The idea that Russia has the right to control adjacent countries is national security suicide. Saying Ukraine must be compelled to make peace with Russia by ceding territory and sovereignty to Russia will not satisfy Russia for long. Russia will go along just as long as it takes to digest its meal and decide who to stalk and kill next.
Churchill famously warned against dealing gently with aggressors:
Each one hopes that if he feeds the crocodile enough, the crocodile will eat him last. All of them hope that the storm will pass before their turn comes to be devoured. But I fear greatly that the storm will not pass. It will rage and it will roar ever more loudly, ever more widely.
This effort to feed the crocodile just a little bit and hope the storm passes is harmful to America:
While Ukrainians have shown admirable courage resisting Russia’s invasion of their country, NATO’s insistence that Ukraine will one day join the alliance only incentivizes Russia to continue its aggression. Rather than working to bring about a negotiated settlement, NATO’s policy, driven largely by the Biden administration, will ensure the slaughter in Ukraine continues.
What, pray tell, is the negotiation supposed to do other than reward Russia for reintroducing great power war to Europe for the first time since 1945? Who thinks one more agreement will get Russia to agree that Ukraine is sovereign with secure borders after it did so in 1945 (when it insisted Ukraine get a UN seat as an independent state), 1991 (when Russia freed itself from the burdens of empire and accepted Ukraine as free), and 1994 (when Russia guaranteed Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity in the Budapest memorandum)?
One more agreement won't work, considering that Russia is speaking a completely different language when it comes to talking about "ending" the war:
Putin's framing of Ukraine's total capitulation as a reasonable precondition for peace negotiations is also part of an attempt to undermine Ukraine's efforts to garner international support for Ukraine's own legitimate negotiating positions, which are based on and backed by international law, by shifting international perceptions of logical negotiating terms in Russia's favor. Continued Russian efforts to claim that Ukraine is refusing "reasonable" demands intend to cast Ukraine as the unreasonable actor, despite the fact that Ukraine's rightful borders have been recognized by international law since 1991.
And this argument by the initial author is really a violation of National Security 101:
If Biden believes it is in the U.S. national interest to send American troops to fight and die for Ukraine in the future, why is it not in the U.S. national interest to do so now while Ukraine is being actively attacked?
The simple answer is because it is not in America’s interest to fight a war against Russia—a country that possesses over 5,000 nuclear weapons—
on behalf of Ukraine, either now or in the future.
FFS, reverse those thoughts and maybe our actions will make sense! Because we don't want Russia marching west and because we don't want to fight nuclear-armed Russia directly, we therefore send military aid to Ukraine which is highly motivated to resist Russia so we don't need to send troops to stop Putin!
Look, I think Biden only accidentally got stuck in the position of vigorously defending Ukraine:
I think Biden is accidentally supporting Ukraine. I think Biden was told Ukraine would lose fast. I think the early war shipments of anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons were designed for a post-invasion Ukrainian insurgency. The arms would be a relatively cheap way for Biden to show resolve after needlessly losing Afghanistan.
But Ukraine and Russia didn't cooperate with that political strategy. Russia effed up and Ukraine fought. Oops. Biden got trapped into backing Ukraine. And I worry he's looking for an exit ramp.
I'm willing to get over being portrayed by Democrats as a horrible human for wanting to resist the USSR back then as the price of getting their support for resisting the Russians today.
Heck, I'm willing to overlook the odd fact that Democrats seem to own more Ukrainian than American flags.
So to Democrats, welcome to the party, pal. Don't go wobbly on me this time if Russia drags the war out.
I say these Republicans should take the win on converting Democrats to doing the right thing to defend America! Give Biden credit. And then do better than him. Don't give Democrats the exit ramp they crave and let them cry crocodile tears while blaming Republicans for losing Ukraine.
Because Russia has more territorial ambitions. Putin wants all of the former Soviet Union back. And that includes Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania which are now NATO members. And if you want to go back to imperial times pre-1917, Poland and Finland were once owned by Russia.
And there's Central Asia, too, but that's off the menu for now because Russia has learned to fear China.
Have no doubt that if Russia takes its former Soviet territory, it will keep going. That's how Russia rolls:
And who believes that Russia thinks that even owning all of Ukraine would provide enough security on their western border when the Red Army sitting in East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary wasn't sufficiently to the west for Russia to believe that their successful defense could rest on something less ambitious than a lunge to the Rhine River?
Face it, if Russia got Ukraine, suddenly having a deferential Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland would be something that Russia would naturally (as any great power would!) expect.
That's the way it works. If Russia gets a buffer that protects their territory, before long that buffer is their territory that itself needs a buffer to protect it.
Lather, rinse, repeat, and pretty soon Russia is worrying about Britain across the English Channel and figuring that Hadrian's Wall would be a nice buffer line.
Hey! It's what a great power has the right to expect!
If we let Russia win after helping Ukraine inflict massive losses on Russia's military, we won't earn any gratitude from Russia. We will have achieved the worst of both worlds by striking an aggressor--and then letting the aggressor survive our blow and win. The script for what happens next writes itself.
The best way to stop Russia is to make going any direction other than west the safest opportunity for it. Because if we don't, why would Russia stop advancing west?
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 coverage continues here.
NOTE: I'm adding updates on the Last Hamas War in this post.NOTE: I'm now on Substack, with The Dignified Rant: Evolved.
