Excellent VDH post on how the Obama administration and Biden paved the way for Russia’s moves in Ukraine
From Victor Davis Hanson, on “Ukraine and the Malevolent Legacy of the Obama-Biden Administration”:
During the current Ukrainian war, the media has created a mythology that the Left was tough on Vladimir Putin’s Russia. And thus, now it simply continues its hard-nosed efforts in Ukraine.
But nothing could be further from the truth…
Indeed, many of America’s current difficulties in Ukraine originate from the Obama-Biden Administration’s former disastrous policies toward Russia birthed between 2009-2016.
Remember the initial premise of Russian “Reset”—the idea and the term were first used by Vice President Joe Biden (“It’s time to press the reset button”)—was based on the myth that the “cowboy” George W. Bush had been too tough on Putin after the 2008 Russo-Georgian War. To Biden and Obama, Bush had unduly sanctioned Vladimir Putin following his opportunistic absorption of South Ossetia in 2008 and attack on Georgia. And thus, the Russian dictator would easily then be wowed by Obama’s legendary charisma and charm from needless hostility to accommodation.
Accordingly, the reformist hope-and-change Obama Administration would rebuild a friendly relationship with Russia. Thereby they would win strategic help from Russia with Obama’s new ambitious agendas for Iran and Syria in remaking a more “equitable” Middle East.
To that extremely dubious end, Russia’s aggressive moves in eastern Ukraine and Crimea were appeased. When Trump was in office Putin desisted, but when Biden became president in 2020 he started planning the Ukraine invasion. Hanson also reminds us of Obama’s sotto voce statement to Medvedev: “This is my last election…after my [2012] election I have more flexibility,” which only the right seemed to notice or care about.
More:
During those eight [Obama/Biden] years, Russia, after a near half-century hiatus, was invited back into the Middle East as a “guarantor” that its client Syria’s WMD stockpile would be destroyed (it was not). Russia instead became a formable promoter of the Iranian, Hezbollah, the Assad regime, and Hamas axis, an obstacle to Israeli responses to cross-border terrorism, and a deterrent to any Western notion of preemptively destroying Tehran’s nuclear potential…
How strange then that we now totter on the brink of a full-throttled war with nuclear Russia over Putin’s latest aggressions in Ukraine. All the while we apparently forget that the Trump Administration never colluded with Russia, was tough in action rather than verbiage with Putin, and thus remained the only one of the last four administrations during which Vladimir Putin did not invade a former Russian republic.
Strange, but hardly accidental.
More irony:
What explains the Obama-Biden serial denial of reality that their own appeasing of Russia was the height of folly? One reason is surely the crackpot notion that Russia had been seen as vital to the so-called Iran deal and related Middle East messes. Then as now, the Left believed that through Russian auspices it could massage Tehran into a nuclear deal and reset the entire Middle East in the bargain.
The result is an Orwellian scenario in which Biden still begs Russia’s aid to ensure an Iran deal, while believing his invaluable broker is an abject murderer who should be yanked out of office.
You know what? We don’t know what Biden actually believes. Initially not a smart or an honest guy, willing to compromise every principle he said he had in order to do Obama’s bidding as VP for eight years, now cognitively challenged and catering to the left, perhaps the term “believes” is inappropriate for any point in Joe’s career. Perhaps the only operative principle in which he “believes” is one he stated the other day: “No one f***s with a Biden.”
Here’s the conclusion of Hanson’s essay, in which he summarizes the situation:
The United States has few options in Ukraine not just because of the Biden Administration’s fiascos in Afghanistan that destroyed our deterrence or because of the Biden family syndicate’s years of corrupt money leveraging of Russian, Ukrainian, and Chinese interests that make Joe Biden vulnerable to pressures from all the major interests in the Ukraine mess.
It is also not just because the woke politicization of the U.S. military has cast global doubt on American military readiness. And it is not even because Biden deliberately has cut back on U.S. gas and oil production at a time of surging global demand and reduced capacity, thus enriching Putin and strangling Western economies.
Instead, we are shackled by a near decade of Russian reset and the aggression it invited on February 23, 2022. Obama and Biden long sought to placate Putin to help with their puerile Mideast agendas. They invited him into Syria. They made him the key player in their pursuit of the Iran deal. And they ignored his 2014 invasions of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
How ironic that we now find ourselves sending arms to protect Ukraine from reverse-engineered Iranian drones, beseeching in vain regimes to send us oil that we refuse to produce for ourselves, and having given up an Eastern European missile defense system to counter Putin’s nuclear threats—even as we coax both our enemies Tehran and Moscow into cementing a nuclear deal that will be as disastrous to our friends as it is to ourselves.
As usual with VDH’s analyses, yup.
It was Trump, of course, who was more willing than Obama to send arms to Ukraine, and it was Trump who killed hundreds of Russian mercenaries in airstrikes in Syria several years ago, and it was Trump who worked towards increasing our energy independence (hardly a welcome development to Russia). The only important issue now is what is our own national interest in this dispute; as the libertarian Dave Smith articulates very well in his recent appearance with Joe Rogan, we should be primarily concerned with avoiding WW3 and a potential nuclear catastrophe, as well as ceasing the current reckless funding (tens upon tens of billions to a corrupt nation with no oversight, a travesty perhaps to be corrected should Republicans prevail next month).
Hold on thar.
Hillary says it’s all Trump’s fault.
“Hillary Clinton repeatedly suggests Donald Trump, Republicans enabling Putin aggression during MSNBC interview”—
https://www.foxnews.com/media/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-republicans-enabling-putin-aggression-msnbc-interview
Now who you gonna believe….?
File under: Russia hoax redux…
+ Bonus:
“Hillary Compares Trump to Hitler, His Supporters to Nazis”—
https://www.newsmax.com/politics/hillary-clinton-adolf-hitler-nazi/2022/09/24/id/1088898/
“…pave the way…”
Make that “…print the way…”
Got to get those printers up and running 24/7…
“Funding Panic Imminent? Fed Quietly Sends $3.1 Billion To Switzerland Via Swap Line”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/funding-panic-imminent-fed-quietly-sends-31-billion-switzerland-swap-line
Oh heck, key graf:
“…[I]n what may be the best news to shellshocked bulls after the worst September and worst Q3 in generations, in a harrowing year for markets, central banks are starting to panic. First it was the BOJ, then the BOE and now, it’s Switzerland’s turn….”
What’s that? What’s an “Inflation Reduction Act” for, anyway???
(Oh BTW, thanks for everything, Joe Manchin!)
j e:
Do you really think that appeasement of Russia is more likely to avoid WWIII?
I certainly don’t – unless the appeasement goes on indefinitely, as he sinks his claws into more and more of Europe.
See this previous post and the comments there.
“…[I]n what may be the best news to shellshocked bulls after the worst September and worst Q3 in generations, in a harrowing year for markets, central banks are starting to panic. First it was the BOJ, then the BOE and now, it’s Switzerland’s turn….”
The Dow has declined by about 15% in the last year. Since you had inflated p/e ratios a year ago, I don’t know what you expected.
thats what AIG was for, funding counterparties in europe,
pacem et bellum, putin miscalculated because he saw the bumbling that biden had done in afghanistan, klaus schwab decided this was the next thing after covid lockdowns, and the purge by vaccine mandate encouraged this illconsidered*
move,
*striking too many targets, with two few troops in abeyance of the rules set down by Frunze academy
My money on the pipeline disruption is China. And China for the direction of the “Biden” administration’s actions. Nearly everything that has happened benefits China – Germany off line, Russia only able to move energy East, the U.S. paralyzed. I mean, sure we could be just that damn bad at this global politics, or the Chinese might be that good (counterpoint: they are communists and are only good at killing their own people and economy).
My money on the pipeline disruption is China.
Good point. I think there are other pipelines than Nordstream, however.
thats what AIG was for, funding counterparties in europe,
No, it was an insurance company, wrecked by the machinations of its London office, which was writing credit default swaps and warehousing the risk.
spitzer decapitated the management, leaving in the hand of cassano, i know i’m in the weeds here,
these moves have moved the needle toward an eventual strike on polish territory, and that would ‘let loose the gods of war’ or how ever shakespeare put it,
j e,
I recommend Dave Smith’s podcast, “Part of the Problem.” I’ve been a regular listener for years.
I don’t think that either Bush or Trump can be entirely absolved from all responsibility. Reportedly, Bush pushed for NATO expansion eastward over the strong objections of Merkel and Sarkozy and Trump agreed to the continued massive arms build up in Ukraine.
Reportedly, Bush pushed for NATO expansion eastward over the strong objections of Merkel and Sarkozy and Trump agreed to the continued massive arms build up in Ukraine.
And both are keeping the Ukraine from being conquered. Funny dat.
They have led us to this brink while refusing to properly arm nato in the event we faced a direct confromtation with Russia handing putin the oil weapon as a club in their silly green nude eel schemes
Everybody f***s with this Biden.
@ miguel > Shakespeare put it this way – although he let Marc Antony do the speaking, over the body of the assassinated Julius Caesar:
https://nosweatshakespeare.com/quotes/famous/cry-havoc-let-slip-dogs-war/
@ miguel > “‘let loose the gods of war’ or how ever shakespeare put it,”
Kipling’s Gods of the Copy-book Headings are quite willing to let slip the dogs of war.
Plutarch was apparently the basis for the play and inevitably the films some interpretations were that caesar knew his fate and yet embraced so as to impugn the conspirators
NATO’s relentless expansion eastward and the US’s continued massive arms build up in Ukraine directly led to Russia’s conclusion that they faced an intolerable and existential, strategic National Security threat. And there’s nothing funny about putting a nation with a huge nuclear arsenal in that position.
Apropos of nothing according to scrolls uncovered in egypt there is a whole nother view of cleopatra arab iconography from plutarch and shakespeare
VDH’s closing paragraph opens with How ironic that we now find ourselves… including thereby all Americans technically represented by the Biden administration. In so doing, Professor Hanson is only technically correct.
We actually find ourselves under hostile occupation by an enemy that has more thoroughly damaged our interests than any foreign power. We have zips in the wire. We know the enemy within our borders, we know their allies, and we know to whom they are sending our money. The appeasement that damages us most is committed by elected representatives who decline to resist this malignancy by every possible means.
Methinks ye’ canna see the torrents for the fleas….
@Banned Lizard
Agreed here. We have differed before and will differ in the past, but your diagnosis here is quite fitting and sadly true.
It’s all NATOS fault. The massive build up of western arms prior to Roosia’s invasion? Looks like Geoffrey has taken up the modern high-potency weed. Holding each toke for 13 minutes too, superhuman.
I can’t really quibble with VDH here. The capacity of leftist ideologues to memory hole inconvenient facts is staggering. (From “The 1980’s called and they want their foreign policy back” to “Putin is a Hitler clone who is going to sweep across western Europe if he’s not stopped immediately” in less than ten years.)
But US policy towards Russia has been schitzophrenic for longer than that. Some of us are old enough to remember when Bush “looked into Putin’s soul.” That was right before Bush turned into a cowboy who drove Russia away after the Russo-Georgian war (at least according to the Obama people).
US policy towards Russia has been an unmitigated disaster for decades.
Russia policy towards itself has been an unmitigated disaster for decades.
(But it sure has given “Biden” some ideas!)
Chubais and co followed summers and sachs recommendations that strip mined russias assets that made a field day for the bratva
Taibbi was a spectator to this this colors his view of western capitalism
You were asking why Trump was/is/will-always-be SO HATED??….
“Bombshell WSJ investigation reveals runaway corruption in the federal government;
“At the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Journal found that ‘more than 200 senior officials… or nearly one in three, reported that they or their family members held investments in companies that were lobbying the agency.’ “—
https://www.based-politics.com/2022/10/11/wsj-investigation-reveals-huge-corruption-in-federal-government/
H/T Instapundit.
(And this is just one agency!)
Related:
“…House Dem Leaders Rankle Congress After Stock Ban Delay”—
https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/house-gop-
“Two prominent Democratic lawmakers violated a federal conflicts-of-interest law. Again.”—
https://www.businessinsider.com/democrats-hickenlooper-raskin-stock-trades-congress-2022-6?r=US&IR=Tdemocrats/2022/09/30/id/1089937/
Roosian policy towards the west is a continuing disaster, for at least 115 years Bauxite. Some US administrations make it worse. The Hildsbeast Reset button, Mr. Flexibility, and Brandon being the most recent examples.
OMB wasn’t one of the enablers of Roosian malevolence.
NATO’s relentless expansion eastward and the US’s continued massive arms build up in Ukraine directly led to Russia’s conclusion that they faced an intolerable and existential, strategic National Security threat. And there’s nothing funny about putting a nation with a huge nuclear arsenal in that position.
There was no ‘relentless expansion eastward’. All of the eastward expansion occurred between 1997 and 2004 and each country which joined during that period had every reason to seek protection from Russia. Their perspicacity has been demonstrated in the last 8 months.
“…but when Biden became president in 2020…”
Small quibble; Joe Biden didn’t become president until January 2021.
Smaller quibble: Joe Biden didn’t become president.
Geoffrey Britain on October 11, 2022 at 11:41 pm said:
NATO’s relentless expansion eastward and the US’s continued massive arms build up in Ukraine directly led to Russia’s conclusion that they faced an intolerable and existential, strategic National Security threat. And there’s nothing funny about putting a nation with a huge nuclear arsenal in that position.
Russia understood the NATO threat the way Poland understood the NATO threat: NATO is a threat to Russian expansion.
There is a reason all the former Warsaw Pact nations and former Soviet nations want to join NATO. And there is a reason historical neutrals like Sweden and Finland don’t see NATO as a threat but see Russia as a threat.
It’s clear who the bad guy is over there.
Barry,
re: Hillary blaming Trump
I am convinced that she has lied so long and so relentlessly that she is incapable of understanding the concept of truth.
She’s even more damaged than Bill.
Some years ago I had a long conversation with someone who was one of the most powerful Democrats in Arkansas during the Clintons’ reign. They said to understand the Clintons one had to realize how seriously damaged they are pyschologically. The example offered:
Bill was governor, but lost re-election. Running again the next time, the dominant issue in the campaign was a proposed $200 “Tag tax” on the sale of autos to finance education. Bill spoke at the auto dealer convention and made the key emphasis of his speech the unequivocal opposition to passing the tax. The room went crazy in celebration and checkbooks opened wide.
Less than a week later Bill spoke at the teacher convention. He promised and stressed repeatedly that the single most important priority of his as governor would be to fight FOR passage of the tag tax. Standing ovation, of course.
This was key. “If you want to understand them, you have to understand that Bill absolutely believed he was telling the truth as he spoke both times. It’s why he’s so effective a liar.”
It seemed crazy to me. But this person just nodded and reiterated that’s how they are. They always believe that they are moral, ethical and right in what they are doing no matter how contradictory the facts or dishonest their behavior. And anyone who opposes them is both wrong and evil. Always.
I don’t know what kind of mental illness this represents.
Ever since that conversation, however, I’ve seen lots of other examples (although usually not as severe). From what I can figure it seems like an extreme version of something like cognitive dissonance.
Essentially — 1. I am a good person. 2. Good people don’t lie (or cheat or harm others, etc.). 3. Therefore, I didn’t lie or cheat or harm.
Instead of reaching a conclusion re: character based on a review of the facts of behavior, the unshakeable belief in the fact of good character is the beginning point and facts/behavior must be interpreted based on the assumed foundational belief in good quality character.
We actually see this often from liberals and their policies. Group mental illness.
Art Deco – Formal NATO expansion may have ended in 2004, but the overtures between the Ukraine and NATO continued well into the present. Ukrainian membership in NATO was a live possibility right up to the start of the war, and may still be.
It also amazes me how much peope struggle to tell the difference between (i) the predictable response to one’s actions; and (ii) whether the response is right or wrong. It’s the old argument about leaving your doors unlocked at night. Suggesting that a robbery victim was mistaken when he left the door unlocked is not at all the same as justifying the actions of the thief.
Stan, appreciate the help(!)…but it seems to me that you’ve explained—perfectly—that the Clintons, DO KNOW what constitutes the TRUTH:
i.e., “Anything WE say…at ANY particular moment”.
Yes, it’s a flexible TRUTH. A pragmatic TRUTH. (Wouldn’t want to be too doctrinaire now, would we? Too scholastic, too rigid—kind of like the equivalent of “…but the science is ALWAYS changing(!)”)
Not sure how the country extricates itself from this pathological situation.
Maybe when General Milley has had enough?
Gosh, when might that ever be?
Probably have to be some kind of disaster, alas…like a sharp slap to the face of someone’s who’s gone totally, insanely hysterical…
Something to snap that person (or country) back into sobriety. Into sanity.
Maybe hyperinflation’ll do it, along with all the other crises upon crises that “Biden” has been foisting on the country in “his” grand scheme of “Transformational” political “grammar” (and reality itself).
(Just want to thank this blog for helping to keep me sane—make that “sane”—everything being relative….)
With regard to Putin, trying “to justify the ways of [psychopaths/paranoics] to [more-or-less normal] man” is a mug’s game.
It might seem as though it ought to “work”…but it never does…in fact, it never can.
(Might make a good poem, though…)
In the meantime, welcome to Wonderland!
(As the saying goes, “you can check out any time you like but you can never leave….”)
“FBI Offered Christopher Steele $1 Million To Prove Dossier Allegations Against Trump: FBI Analyst”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/fbi-offered-christopher-steele-1-million-prove-dossier-allegations-against-trump-fbi
Hint: “FBI Analyst” is—you guessed it—Brian Auten
Don’t worry though:
“… Auten said that the FBI ultimately never paid the money to Steele because he was unable to substantiate the claims made in his dossier. He also noted that Danchenko did not provide evidence for the dossier’s allegations.
“The FBI analyst also testified that other U.S. intelligence agencies looked into the claims made in the Steele dossier but were also unable to confirm the specific claims that were made….”
Which no doubt explains precisely why all these “unconfirmed” allegations were leaked to and bandied about by the media for several years (even as they continue to circulate in cargo-cult-like fashion amongst the “faithful”)…
So…is John Durham playing the role of Alice? (or the Cheshire Cat…)
Bauxite joins Geoffrey in the club for Putin rationalization.
Wonderland, continued:
“Durham shows jurors emails to prove Danchencko concealed, lied to FBI about Steele dossier sources;
“Danchenko faces five counts in connection with allegedly having lied to the FBI about his involvement with the now-discredited, so-called Steele dossier.”—
https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/day-two-danchencko-trial-begins-durham-returning-fbi-intel-analyst-witness
Which might raise a few questions, such as:
1. What if the FBI knew that Danchenko was lying to them?
(with more than faint whiffs of the “so-what?” “immateriality” we witnessed at the Sussmann trial)….
2. What if the FBI TOLD Danchenko to lie to them?
(with…ditto? Even if the more complex plot line might heighten the drama just a bit.)
3. What if the FBI didn’t care whether Danchenko lied to them or not? I.e., it didn’t matter one way or the other; that is, the FBI subsequently hired Danchenko to protect (AKA “cover up for”) themselves….
(Ditto, once again…)
Which seems that the inevitable ending to this love story is—as with the Sussmann romance—“No harm, no foul” (IOW no-fault insurance?)
Its understandable that fmr warsaw pact nations would join nato when you extend it to the countries inside the soviet union it might be considered a breach of understandings
Nato was premised on a incursion through the fulda gap into western europe
Related (Door Number 3?):
‘Bombshell revelation of $1M offer to Steele shows FBI misled Congress on Russia probe: Kash Patel;
‘The House Intelligence Committee under Rep. Devin Nunes sent 17 congressional subpoenas to the FBI “for information specifically related to payments and confidential human sources, were denied this information, and we learn it four years after our investigation,” said the lead investigator of the panel’s probe into the FBI’s Russia Collusion investigation.’—
https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/bombshell-revelation-1m-offer-steele-shows-fbi-misled
Key grafs:
“…”Never in my entire career have I heard of such an offer to pay a source to corroborate their own information,” Youssef told Just the News. “The FBI queries other sources in order to validate the original source of information. It is unheard of that the FBI would offer to pay Steele $1 million to corroborate his own information.
“Obviously, the FBI was unable to validate this information through any other source that they had to resort to ‘bribing’ Steele to lend credibility to his own information, which the FBI knew to be inaccurate and unreliable,” he added. “What a sad state of affairs in my beloved FBI.”‘
Art Deco – Formal NATO expansion may have ended in 2004, but the overtures between the Ukraine and NATO continued well into the present. Ukrainian membership in NATO was a live possibility right up to the start of the war, and may still be.
Bauxite, as recently as ten years ago the Ukrainian public was quite ambivalent about the country’s proper orientation in foreign affairs. How do you fancy we got from there to here? While we’re at it, could you use a common definition of ‘relentless’ and not an idiosyncratic one? It improves the efficiency of communication. (Note also, NATO membership requires unanimous approval and has conditions attached that the Ukraine would have had to meet).
It also amazes me how much peope struggle to tell the difference between (i) the predictable response to one’s actions; and (ii) whether the response is right or wrong.
That’s irrelevant to the current discussion.
“…Ukrainian membership in NATO was a live possibility right up to the start of the war, and may still be.”
That was Biden’s coy shilly-shallying.
Stoltenberg firmly downplayed that possibility even (or should that be, “especially”?) AFTER Putin’s invasion/incursion/visit…
In addition, one ALWAYS seems to forget what happened in Crimea and the two eastern provinces years prior…
Thats not what the chinese were told, thats an insane notion
@Bauxite
Agreed there.
US policy towards Russia has been schizophrenic primarily because Russian government policy to the West was very much Rope-A-Dope. Exploiting Western desire to detente in order to lower guards and extract concessions, only to then turn around. Which unsurprisingly led to a “schizophrenic” response by US administrations who were burnt, only for the cycle to generally begin again with new administrations (who often used the “failure” of Russian diplomatic policy to their predecessors, who often were political rivals).
I figured this out during the Obama “Reset” appeasement. But the truly astute observers like Mark Steyn were pointing this out near the start of the century.
Sadly true, though of course Obama’s goons wished to shank Bush (back when he was literally Hitler) and our Georgian Allies so they could appease the Kremlin while looking good.
Not as badly as Russian policy to the US.
@Bauxite
Agreed there.
US policy towards Russia has been schizophrenic primarily because Russian government policy to the West was very much Rope-A-Dope. Exploiting Western desire to detente in order to lower guards and extract concessions, only to then turn around. Which unsurprisingly led to a “schizophrenic” response by US administrations who were burnt, only for the cycle to generally begin again with new administrations (who often used the “failure” of Russian diplomatic policy to their predecessors, who often were political rivals).
I figured this out during the Obama “Reset” appeasement. But the truly astute observers like Mark Steyn were pointing this out near the start of the century.
Sadly true, though of course Obama’s goons wished to shank Bush (back when he was literally Hitler) and our Georgian Allies so they could appease the Kremlin while looking good.
It almost gives me a smile to know how badly that blew up in Obama and Clinton’s faces, but the human toll was not worth it.
But in any case, it was utterly not worth betraying our Georgian Allie’s after Putin forced a war on them at their most vulnerable, while their troops were fighting alongside us in Iraq.
Not as badly as Russian policy to the US.
As has turned out to be a remarkably sober and responsible decision, for the exact reason Eastern hawks like the Polish pointed it out. Not that they had to be prescient; Transnistria happened in 1990.
Not really, NATO membership is a multi year process that Ukraine was not ready for and would take quite a long process to do. Which is why the start of this war in 2014 had not even been started. Which is why the war started over a dispute about EU Associationship, not NATO.
It amazes me how someone who probably has never heard of the Astana Accords, let alone what they say, and who absolutely underestimated the two faced, intentionally deceptive nature of the Russian government on matters like this (precisely to make it harder to gauge “predictable responses”) is trying to speak on this.
Talks about leaving doors unlocked at night is missing the point. This was fundamentally not about NATO membership. And one reason we know this is because even Putin’s official regime mouthpieces did not start peddling that until the escalation of the war earlier this year.
Moreover, the analogy does not fit. The Ukrainians only became committed to joining NATO (as opposed to the EU, which they still had not committed to but there was widespread consensus about an EU Association Agreement, even by Putin’s man Yanukovych until he got browbeaten by Moscow in a rather counterproductive way). Indeed, Both sides of the Ukrainian civil divide pursued a policy of constitutional neutrality until 2014, with the difference being on which relationships in said neutrality would be emphasized.
It was after the Kremlin showed this policy to be naive that Ukraine unsurprisingly veered sharply to supporting NATO policy. So in this analogy, the “left the door unlocked at night” was by Ukraine trying to balance between Russia and the West without joining a defensive alliance.
And even that gets mitigated when you realize the Ukrainians had been led to believe they had something about as good (and in some perspectives better) with the Budapest Memorandum of 1994.
The Kremlin admitted it has zero right to wage war on its neighbors because of real or perceived threats of them joining NATO or the EU. It just is not mentioned as much given the justified obscurity of the Astana Accorda. And after a certain point navel-gazing about “predictable actions” needs to stop when the Kremlin is ruled by a man who acts like a two faced con artist.
If russia was a communisf region as it was for 74 years the west would be largely in its favor in many respects re culture if not economics we have lost the cold war, it just 30 years to realize it
Its a revanchist reactionary regime like kornilov might have established had he won, has kerensky not interfered in the liquidation of lenin
Miguel cervantes on October 12, 2022 at 2:34 pm said:
Its understandable that fmr warsaw pact nations would join nato when you extend it to the countries inside the soviet union it might be considered a breach of understandings
The Baltic states were already former Soviet states that joined. It’s telling that former Soviet states prefer NATO to their former nation.
Miguel cervantes on October 12, 2022 at 2:34 pm said:
Nato was premised on a incursion through the fulda gap into western europe
Yet it has remained more relevant than most thought. If Russia wasn’t trying to dominate other nations NATO could have withered away.
@Geoffrey Britain
I think they can be absolved of all meaningful responsibility or blame as far as this goes.
Which becomes a hell of a lot easier to understand when you look at the terms Merkel and Sarkozy happened. Both came to power after 9/11, following an attack on the US homeland. And Sarkozy in particular came in just before the Georgian War when Putin actively exploited Georgia’s divided focus supporting us in Iraq and its lack of NATO status to wage a war on it. Is it any surprise that the US would be more interested.
AFTER THE RUSSIAN INVASION IN 2014.
Which is firmly supported by the US’s pledge in Budapest 1994 to support Ukrainian independence and territorial integrity against aggression.
Anybody trying to blame Trump for that should hold their head in shame for bullshit victim blaming and slap their heads with the text of Budapest 1994.
Which was not so relentless and in any case was voluntary. In particular it ignores.that this conflict originated in a dispute about EU Association negotiations, not NATO.
So if you’re not willing to measure the (rather tertiary) influence NATO had on this, you should probably stuff it and stop talking about it since your lack of research on this and other matters is egregious.
Oh fuck off with the victim blaming, timeline distorting bullshit.
The “US’s continued massive arms buildup in Ukraine” was THE DIRECT RESULT of the Russian invasion and partition of vast amounts of Ukraine ib 2014 and US diplomatic and legal obligations from Budapest 1994. Which I might note Russia knew of and claimed to agree with prior to 2014.
Which means that even if I was naive enough to accept your statement about Russian conclusions (and I am absolutely not for a host of reasons), even your own argument points to the Russian government putting itself and the nation they ruled in this situation by a combination of criminality and leadfooted diplomacy.
Which also points to a consistent problem with your apologia: you consistently refuse to address what legal or practical obligations the Russian government has to avoid conflict, especially ones it starts.
This is ironic since it isn’t like the Russian government has been completely silent about said obligations (even if it clearly prefers to not highlight or talk about many of its promises and pledges for obvious reasons). And I know you know some of them, such as the Astana Accords. So this very one sided view is annoying and wrong.
@Barry Meislin
I’m not sure what enrages me more. The nature of this abuse or the fact that it is so predictable any more.
And they have emptied their stores in the event they actually have to confront Russia in the future this is a little like the panjandrum they mounted against kadaffi using echoes in the 80s we know the result dont we imagine that a thousand fold
Meanwhile China the country that is responsible for 5-10 million excess deaths is basically sitting pretty
“Oh fuck off with the victim blaming, timeline distorting bullshit.”
I’ve long appreciated the fact that you don’t encounter this at Neo’s site. Unneccessary invective.
@Sharon W
In this case the issue is we disagree on what “unnecessary” means.
And let absolutely nobody write that I have resorted to it lightly, without literal months of discussing and debating this, including intensive analysis of primary sources. And in most cases where I disagree with people on this issue- such as Banned Lizard and miguel cervantes – I have conducted this civilly.
However, my patience is not finite, especially when it is confronted with people who not only refuse to research the points (and make rudimentary, basic mistakes such as which side of Ukraine Odessa is on), but who refuse to acknowledge points. Especially when I have to parse out terms such as the Astana Accord.
Also, if we are going to discuss “unnecessary invective” let’s talk about EXACTLY WHY I told Geoffrey Britain -after reading and responding for months- to Fuck Off.
Shall we?
This is manifestly dishonest and incompetent on a profound level. Firstly: the US’s “massive arms build up in Ukraine” was a DIRECT RESPONSE TO The Russian Government invading Ukraine with the intent to illegally annex parts of it by force and fraud in contravention to Russia’s previous obligations. As such, the only faction that can be blamed for the “massive arms build up” is the Russian government itself, especially in light of its refusal to abide by either Minsk I or II (which was supposed to prevent this outcome.
Notably, the US and Russia both agreed what proper responses would be to a violation of Ukrainian sovereignty by a given faction.
https://www.pircenter.org/media/content/files/12/13943175580.pdf
I also point to the text of the 2010 Astana Accords, in particular Point 3 about freedom of alliances.
https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/b/6/74985.pdf
Secondly: Badgering on about “NATO Expansion” is at best a tertiary issue, if not an outright red herring. There’s a reason why it is called “EUROmaidan.” Because the dispute that led to this war was about the EU Association Agreement (which in spite of my staggering distrust and dislike for the EU – and my support for shrinking it by means such as Brexit- was not viewed as such a bad idea by Ukrainians, including Mr. Yanukovych himself given his campaign promise to sign such an agreement only to renege on it and persecute those who legally protested).
And even if it were the case, again, the Russian government at least tacitly acknowledged Ukraine’s right to choose any alliance or foreign entanglement it wished. Again, Astana Article 3 in 2010.
https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/b/6/74985.pdf
Let’s be frank here. I wrote some nasty curse words on a post. Geoffrey Britain nakedly lied about why Ukraine is at war in an attempt to downplay Putin’s criminality. There is no universe in which the latter is more moral or polite than the former, and the mixture of dishonesty, nakedly provable incompetence, and failure to acknowledge any of this is precisely what triggered my reaction.
Which is why I stand by my response. You might quibble that it is an ugly response – and that is true as far as it goes- but it is a response to a far uglier, ruder act. One that is part of a pattern of dishonest, uncivil behavior for which Geoffrey Britain has been called out by our host for and which I have run out of patience for.
What is ugly is what is being done to this country methodically viciously the annihilation of all our institutions our standards the shredding of our military and its morale through political officers like bishop garrison the bloody denoument of bastion gates the emptying of our strategic reserves the turning our medical class into glorified witchdoctors the descent of our cities into hellscapes the reign of terror against men and women of character in the judiciary
Had we not seen the dark defile of the last 20 years as men and women were murdered and maimed for no enduring purpose maybe i would endorse this caucasus crackup, but all the justifications have turned to ashes and naturally all those who punched a ticket and didnt ask questions (generals bolduc and flynn are the exceptions) are now at the top of the heap
Jmho
@miguel cervantes
Agreed indeed, and I never said otherwise. Which is why I agree with Banned Lizard on where our priorities are even if we disagree on some matters like Ukraine. The US must come first, because almost nothing Putin can do will endanger us as much as what the Left has already done. Indeed my main argument for supporting Ukraine is to help us buy time and breathing space to deal with the Left, and also to help import some of the optimistic traits we have seen in Ukraine (such as muscular civilian defense and the willingness to dethrone corrupt and authoritarian politicians) here.
Well, Osama and Saddam are still dead and that will endure until and unless their Allah decides to resurrect them. Likewise the terrorist networks that helped strike us on 9/11 are in tatters and have decentralized. That’s enduring, though not as much else is. For better or worse the US does need to limit its foreign involvements and handle the matters at home first.
Turtler – The “locked door” analogy was directed toward those who respond to any criticism of US Russia policy with name-calling. (“Anyone who criticizes the US or the west in any way is a closet Putin sympathizer!”) That ad hominem is nonsense. Shouting down opposing opinions is also a great way to make big mistakes.
Russia is what it is. It’s a big mess, and it has been a big mess more often than not for most of its history. But, at least because of its natural resources and its nuclear arsenal, Russia is still a major power. Russia also found itself in a situation after the Cold War where many long-time regions of the Russian empire became independent neighbor states. This includes Georgia and especially the Ukraine. The Ukraine had been part of the Russian empire for centuries and, prior to the 1990’s, had a very limited history as an independent state since the old Kievan Rus days in the late middle ages.
You can talk about NATO or the EU, but the bottom line is that western policy over the last 20+ years has been to pull former long-time pieces of greater Russia out of the Russian orbit and into the western orbit.
It is virtually impossible to do that without humiliating Russia.
That’s not to say that the Ukrainians wouldn’t be better off in a western oriented country. I have no doubt that they would. That’s not to defend Russian action in any way at any point in history. There are myriad reasons to criticize Russian policy going all the way back to the Czars.
What I’m saying is this – Humiliating a major power is very risky. If one decides to pursue a policy that involves humiliating a major power, one had better have a very good plan. A humiliated major power is an immensely dangerous thing.
What scares me most about this war is that I don’t see any recognition of that among our leaders or among those who are defending US involvement in the war.
Roosia did an incredibly foolish thing, invading Ukraine, but it is very concerning that it is widely recognized. Ukraine also has no business wanting to actually not be a Roosian county, aka Belarus2, and instead an actual independent sovereign nation. How humiliating for Roosia.
Vlad has no clothes Bauxite, how humiliating, and dangerous!
In the grand old days, before Gorbachev, many geographic and cultural entities were part of the Russian Empire: the Baltic states, many of the ‘stans, Georgia, Alaska, ect. It is deeply humiliating and dangerous that they are now independent and threating the Roosia of today, eh, Bauxite?
You can talk about NATO or the EU, but the bottom line is that western policy over the last 20+ years has been to pull former long-time pieces of greater Russia out of the Russian orbit and into the western orbit.
They don’t have to do any pulling, Bauxite.
You see NATO and the EU should have been strenghtening Roosia’s national prestiege and self esteem by pushing those unfaithful, feckless, and disloyal serfs back into the loving embrace of Mother Roosia (should have been doing this for the last 20 years.) But NATO and the EU have not been doing these things, woe, if only adults were in charge! (sarc)
Art Deco – The Hungarians in ’56, Czechs in ’68, and the Baltic states in the early 1990’s didn’t need pulling either.
Just because people outside of the US want something doesn’t mean that it is in our interest to give it to them.
What is it precisely that “we,” the US, will give to them? Is it something that Mother Roosia is withholding from them? For their own good, most assuredly.
For the situation is quite the same; before the collapse of the USSR, and the present Potempkin Roosian Federation?
Well the czarisf empire has considerable overlap we dont want to reference the black one hundreds and trepov ignatiev and co indifference to them
@ Bauxite
Ah, my misunderstanding.
On this much we absolutely agree, and that is why in spite of our differences and that I have with others I try and keep an even keel and argue on the evidence and merits of what I see, and usually act primarily when I find people arguing in bad faith or in monumental incompetence (for instance, thinking Odessa is in the Donbas). Of course people may lobby criticism about how well I have held to that, but I try. I certainly have little interest in squelching our freedom to dissent (Especially regarding the Globalists in the Left) over it.
And indeed, I can freely talk a great deal about the many blunders and worse of Western leadership and even Western pop culture as a whole, or that of others (in particular I think the Poles have been unduly hawkish and anti-Russian). Reality is rarely nothing but Pure Black and Pure White.
But I do think that even when held in the balance and assessed duly, the record is far more damning to the various regimes to have taken up residence in the Moscow Kremlin than it is to others. Especially since, as I pointed out, Moscow has had many opportunities to smooth over the rough spots of the past and to balance force, flattery, and other means to pursue its objectives (whatever those may be). And indeed, I do think Putin has received too little credit for more or less succeeding at this prior to 2014 (in spite of sharp criticism and yelling by people like myself and Mark Steyn on how we were being taken for a ride).
But that loops back to the problems of the war in Ukraine, and why it was fundamentally a massive risk for Putin in a way that Georgia was not; perhaps comparable if not worse to the Chechen Ulcer for Yeltsin. Especially since- as we now know- an awful lot of Russia’s soft power came from a very skilled manipulation of its image abroad and the specter of the High Soviet Military. That began to evaporate when faced in a pitched battle that could not be ended quickly and (unlike the Russian involvement in Syria) could not go back and forth.
Agreed.
A fair point, though I do think “became independent”- as Neo argues- is understating the matter. The two great collapses in modern Russian history (and many of those before it) occurred after extremes of centralization, authoritarianism, and incompetence all hit the bread basket issues of the people there, which resulted in major breakups. In particular it is telling that the direct catalyst for the collapse of the Soviet Union was as a result of Soviet hardliners trying to pre-empt an attempt by Gorbachev to moderate his government and reform the USSR into something similar, and the prospect of the coup succeeding is what sparked the first wave of secessions.
Of course, we shouldn’t dumb this down too much. Russia has been an authoritarian, centralized power for almost all its history and has succeeded and even thrived as such; Decentralization is not always a blessing (as the 1990s Anarchy and the long warrings of the Rus Princes show), and corruption and incompetence can be glossed over to one degree or another in better times or with enough incentive (like the Napoleonic or Nazi invasions having the PR of a lead foot). But it was the mixture of those that hurt and that successful Russian leaders have to balance.
On another note, it’s “Ukraine” not “the Ukraine”, ex
This is very true, and I’ll be the first to argue that had situations gone differently “the Ukraine” might still be a part of Russia and a remarkably placid part of it. However, that would require a few major differences.
Even Nikolai Gogol – a surrealist novelist but also a fervent Russian Absolutist and Panslavist – talked about the massive gulfs in culture and history between what he called “Northern Russia” and “Southern Russia.” Of course, the concept of an independent Ukrainian nation would have been anathema to him and he never thought- as far as we know- that the Tsar of Moscow should not have ruled there. But he also was a scholar with intense sentimental attachment to the region and he could not ignore its history, let alone the fierce romantic sentiments or sub-identities that life on “the Wild Fields” had bred.
Which proved to be a problem for integrating that the Russian state faced. And one it generally did a decent (if heavy handed) job at by using its power to coerce people like Khmelnitsky to make a union with themselves as the Subordinate Power, before gradually consolidating power and easing out Cossack independence. But it also devastated the powerful sentimental attachment these people had to Moscow as the seat of their faith and a civilizational center to look to, especially after cultural persecutions in the 19th century.
Ironically, Russia’s success at using a mixture of soft and hard power led to overreach and that helped respark separatism and ultimately modern Ukrainian nationalism.
I’m willing to more or less agree, but I think it is overstated. In particular, Western policies have generally been pretty uneven in its approaches to Russia’s “near abroad” and often contingent upon the continual quest for good relations with Russia. This is particularly evident when we look at Central Asia and the Caucasus, where the US and most other Western powers pointedly refused to directly challenge Russia in the hopes of courting Putin’s government (with success in many cases, though not in others; for instance the US Air Bases in Central Asia).
I think it also overlooks perhaps an even more important facet to the matter than the West. Growing local hesitation about and ultimately hostility to being in “Russia’s Orbit.” Which led to the post-1991 stampede West, ironically helping to reinvigorate a NATO that might have been wavering due to lack of commitment from its Old Member States. This is made particularly worse by the Russian government’s tendency to not mend many bridges with the NATO members and to alienate otherwise neutral ones (granted, not all of it is strictly its fault, with sectarian wars in places like Transnistria and Georgia kicking off separately from Russian leadership, but usually prolonged by it).
This was ultimately a pretty large misplay from the Kremlin, and one that it needn’t not have done. And one does not have to imagine Russia becoming some kind of Right-Conservative Liberal Lockean Utopia or some Leftist Globalist Soft Power Superpower in order to imagine it. Muscovite leaders going back to Ivan the Great did well in using soft power to pry away territory and loyal people on their Western frontier and to push other nations to detente out of fear of it, and others like Yekaterina and Elizabeth brought Russia to close to the height of its power by a mixture of velvet glove and iron fist, coming to politically dominate former enemies such as the Crimean Khanate and Poland-Lithuania while holding their own against aggression or counter-attacks from East and West from factions like Sweden.
But that requires a fine balance of power, and it does seem like Russian governments routinely overplay their hands. For instance, Poland’s staunch anti-Russian bias was informed by the partitions of Poland (brought about by fear of its Polish client becoming more self-sustaining) and the failure of compromises like the Congress Government. Sweden – after a long and mostly successful policy of reconciliation following Sweden’s defeat in Finland and abandonment – was alarmed by some particularly dumb Late Tsarist saber rattling and then utterly terrified by first the Soviets with their utopian posturing and now Putin’s attacks on Ukraine. And they and others can point to many cases where the Russian government signed in its own hand, acknowledging the illegality and folly of its actions.
Which is a very real case I think of Russia humiliating itself quite pointlessly and avoidably. Partially we might argue because it feels pressured to conform to “international norms” as defined by the globalists in Turtle Bay and partially because it is attracted to the positive diplomatic ramifications of empty, nice-sounding lip service that does not really impede its freedom of action much, but ultimately they were self-owns that Machiavelli would have cautioned about regarding a Princeps’s promises (and how it is best to make as few as possible).
And it is far from the worst one, given things like the demographic and intellectual rot that Russia is suffering from and failure to do much more than “reform” the kleptocracy into a more centralized and controllable system or to have an end game for when to stop playing Rope a Dope with the neighbors.
Of course Russia is far from the worst bungler in history on these regards, and we can point to many different failures of its kind in the West. But it is probably more radical and hurtful to Russia than those things.
Agreed there.
A fair point, and this is also why I have found many of the actions and especially words of Western leadership to be deranged (such as admitting that US intelligence is helping the Ukrainians kill Russian Staff Officers IN PUBLIC?!?! Seriously?!!?
I’m in favor of using intel to help the Ukrainians do that, even at the risk of the Russians detecting it. Indeed, the Russians can unofficially “know” it from their conclusions all they want, but going out there and admitting it saves them the trouble of having to build a case).
I’m honestly in favor of humiliating Russia to some degree in this war -precisely because I hope it has a salutatory effect on many things – but I want to limit the amount of pain and humiliation involved to removing Russian occupation from Ukrainian territory (save perhaps that which is agreed by both sides to change hands due to a transparent plebiscite, like what Zelenskyy proposed) and maybe the collapse of the occupations elsewhere or even the Putin government. But as much as I like fictional map bordergore, talk about “decolonizing Russia” by doing things like trying to spin off an independent Buryatia or giving Kola to Finland is madness that serves no good purpose even when done by civilians.
But on the subject of humiliation, I think there’s another side to this that makes it dangerous. I’ve repeatedly referred to Putin’s policies towards the West and many other countries as two-faced and Rope-a-Dope, and I stand by that, and those had greatly embarrassing and humiliating consequences for much in the way of Western leadership, including both sides of the aisle on the US. I think that helps go quite a ways to explain the exact fervor and vehemence of Western leadership in this, and the desire to humiliate Putin and Russia.
I also think it points to another threat. Of a Russia that humiliates itself for various reasons (not exclusive to being humiliated by other outside powers like the US) – whether it is by failure to bring Chechnya into control, to solve corruption or demographic rot, or the short-sighted self-owns from violated pledges- and that has public support to seek revenge elsewhere. Which coupled with antagonism from the outside can make for a really dangerous cocktail, and one I do not think is limited to Putin or his political network.
In any case, while I admit to being something of a pro-Ukraine hawk, the West has far more urgent problems we cannot afford to lose sight of and which cannot take second place. Chief among them the Reign of Error and increasingly Terror by the Left.
Agreed, and an astute point. It also points to another issue. The US DID give support to the Hungarians, Czechs, and Baltics. In particular Asylum and even some intelligence and arm aid (mostly in the long Baltic guerilla war after WWII). It did so to nibble at the shins of the Soviets, and with success. In particular it outright Stimson’d the Baltics and provided haven for their governments in exiles.
But the US never went to War for any of these countries (unless we want to argue significant political and military help in the aftermath of WWI, when US support helped people like Pilsudski put the Bolsheviks back). Precisely because it recognized the costs and how it was not cogent to American interests.
That is, I think, my preferred stance. I think we have significantly more elbow room with Ukraine and Georgia and so forth now than people like Eisenhower did, but that does not change the fact that America must come first.
Turtler – Thank you for the detailed reply. My concern is that extra elbow room that you refer to may be illusory.
The back-and-forth that we had with the Soviets during the Cold War over Hungary, Prague and the like never became a matter of continued existence for either party (fortunately). I don’t think that even the “hot” conflicts during the Cold War rose to that level (again, fortunately). This war might well be existential, at least for Putin and possibly for Russia as we know it.
I can agree that Russia has fewer ways of hurting the US than it did during the Cold War, but it still has a full nuclear arsenal. It seems to me that our current “elbow room” comes from pushing Putin as far as we can, but not far enough that nuclear war starts to look like the least bad option for him. We’re making his other options very bad indeed. That’s a dangerous game.
Art Deco – The Hungarians in ’56, Czechs in ’68, and the Baltic states in the early 1990’s didn’t need pulling either.
Your point is irrelevant and nonresponsive.
in 56, western europe was largely tied up with the question of suez,* in ’68, there was a feeling of unrest much like 2020, both here and there,
*the series the hour, largely makes that point,
now there is an alliance that comprised 3 billion people, that have a sizable combination of industrial and economic power, that the saudis have been forced into by the most maladroit strategy since ever,
@Bauxite
Understandable. I think that can’t be true for all of it, but some of it might be and the issue is of pushing things too far… or that a Kremlin that sees the war as going downhill without remedy will try to escalate.
I’m not so sure; the Soviets tended to view many of the conflicts as existential, if not specifically (and in some cases like Prague and Budapest they seem to) than in aggregate. After all, their goal was world revolution.
That’s my fear. On one hand “Russia as we know it” could need taking down and rebuilding by certain definitions, but on the other hand I have no interest in partitioning or balkanizing Russia. And of course Putin tends to look out for number one and have remarkably short view horizons when making a lot of choices (such as putting off anti-drug crackdowns and surrendering most control in Chechnya to Kadyrov – and thus greatly undermining Russian sovereignty and the reasons for the Chechen Wars – in order to look better).
Such a man may decide that he will do anything in order to cling to power.
Agreed, or close to it. And there’s also the fear that while it has less elbow room or methods it has, the more the Kremlin might do it.
That’s part of it, but I think a lot more of our elbow room comes from things like the demographic decay of Russia vis a vis the USSR, technological development, and so on. As well as a somewhat functioning bureaucracy and especially professional military. I am under no illusions that all of those are going downhill at present, but so much of war and politics comes down to outlasting the other guy, and the US is decently positioned for that.
Agreed, though I think nobody has done more to make said options very bad than he has.