The failure of the US Congress to provide aid to Ukraine in a timely manner is a massive rupture of the US’s standing both with NATO and with global democracies that implicitly count on the US to support them if shit ever hits the fan in their region. The bottom line is that the US is no longer a trusted ally or friend.
Jens Stoltenberg, a former Norwegian Prime Minister and now Secretary General of NATO reacted to the US failure to deliver by announcing he is giving Ukraine “permission” to use its soon to be delivered F-16s to launch attacks inside Russia:
“Stoltenberg believes that the death of Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny and the first Russian gains on the battlefield in months should help focus the attention of NATO and its allies on the urgent need to support Ukraine.”
According to Stoltenberg, it will be up to each ally to decide whether to deliver F-16s to Ukraine, and each have different policies. But he said at the same time, the war in Ukraine is a war of aggression and Ukraine has the right to self-defense, including striking legitimate Russian military targets outside Ukraine.
The criticism of this is that it could lead NATO into a European war that might well include nuclear weapons. Above all, NATO is a defensive, not an offensive, alliance. Finally, there are no provisions in the NATO Treaty authorizing offensive, outside-the-NATO boundary operations.
The House Republicans have effectively turned the Ukraine war into a free-for-all. Without US arms assistance, there’s a substantial risk that this war could easily escalate, with the US having only a limited voice in both strategy and tactics. On to cartoons.
Republicans have reduced the US to hot air:
Putin’s now hoping for a Ukraine surrender:
Moon landing dredges up old theories:
Russia’s Congressional dupes fail to see the problem:
IVF ruling has consequences:
There’s a sucker born every minute in Trump world. The shoes are pre-order only; just another Don-con: :
Peach trees in bloom, Low Gap, NC – March 2023 photo by Donna Johnson
Springtime brings hope after a dark, cold winter. The clocks leap forward this Sunday. It’s also a time to take stock of the old assumptions that our recent geopolitical strategies are built on. The US is trending in what may be an unsustainable direction in our global politics.
A year ago with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, America sought to make Ukraine a proxy for the fight between authoritarianism and democratic forms of government. The Ukraine war caused several major changes within Europe and NATO:
Germany moved away from its strategic energy supplier, Russia.
NATO became more clearly unified than at any time since its founding.
The Eastern European members of NATO became the drivers of military engagement on the side of Ukraine.
The US and NATO have found they do not have the production capability to continue providing military weapons and ammunition at the rate Ukraine is using them.
The Ukraine war has precipitated other global consequences. While Russia has become a pariah to Europe, China has become one of Russia’s most important allies.
Many readers won’t remember that 60 years ago, there was a fundamental split between the Soviet Union and China, largely over differences in communist ideology. Over the years, they have slowly moved closer together, driven in part by US policy and by their shared quest for a global reset of geopolitical power.
Now they are willing to work together to dismantle or blunt the US-led world order.
This “alliance of autocracies,” is built on China’s and Russia’s belief that the US’s supremacy is waning. And they are entitled to rule within their own spheres of influence. And to use force if necessary to control those spheres. An alliance between China and Russia brings advantages to both countries. Recent US intelligence says that China may supply Russia with weapons to aid in its war against Ukraine. There is talk of China building a drone factory in Russia to supply its war in Ukraine.
Russia also desperately needs China to stabilize its economy by importing more below-market cost oil, a boon to China’s economy. In June 2022, Russia became the PRC’s largest oil supplier, eclipsing Saudi Arabia. While Russia is betting that Western fatigue will hand them a victory in Ukraine, China is sizing up America’s ability to engage in a faraway battle should China decide to invade Taiwan.
The US is attempting to isolate both China and Russia. With Russia, we’re using ever-tightening economic sanctions. With China, we’re building a geographic containment strategy among our allies in Asia. Containment has been helped by North Korea’s bellicosity against South Korea and Japan, who recently decided to partner militarily, much to China’s distress. The Pentagon has also expanded its bases in the Philippines while shrinking our military footprint in the Middle East.
With US/Russian relations basically clinging to life, prudence should have indicated that the US adopt a more friendly stance toward Beijing. However, we’ve prioritized support for Taiwan over better relations with China. Both the Trump and Biden administrations embraced high tariffs on Chinese imports.
In 2022, Biden added sweeping tech restrictions on China, including a provision barring the PRC from using semiconductor chips made with US tools anywhere in the world. That’s the harshest economic measure leveled against China since the normalization of diplomatic relations in 1979. This hasn’t gone unnoticed by China. China’s new foreign minister said:
“The more unstable the world becomes, the more imperative it is for China and Russia to steadily advance their relations.”
It’s clear that the Russia‐PRC relationship isn’t yet a full‐fledged military alliance, but it’s moving in that direction. And both are friendly with Iran and North Korea, which have also supplied weapons for Russia’s war in Ukraine. It isn’t a great stretch that these four could create a new “axis of evil” that could lead to the West needing to plan to fight two faraway wars simultaneously.
This is at a time when we cannot find enough munitions and weapons to fight one proxy war in Europe.
The odious Henry Kissinger once cautioned that it must be a high priority for the US to make certain that our relations with both Moscow and Beijing were closer than their relations are with each other. But our policy makers have done just the opposite.
While the argument for not continuing a proxy war in Ukraine has merit, Wrongo has argued that Ukraine is a war of necessity because democracy in Europe is what’s really on the line. And, with the 2024 presidential campaign about to start, Republican opposition to the war is growing.
Biden needs to keep what political capital he has, but he also needs to improve our ability to sustain our military support for Ukraine. That may be difficult because America hasn’t developed a solid military strategy for tomorrow’s battles which may well be with one or more of the great powers.
It is more difficult because we’ve spent the last 20+ years using $80 million-dollar planes to drop $400,000 bombs on $25 tents, while still wondering why we didn’t win any of our wars in the Middle East.
Ironically, our geopolitical strategy and the supporting military strategies may have the US in the position of being the midwife bringing a newborn Russia‐PRC military alliance into the world.
Santas on the Grand Canal in Venice 2017 photo via WSJ
(This column is late coming to you since the big storm left the Mansion of Wrong with no internet for two days, due to a large tree falling across our road. The high winds prevented crews from working to remove it for 24 hours. It also may be Wrongo’s last column until Jan. 4th.)
The New Year will continue to bring us the chaos that we’ve sadly become accustomed to. The 118th Congress and its Republican House majority will again test America’s norms. The 2024 presidential election is going to bring an extra silly season of political news, so take a real break if you can.
One thought for year end is to set out a framework for thinking about America’s commitment to Ukraine.
We know that a significant number of Republicans and some Democrats want to pull the plug on our support for Ukraine in its war with Russia. For now, the majority think it should remain a “whatever it takes, for as long as it takes” situation. Implicit in the second viewpoint is that American soldiers are never going to be combatants in Ukraine, and that we’re not talking about another 20-year war like in Afghanistan.
A few things to think about. Do we have a choice to support Ukraine, or is supporting them a necessity? We have talked about the difference between “wars of choice” and “wars of necessity” throughout Wrongo’s adult life. Two of our worst military experiences were in wars of choice: Vietnam and Afghanistan. We didn’t have to intervene in either, but our political leaders decided that America’s national security had a true connection to both conflicts. The clear wars of necessity for America were the US Civil War, and the two World Wars. All threated the existence of the US homeland.
Somewhere in between wars of choice and necessity is Ukraine. It isn’t an ally where we are obligated by a treaty, like we have with Europe via NATO. We are obligated to defend any NATO member who is attacked. For example, that would mean a war against Latvia is a war against the US.
We spent 20+ years fighting in Afghanistan. Given what we learned there, would America ever spend a minute fighting for Latvia? When Trump was president he flirted with saying we wouldn’t immediately commit to defending just any NATO country, and he wasn’t alone in that thinking.
That means we could consider choosing not to defend NATO at all, or not to defend individual NATO countries.
We’re facing Cold War II with China and Russia. Our new Omnibus budget allocates 10% more money to national defense than last year, largely because of the possibility of fighting both countries at great distances from home. The budget implies that our national security is threated by both of them.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could become a generation-long rolling war between Russia and the small NATO countries that border either Russia or Belarus, if Ukraine loses. Would America then rally and support NATO? Where would we draw the red line? Support for Germany but not for Poland? Ok, we’ll support Poland, but not Latvia?
We need to think through our priorities. We fought in Afghanistan because we believed fighting a far enemy (al-Qaeda) was better than waiting and fighting them as a near enemy. That is also the basis of why we created and remain a member of NATO: Fighting Russia over there was smarter than fighting it nearby, like in Cuba.
Neither China nor Russia are presently our near enemies. If China invades Taiwan, direct involvement by the US would be another war of choice with a far enemy. Ukraine represents a war of choice with a different far enemy, but one in very close proximity to our treaty partners, an enemy that could cross NATO’s trip wire at any time.
Our history suggests that the American people will agree to wage wars of choice if they are relatively cheap and short in duration. What we call a cheap war is mostly a partisan political question. But talking about the cost of a war of choice is a proxy for how Americans value the country that we’re intent on supporting.
Ukraine is a proxy war of choice. We have very few people on the ground and none in a direct combat role. The twin goals are to preserve Ukrainian independence and to bleed Russia of its conventional military capability. Americans need to consider the following implications for national security:
Since our resources are limited, should we choose between containing Russia or containing China?
What is the goal of containing either or both?
How important are the small NATO counties to our national security?
If Ukraine loses its fight with Russia, would our national security be weakened?
If yes, can we live with that, or should we be doing more now?
On to a Saturday that’s also Christmas Eve! Forget tree-trimming and the last-minute Amazon shopping for a few minutes. It’s time to unplug and land on a small oasis of soothing in the midst of all of the chaos.
Gaze out at the last few leaves on the trees, and listen to the late Greg Lake, of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, perform 1985’s “I Believe in Father Christmas”. Although most people think of it as a Christmas song, Lake wrote the song to protest the commercialization of Christmas. Here Lake, along with Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson on flute perform it live at St. Bride’s Church, in the City of London along with the church’s choir:
The last line of the song says: “The Christmas you deserve is the Christmas you get.”
That might be considered harsh in some circumstances, but it might also be true. Anyway, Merry Christmas, Happy Festivus, Happy Chanukah, Happy Kwanzaa, and Happy New Year to all. Let’s hope the deep divisions in our country can be somehow healed by a seasonal miracle.
It’s doubtful that Ukraine’s President Zelensky will remain in power, or indeed, live to the conclusion of Putin’s War. There’s a very good likelihood he will not physically survive this weekend, but he’s been remarkably courageous in the face of all this. Ukraine posted a video in which Zelensky said, when the US offered him safe passage out of the country:
“I need ammunition, I don’t need a ride.”
We knew Zelensky had guts because he stood up to Trump when Trump attempted to blackmail Ukraine into sabotaging Joe Biden’s campaign in 2020; but his strength now is at a different level. Three years ago, he was playing a president in a popular television comedy. Today, he’s confronting Russia’s military, having become his TV character in real life.
We’re so used to posturing, talking points and brand management by politicians that it’s almost breathtaking to witness actual courage, resolve, and leadership. Zelensky is rising to this moment.
Many “wise” western pundits have been saying that the guy was hopelessly in over his head. But clutch moments show us to be who we are. And there he is: Not running. Compare that to America’s former ally, the last President of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani, who got the f outta Dodge at the first hint that things were going south.
Very few of us will ever face Zelensky’s situation. But we all have moments where we must face our fears and live out our principles or run. Zelensky is passing that test. On to cartoons, all about Putin.
Putin’s War has some support:
It’s hard to campaign when your leader undermines the message:
Sedona, AZ dusted in snow- February 2022 photo by Valentina Tree
Late on Friday, the US, Britain and EU said they will sanction Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. This is the third round of Biden’s sanctions, and blocks the Russian president from any economic activity within the American financial system. White House press secretary Jen Psaki indicated the US would also implement a travel ban for Putin.
These sanctions effectively place Putin in the same category as North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
As with other Russian sanctions, it isn’t clear how effective the Putin asset freeze will be. According to the Pandora Papers investigation, Putin appears to control assets in Europe, but the amounts are trivial compared to estimates of his wealth. The travel ban is significant. It says that the West considers Putin to be an international pariah. Earlier, Biden also announced a second round of sanctions against Russia.
The challenge facing Biden is how to avoid either starting or losing, a World War. He’s done a decent job rallying other nations towards a common viewpoint about Putin’s War. Putin believed he could at least neutralize certain allies within both NATO and Europe, along with some politicians and the public in a few EU countries.
But thus far, Biden’s had success at undercutting Russia’s efforts. He has been able to achieve broad unity by making it clear that Russia is an unprovoked aggressor. Yet Kyiv may soon fall to the Russian invaders. Addressing his nation, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said the Russians are coming after him specifically:
We can’t ignore what’s happening, but the US won’t risk all-out war over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. We hope to avoid these choices by imposing sanctions that might turn the Russian people against Putin, by depriving Russia of cash and other resources. The sanctions are impressively multilateral.
However, the new sanctions have some loopholes. Adam Tooze reports that the sanctions specifically exclude energy: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“Energy is the really critical issue in the sanctions saga for both sides. It is what will hurt Russia most. It is also what is most critical for Europe. And, on energy… Biden…made this aside:
‘You know, in our sanctions package, we specifically designed to allow energy payments to continue.’”
Really Joe? The sanctions say that as long as your energy-related transactions are channeled through non-sanctioned, non-US financial institutions, for instance a European bank, buying gas from Russia is peachy. So, all of the payments for Russian gas will be paid free of problems for as long as sanctions are in place.
“The German government has pushed for an exemption for the energy sector if there is a move to block Russian banks from clearing US dollar transactions….other major western European nations hold similar views.”
It gets worse. The carve-out isn’t limited to energy, it also applies to Russia’s agricultural commodity exports. So long as those transactions run through non-US, non-sanctioned banks, the US sanctions will not apply.
This shows how dependent our European partners are on Russia for gas and agriculture. It also shows how hollow the sanctions are, and how they will not be the “punishing” sanctions Biden promised.
It’s useful to remember that Germany’s use of Russian gas has been a completely tenable and a mutually beneficial relationship for 40+ years.
Finally, Biden didn’t announce excluding Russia from the SWIFT global financial payments system because Italy, Germany, and Cyprus weren’t willing to do it. Part of this has to do with buying Russian gas. It also has to do with how dependent their economies are on exports to Russia. Although, as Biden noted, full blocking of Russian financial institutions should achieve the same, or even greater, effect as a SWIFT ban.
Except for that gas and agriculture thingy, so not the same at all.
The question is whether the EU and NATO are truly willing to bear the costs of inflicting pain on Russia in order to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As of today, it seems that they are not.
Time to take a break from geopolitics and whether Lindsay Graham will support Biden’s new Supreme Court nominee, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. It’s time for our Saturday Soother, where we turn away from the news and focus on trying to calm the f down.
Today is a typical winter day in Connecticut. It’s chilly and there’s snow on the ground, but far less than predicted.
Since Putin is acting like the Honey Badger, let’s start by upping your honey badger game by brewing a mug of Honey Badger Espresso from Intelligentsia Coffee. They’re a Chicago-based chain with locations in Chicago, Los Angeles, Austin, Boston, and NYC. Leave the intelligentsia and take the honey badger.
Now grab a seat by a window and listen to Handel’s “Ombra mai fu”, known as Handel’s Largo of Love, it’s the opening aria in the 1738 operaXerxes. Here it is performed in 2017 by Czechoslovakia’s Janacek Chamber Orchestra with soloist soprano Patricia Janečková:
Rio Grande, near Taos, NM – February 2022 photo by Augustine Morgan
“God created war so that Americans would learn geography” ― Mark Twain
Yesterday we woke up to a new world order created by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Details are still sketchy, but it seems that Russia attacked from the north, east and south. Cruise missiles hit targets even in western Ukraine. The NYT provided this early map of reported Russian attacks:
The shaded areas on the right are Donetsk and Luhansk, the Ukrainian provinces that Russia recognized a few days ago as independent republics. The smaller area inside is the area currently controlled by the Russian separatists.
This news and Putin’s kabuki play leading up to the invasion obscures the fact that we’re now seeing the revival of war as an instrument of statecraft. History shows that wars of conquest used to be common. In the 19th century, that’s what strong states did to their weak neighbors. Since the mid-20th century, wars of conquest are the exception not the rule. Russia has now brought wars of conquest back on the geopolitical stage.
Putin’s attack has the goal of regime change, plus the annexation of the breakaway provinces. While NATO and the US seem to have no real countermeasures, other than sanctions. That demonstrates another of Russia’s goals: exposing NATO’s impotence.
NATO’s late-stage impotence has many causes.
The collective defense provisions of Article 5 of the NATO Charter has held the alliance together. It provides that if a NATO ally is attacked, all members of the Alliance will consider it an armed attack against them and take action to assist the attacked ally.
For much of the Cold War, (including when Wrongo served in Europe) NATO had a standing army prepared to deter an attack by the Soviets and/or its Warsaw Pact allies. NATO also maintained significant air and naval forces to confront Soviet aggression. NATO’s forces were anchored by a massive US military presence in Europe, including hundreds of thousands of troops, tens of thousands of armored vehicles, thousands of combat aircraft, and hundreds of naval vessels.
All of this gave Article 5 teeth.
When the Cold War ended in 1990-91, this combat-ready military force was gradually dismantled. Now, if there were to be a conventional fight in Europe, the Russian military is much stronger. It would defeat any force NATO could assemble.
Today the ability to deter a potential adversary from considering military action against a NATO member is no longer a certainty. That means the notion of NATO providing European collective self-defense is questionable.
In the past, NATO planned on countering the Soviet Union’s weapons and manpower superiority with tactical nuclear weapons. But The Heritage Foundation says that we can’t do that because there’s an imbalance in our nuclear arsenals:
“While the US and Russia have a similar number of deployed strategic (i.e., high-yield) nuclear weapons as limited under New START, Russia has a 10:1 advantage over us in nonstrategic (i.e., low-yield) nuclear weapons—aka tactical or battlefield nukes.”
They report that Russia has about 2,000 nonstrategic nuclear weapons, while the US has about 200. Half of them are in the US and half are with NATO, so we have about 100 tactical nukes on the ground in Europe. You might say no one is ever going to use nukes in Europe, but on Wednesday Putin warned: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“Anyone who tries to interfere with us, or even more so, to create threats for our country and our people, must know that Russia’s response will be immediate and will lead you to such consequences as you have never before experienced in your history.”
Putin’s threat could mean anything from cyber-attacks to nuclear war. But Global Security Review reports that the current edition of Russian military doctrine says that Russia:
“…reserves the right to use nuclear weapons to respond to all weapons of mass destruction attacks…on Russia and its allies.”
That significantly lowers the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons. The idea is Russia might employ tactical nuclear weapons during a conventional conflict with NATO forces to prevent a defeat, to consolidate gains, or to freeze a conflict in place without further fighting. The last two could happen in Ukraine.
Given that the disparity between Russian and European tactical nuclear weapons is so large, Moscow probably thinks any potential NATO nuclear response to their threat of using nukes isn’t credible.
This means NATO today can no longer stave off a Russian threat in Europe without using strategic nuclear weapons, a major escalation. That would be a very unlikely scenario if Russia is taking small bites of Western territory, as in Ukraine:
(hat tip, Monty B.)
Since World War II, the US has reserved the right to the “first use” of nuclear weapons should the need arise. But in January, several Democrats urged Biden to promulgate a “no-first-use” policy for US nuclear weapons. Eleven Senators and 44 House members signed a letter urging Biden to accept the policy. Imagine the consequences if a policy of no-first-use was in place, given what’s happening in Ukraine. Or what might happen if the fight was with a NATO member.
We’re now in a place where the West either accepts Russia’s new European order, or we gear up to make them recalculate Putin’s strategy.
If we choose to oppose the new Russian order, the US and Europe will incur costs. It will hurt our economies, since while sanctions will hurt the Russians, we’re hoping they will not hurt us as much, or more. Russian cyber-attacks may seriously hurt our infrastructure. The West will be forced to provide large levels of military and humanitarian support to a damaged and smaller Ukraine, possibly for years.
We will see increased defense spending. Our military will once again be deployed to Europe where they will serve as a tripwire against Russian aggression like they did in the Cold War.
This will require a unified NATO to work together for many years. Is that a realistic plan, given that different US presidents, like Trump, may not support the goals of this new NATO?
We’re in a different world now. This war will almost certainly be transformative for Europe and the world. The full effects of Russia’s attack on Ukraine will play out not just for years, but for decades.
Let’s close with the Beatles “Back in the USSR”:
Lyrics:
Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out,
They leave the West behind
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout
That Georgia’s always on my mind
Winter in the Palouse, near the town of Oakesdale, WA – January 2022 photo by James Richmond Photography
We talk a lot about a nation’s credibility in foreign policy. The US strives to be credible regarding its positions with allies and foes alike. We have often failed. Russia has also proven many times over that it isn’t a credible partner.
The world is well-aware of Russia’s ostentatious military buildup along Ukraine’s border. Putin added to the tensions by making demands requiring a new European security order. He wants Russia to be allowed its own sphere of influence that roughly corresponds to the old Soviet Union. That means NATO should certainly not expand, and possibly should contract.
Let’s look at history between the US and Ukraine:
In 1994, President Clinton asked Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons. In return, Ukraine got a financial settlement and the Budapest Memorandum which provided non-aggression assurances by both the US and Russia. Ukraine shipped 1700 or so nuclear warheads back to Russia and destroyed the missiles.
In 2014, President Obama looked at the big, muddy land called Ukraine and asked if its strategic importance was worth war. Meaning a real war, with an enemy that could fight back. He decided on economic sanctions.
In 2020, President Trump attempted to blackmail the Ukrainian president into interfering on his behalf in an American election.
In 2022, President Biden rules out military intervention should Russia invade Ukraine, talking mostly about more economic sanctions as the consequence.
Regardless of whether Russia invades Ukraine or not, the US is walking down a perilous path. It faces efforts to divide and neutralize its alliances in both Europe and Asia.
In Europe, Russia wants to bury the post-Cold War order. Putin wants Europe to recognize its sphere of influence in the former Soviet countries. Putin wants to separate Ukraine from NATO permanently. He would like to fracture the European alliance by making Germany a more neutral party as Russia attempts to create its western buffer zone.
Europeans think that Putin won’t invade but will follow a hybrid strategy — keeping a military presence on the border, continuing weaponization of Russia’s European energy supply and increased cyberattacks — which will serve to keep NATO from becoming fully anti-Russian the way an invasion of Ukraine would. From the NYT:
“Before the crisis, Germany was America’s closest ally in Europe, boasted a special relationship with Moscow and was the most important partner for Eastern and Central Europe. Today…Berlin’s relationship with Moscow is fast deteriorating….Germany’s difficulties are a hint of what could come if Mr. Putin continues his brinkmanship, without providing the certainty of an actual invasion.”
The US and Germany aren’t singing from the same choir book right now, so Putin may be on to something.
In Asia, China would like to drive a wedge between the US and some of its Eastern allies. It already has agreed with Russia on the demand for NATO to pull back in Europe.
India tilted toward Russia at the UN Security Council meetings last week. After China and Russia cast “no” votes in the Security Council on whether to hold an official session to discuss the Ukraine crisis, Responsible Statecraft says that India abstained. It was effectively a rejection of the US attempt to hold Russia accountable.
Any person can see what’s coming in cold war 2.0 and should be very wary and worried. We need to learn to navigate in what has become a multi-polar world, one with worthy competitors in Russia and China.
We should remember that during cold war 1.0 in 1962, the stationing of Russian missiles in Cuba let to a great power deal. Russia took its missiles out of Cuba and the US pulled its missiles from Turkey and Italy. Back then, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was willing to consider Kennedy’s fears about Moscow’s missile deployment in Cuba. That became the basis for ending the confrontation.
The enormity of how close the world came to thermonuclear war led to an easing of tensions. The next 50 years were a period of relative calm in US/Russian relations.
Today’s warlike tensions between the US and Russia over Ukraine have most of the same elements present, with the roles reversed. Now, Putin is telling the West that Ukraine should not be allowed to join NATO. He also demands that the US should not place offensive weapons in Ukraine.
Like Cuba in 1962, is Ukraine now the chessboard for these superpowers? Is there a lesson here from that history?
Time to wake up America! You aren’t uniquely qualified to run the world, and there are competitors who will work really hard to prevent you from trying to continue doing so. To help you wake up, listen to Pink Floyd perform “Dogs Of War” from their album “Delicate Sound Of Thunder” at the Nassau Coliseum, NY in 1988. While the singing is a bit muffled, the band sounds fine, and there’s a great saxophone solo by Scott Paige:
Sample Lyric:
Invisible transfers and long distance calls
Hollow laughter in marble halls
Steps have been taken, a silent uproar
Has unleashed the dogs of war
You can’t stop what has begun
Signed, sealed, they deliver oblivion
The dogs of war won’t negotiate
The dogs of war don’t capitulate
Landscape Arch, Arches NP, UT – January 2022 photo by Peter Ferenz
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room in the standoff between Russia and Ukraine: NATO. Back in the early 1990s, Clinton wanted to have it both ways with his Russian counterpart, Boris Yeltsin. He wanted to expand NATO while at the same time, partnering with Russia.
Yeltsin wasn’t having any of that. He accused Clinton at a summit of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, (CSCE) that the US was “trying to split [the] continent again” through NATO expansion. Putin believes that today.
NATO’s expansion, either in the form of full members (or in increased military activities), has now been the policy of five US presidents: Clinton, GW Bush, Obama, Trump, and now, Biden. So, a couple of questions:
Did NATO’s expansion to the east of a reunified Germany increase the security in Europe and reduce the risk of a major war in Europe?
Did NATO’s expansion in membership increase the safety and security of the American people?
The answer to both is a no. NATO expansion post 1990 hasn’t helped the original European allies and has done nothing to improve the security of the US. Arguably, we’re worse off today than in 1990.
Today there are true splits within NATO. Germany, its most important country, isn’t on the same page about Russia. From Der Spiegel:
“The US wants to impose harsh sanctions on Russia if it invades Ukraine. But the German government is putting on the brakes out of fears over the economic consequences and what punitive measures could mean for energy supplies for a country that gets much of its gas from Moscow.”
Germany’s conflicted about Ukraine. Der Spiegel reports that last week, the US CIA director William Burns held a meeting in Bonn with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Burns told him that if Russia attacks Ukraine, Berlin must take a clear stand.
Biden also wanted to meet with Scholz in Washington. It would have been an opportunity for them to closely coordinate steps in dealing with Russia, but Scholz refused to go and meet him. We have a problem when Russia is building up to the biggest European military threat since the end of the Cold War, and the German Chancellor is unable to clear his schedule to meet with the American president.
Having declined the Washington visit, Biden dispatched Secretary of State Blinken to Berlin, and like the CIA director, his message was – Germany must participate in tough financial and economic sanctions if Putin strikes.
Despite the European ambivalence, Russia’s move to surround Ukraine with troops may be a strategic error. Europe has wanted to become a kind of giant economic Switzerland, independent but neutral. Today, it’s trying to come to grips with the fact that Russia wants to push NATO as far back as it can by recovering former Soviet territory.
Russia making NATO into a target seems to have revivified NATO a bit. It was more or less in slumber before Putin’s move against Ukraine and his demands of NATO and the US. Europe, the US, and NATO are walking a tightrope now, since there’s a fine line between diplomacy and “appeasement”.
The US and NATO countries all have entrenched maximalist military hawks who will attack any politician that surrenders an inch to Russia in the current situation. That’s an understandable position. In the last decade, Russia broke up Georgia, it ended the revolution against Assad in Syria, while securing its naval base there. It annexed Crimea albeit with local popular support, sent troops to Libya and Africa, supported Armenia against Azerbaijan, and recently “preserved” the non-elected government of Kazakhstan.
Can/should this be allowed go on forever? Is this the right time to push back hard?
There is no military solution that will keep Russia out of Ukraine. When Wrongo was a member of the NATO forces, the accepted strategy was that US and European troops on the ground were a “tripwire”. It was clear that the Soviet Union had vastly superior military assets amassed on Europe’s border. And Europe’s border was at that time, East Germany. Berlin was just 300 miles from Bonn, a day’s trip.
The counter to the Soviet’s military superiority was NATO’s potential use of tactical nuclear weapons. We could stop their ground forces reasonably effectively before they could get to Germany’s capital. The basic NATO position was to fight long enough with conventional forces to make the possibility of nuclear escalation plausible.
Today the situation is similar. Russia has vastly superior military assets amassed on Europe’s border, but the distances are greater: From Smolensk on Russia’s western border to Warsaw in Poland is about 500 miles, and it’s 1,075 miles from Smolensk to Bonn, Germany.
That breathing room explains Clinton’s flawed reasoning for NATO expansion. But, since the West has said that it will no longer use tactical nuclear weapons, it has limited options if it faces a limited invasion of say, Ukraine, a non-NATO member.
This leaves the US with trying to find a diplomatic solution, one which doesn’t look like appeasement, one that the many NATO members will also find acceptable. Having to compromise will mean finally admitting that we are part of a multipolar world.
Is Washington ready to go there yet? Very doubtful. Our path is fraught with danger as we careen from crisis to crisis. Something has to change or we’ll misplay a hand and be back where we were in 1939.
It’s time for NATO, Europe, and the US to wake up! It’s hard to see a sensible compromise that doesn’t look like appeasement, but it’s their job to find it for the rest of us.
To help them wake up, listen to John Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen perform “Wasted Days”, from Mellencamp’s “Strictly a One-Eyed Jack” album, released this week, it’s one of the three songs featuring Springsteen:
Sample lyric:
How much sorrow is there left to climb
How many promises are worth a dime
Who on earth is worth our time?
Russia has decided the time is right to challenge the balance of power in Europe. The talks between Moscow and the US, and between the EU, NATO and Russia were motivated by two reasons. First, Russia’s long time concerns about NATO encroaching on their Western border. Second, the view in the West that Russia, after massing troops on the Ukraine border, is going to invade Ukraine and absorb it.
Putin told Biden in early December that he was looking for European security guarantees. They were later presented by Moscow in the form of two draft treaties, one a Russian-US security treaty, the other a security agreement between Russia and NATO. That led to the recent talks that seemingly went nowhere.
The pawn in this diplomatic game is Ukraine. The basic options for Ukraine are the same as were discussed in 2014: Alignment with Russia, alignment with the EU/NATO or balancing between the two.
But to Moscow, Ukraine isn’t the problem. Putin thinks it’s Washington.
We should remember that Putin laid out his position to not accept any further eastward expansion of NATO in his speech to the Munich Security Conference in February, 2007. He hasn’t changed his thinking.
Both sides know that Ukraine is an impoverished, de-industrialized, divided, and corrupt mess. Ukraine ranks 117 out of 180 countries on Transparency International’s corruption index. Why would either side want to take over responsibility for Ukraine?
Also, Russia understands that the NATO expansion hadn’t been on the table for years until Putin brought it up. Suddenly, he has the West debating an issue that wasn’t an issue for a long time. Ukraine hardly qualifies as a potential NATO member – it doesn’t have the resources to defend itself. There’s no way it could really contribute to defending other countries in Europe, even though they did send a few troops to Iraq and Afghanistan.
So why would Russia attack Ukraine? Moscow is fully aware that while its troops would be welcomed in Eastern parts of Ukraine they wouldn’t be in others. Yet, we learned yesterday that Russia withdrew its diplomats and their families from Kyiv:
“According to one senior Ukrainian security official, 18 people — mostly the children and wives of Russian diplomats boarded buses from Kyiv back to Moscow. About 30 more Russians left within the ensuing days, from the Kyiv embassy and a Russian consulate in Lviv. The Ukrainian security official said Diplomats at two other Russian consulates have been told to prepare to leave Ukraine.”
Anatol Lieven, writing in Responsible Statecraft, wonders what the US, NATO and the Europeans are thinking. They’ve rejected Russia’s conditions for an agreement since they were not willing to rule out expansion to Ukraine, Georgia, and other former Soviet republics: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“…NATO has no real intention of admitting Ukraine, nor of fighting Russia in Ukraine. Both Washington and Brussels have openly ruled this out. Indeed, NATO could not do so even if it wanted to. US forces in Europe are wholly inadequate to the purpose, as are what is left of the British and French armies.”
It’s possible that Russia is attempting to split Germany from the rest of Europe. Germany is reliant on Russia’s natural gas to a greater extent than other European countries. Assuming that Lieven is correct about NATO military weakness, it’s also possible that Russia is trying to intimidate NATO. According to Adam Tooze, Russia accounts for about 40% of Europe’s gas imports. And a rupture of relations will result in the complete embargoing of Russian gas and oil to European customers.
While the US, NATO, and the EU have all promised “unprecedented sanctions,” against Russia if they invade Ukraine, sanctions only matter if the other side cares. If Russia decides to rupture relations with the West, it will have calculated that it would survive more economic sanctions. The primary Western threat is to block Russia from using the SWIFT electronic payments system. But it’s possible that Russia could survive being blocked from SWIFT for longer than Europe can survive without Russian energy.
Despite that threat, Western allies are sending dangerously contradictory messages about their willingness to impose anything on Russia beyond a financial slap on the wrist. One variable that sums up Russia’s commanding position in a sanctions environment is Russia’s foreign exchange reserves:
With north of $600 billion in reserves, Russia is just behind China, Japan, and Switzerland. This gives Putin the capacity to withstand sanctions on the rest of the Russian economy.
Putin has a timeline. In 2024 he faces a choice as to whether to continue in power or to begin to prepare for his final exit. At that point, he will be 72. We have to assume that by then, he would like to have drawn a line on Western expansion.
Also, 2024 overlaps with the end of Biden’s first (only?) term as president. So, setting the terms of Russia-US relations on the expansion issue must be a priority for the Kremlin. Biden has clearly signaled that his priority is China and that he is willing to pay a political price for retrenching its strategic position (Afghanistan). Perhaps that opens the door for a Russian deal in Europe.
Lost in this discussion is the possibility that directly confronting Russia could drive them to sign a joint defense treaty with China. That would be a world-changing diplomatic move, assuming it included a mutual defense provision.
It would be a balance of power earthquake, a real-life demonstration Mackinder’s Heartland theory, which states that:
Who rules Eastern Europe commands the Heartland
Who rules the Heartland commands the World Island
Who rules the World Island commands the world
Mackinder thought of the heartland as the core of Eurasia, and he considered all of Europe and Asia as the World Island. Think of such an alliance controlling much of the world’s natural resources, having global leadership in manufacturing, and the best of STEM education. Imagine their combined military and naval might joined in a military pact.
There is still a chance that US flexibility in two areas may avert a diplomatic meltdown with Russia. The first would be a NATO commitment to deploy no new forces in NATO countries close to Russia’s borders, in return for Russian limits on new deployments and the stand-down of the troops now deployed on Ukraine’s borders.
The second would be genuine US support for the failed Minsk II agreement which focused on autonomy for a demilitarized Donbas region within Ukraine. Donbas autonomy within Ukraine would be a serious barrier both to Ukraine seeking NATO membership and would therefore indirectly meet Russia’s key concerns.
NATO, the US, and the EU need to come to a more modest view of themselves and their role in the world. We should abandon the empty and hypocritical false promise of further NATO expansion and seek a reasonably cooperative relationship with Russia.
Otherwise, we can go on living in our world of make-believe, a world that may easily be shattered by harsh realities.
If you had your fill of Trey Gowdy during the Benghazi hearings, you can be excused for vomiting if you watched the FBI’s Peter Strzok’s hearing last week.
In the hearing, the Republicans wanted to make America believe there was an FBI conspiracy to prevent Trump from being elected president. How did the FBI go about it? First, by mounting an investigation of what nearly everyone now acknowledges was a comprehensive effort by Russia to help Trump get elected. But then, the FBI kept that investigation completely secret from the public, to prevent news of it from affecting the outcome of the election.
You also have to set aside the fact that the Director of the FBI may have thrown the election to Trump when he violated FBI protocols, and announced 11 days before the election, that the Bureau was reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails.
There doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the FBI engaged in a conspiracy, and the GOP’s claim is contradicted by everything the FBI actually did.
And so far, Republicans have not produced any evidence that Strzok, or anyone else, took any official action that was biased or inappropriate with respect to the Trump campaign.
Fake news, folks. But Gowdy’s committee managed to set a new low during their show trial of Strzok:
This is where we are: The American right have become Trumpers. The head Trumper is free to say and do whatever he likes, and so are his lackeys in Congress.
Today, there is no institutional check on Republicans, except another Republican, Bob Mueller. Ultimately all he can do is provide a report to Congress, which the Trumpers will ignore, regardless of the validity of any accusations it contains. The fate of the nation now hangs on the midterms. And since the electorate failed the country in 2016, we shouldn’t be too hopeful about the odds.
On to cartoons. Strzok tells it like it is:
Trump’s move to remake Supreme Court goes a little too far:
Trump’s new guardian is Judge Kavanaugh:
Trump was poorly received in UK:
Trump took on Germany at the NATO meeting. It wasn’t hard to know why:
Trump’s moving on to his Monday meeting with Putin:
There’s a sucker born every minute in Trump world. The shoes are pre-order only; just another Don-con: :
Winter in the Palouse, near the town of Oakesdale, WA – January 2022 photo by 
