columns.
Re: the headline image. It was generated by AI.
The image is simply intended to show how over the weekend — for better or worse — Mar-a-Lago was center stage.
Re: Zelensky’s aging. Yes, it is clear the war has rapidly aged him.
Be assured no disrespect is intended. Jon & I do a weekly television show in Ukraine for Kanal 24 & we often stress our respect for him.
Happy New Year to you & your family!
Mark
Please note that the spelling of President Zelenskyy’s name takes a double y. And I wonder why you have chosen to use a very youthful photo of the man who has been leading his people through a bitter war for four years- years that show in his face.