War in Ukraine

To be clear, as I noted in one of these threads yesterday, I think the US needs to go back to having an armored division in Europe as a deterrent to Russian aggression. I’m solidly on the side that Russia is in the wrong.

I’m not so quick to forgive Biden for the “minor incursion” comments just because the rest of the White House later tried to walk it back. Particularly when the sanctions we have announced so far seem fairly consistent with the idea that we won’t do much as long as it is “minor.”

 

Unless you’re looking to make everything about Trump, his comments (and him) are more or less irrelevant to the overall story. I wouldn’t have known he even made the comments if not for folks posting them here 37,000 times.

 

It may be part of the story as it may hamstring our response.

 

Please tell me there is more to the plan here than, after Russia overruns Ukraine, smugly saying, “Well, Putin would have done it even faster if Trump had still been President.” Because, first, while none of us could ever know for certain what Trump would do under the same circumstances, there is much in the actions he did take and of course in his colossal unearned ego to suggest this is unlikely. Second, and much more importantly, it simply is not relevant. Trump is not President. Biden is. What happens next is purely a function of what Biden does or fails to do. If Putin subjugates Ukraine, maybe it will make some on the left feel better to tell themselves it’s somehow Trump’s fault or that Trump would have handled it even more poorly. But it won’t change the fact that we have a serious problem here. A world problem, not a domestic political problem.

Oh, and just so you don’t think I’m giving a pass to the dumbass political garbage coming from some on the right, similarly to how what Trump woulda done is not relevant, what Biden shoulda done six months ago is not relevant either. It’s getting fairly old to hear right wingers, when challenged on their (often fair) criticism of the President’s actions on this subject as to what they think we should do now, say, “Well, Biden should have sent more anti-tank mines last year” or something like that. To put in context how dumb that is, that’s like when Germany was posturing to invade Poland if the House of Commons had been paralyzed in debate about whether Britain should have rearmed in 1936 as Churchill had been pleading. Like then, what matters is what we are going to do now.

Frankly, I hope I am very wrong, but I’m not seeing much now except getting our excuses straight in advance. And that’s all I heard with Stephen King’s cute little tweet.

 

What response?

I’m not one of the “Putin’s the good guy here” crowd, and most of my posts have been complaining about us not doing anything particularly meaningful.

But the “this would have been so much worse under Trump” (notwithstanding that Trump is the only one of the 4 most recent US presidents who didn’t see Russia invade a neighbor during his term) and the “Trump is saying dumb things” (yes, and?) don’t seem to be much more than either: 1) an attempt to distract from what a mess this is; or 2) the fallback for people who no longer remember how to have a political dialogue about anything other than complaining about Trump.

 

Jeez.

We are working with the European community on a sanctions while considering even stronger ones. If things escalate after the first week and non-economic responses are warranted, it would be awfully nice to have bi-partisan support instead of having the republican leader re-enforcing propaganda like the "peacekeepers" pretext.

 

There was nothing Trump was doing to functionally stop the moves the Russians are making against Ukraine. If anything Trumps words and actions all along are tacit approval for what Putin is doing, he said as much about Crimea, basically calling it Russian territory. So it seems beyond disingenuous for anyone to think the reason Putin didn’t invade before was because he respected Trump. If there was any impact whatsoever, Putin may have even delayed this move until after the 2020 election so as to not disrupt his golden boy’s chances of being re-elected. That is about the level of deterrence I believe the former President had.

Hell, the big substantive “complaint” some of the Russia hardliners on the right side of the isle had, were related to Biden’s easing of Nordstream 2 sanctions in deference to Germany. Ted Cruz basically hung up his committees’ regular business trying to legislatively force those specific sanctions regardless of the Germans wishes, but now it turns out the Germans were on board with this move anyway… at least for now. The pipeline is on hold. All that grandstanding was basically for nothing, and was perhaps even counterproductive to lining up the allies response.

 

There were economic sanctions by the entire West implemented yesterday, effectively cutting off Russias credit with the western economic system that were joined by Japan last night. He hasn’t been completely cut off from trade yet, but that is to give him an indication that the juice better really be worth the squeeze if he proceeds and provide another stick while also keeping an off ramp.

While I agree that we need an armored buildup in Poland and the most eastern-facing NATO countries ASAP (despite knowing that it will be painted by Putin as proof of imminent attack by NATO), to say there has been no response is hyperbole and not an accurate statement. Tbh, I expect better from your posts.

 

... and what exactly would the hand wringers have Biden do? There are bad options and far worse options. If Putin assaults all of Ukraine that puts the entire world at risk as it could spiral out of control, particularly if there are "incidents" along Ukraine's western borders with NATO countries. The last thing anyone wants unless they are suicidal is an all out extinction level nuclear war event.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with the second point you made. There will be time to admire Putin as a strategic genius later for the way he got regular troops into Eastern Ukraine without firing a shot and while the whole world was watching. Speaking for self, I did not anticipate that move, and I would be inclined to call out as a liar anyone who asserted that they did. For the moment, our national focus needs to be on how to reverse what he has done while mitigating (not eliminating) the risk of general war.

As to the first, I tell you gravely that economic measures, while necessary (in stronger form than the present discussion), are not going to work without viable military pressure. Putin has to believe we will fight, even in a limited manner, and right now he does not. Despots grow stronger from military victories and weaker from defeats. If we back off, we give him an enormous military victory without firing a shot. If we hold firm and present him a viable threat of military force, then I think he will have to back off. Putin is not Hitler. He is smart, and he is patient. The only reason he is pushing this matter is that he believes it is a move without serious risk. He cannot risk even a limited war with us, because we have the ability to cause him severe casualties with low exposure to our own forces (unless he escalates to general war with NATO, which he will not do yet). Casualties and military defeat in the conduct of an aggressive war would severely undermine his leadership, and he cannot have that.

 

Putin isn't a rational actor in this. Some believe he is losing his mind. It is also obvious that the missing Soviet republics are like lost children to him.

No amount of rational acting in any way will set him straight on this.

 

Precisely. Don’t forget that part of that “anyone” includes Putin. He isn’t a madman. He’s only pushing this, because he believes there is negligible risk that we will fight. Ironically, if we disabuse him of that now, then there will be no fight. If we bend over for him now, full Munich-style, then I can promise you it won’t end there. Only when he comes for his next prize he will be reinforced with the full manpower and resources of Ukraine.

 

Are you serious? Putin is absolutely a rational actor, and in terms of getting what he wants with minimal violence (for the moment) he is owning us. I don’t say that out of admiration.

 

Limited war, yes. Air and naval power backing up the Ukrainian armed forces on defense. You said “bluff.” I said “viable military threat.” That’s the opposite of a bluff.

 

We will see. See his recent speech when he gets emotional about this. I don't believe he will pull back unless there aren't other options.

 

His “emotional speech” was intended as propaganda for a Russian audience.

No one actually believes that Ukraine has always been an integral part of Russia and only exists in the first place because Soviet dictators got distracted by internal power struggles and accidentally let them walk away and take definitively Russian people and things with them.

 

Actually, if I have to make a prediction, I don’t think we will see. I am convinced (to my horror) that we will roll over for this and do nothing apart from shake our fists. And we will never know if Putin would have backed down if we had stood up to him. But as I said, I hope I am wrong.

 

Your probably closer to this as a Putin apologist than I am but I am not sure what is acting and what isn't with him.

 

I agree with Ben here. That was a war speech to his populace to justify his invasion of another country’s sovereignty. It was pure propaganda akin to when Hitler justified his invasion of his neighbors as part of “greater Germany.” He had to set some narrative for his thuggery other than pure authoritarian thuggery.