While we wait for whatever catastrophes tomorrow may bring, I’d like to make two observations about the situation with Russia and Ukraine. First, I don’t believe the additional economic sanctions that have been placed on Russia in response to its invasion of Ukraine will have much impact. Indeed, I think they’re likely to be harder on the countries imposing the sanctions than they are on Russia.
Second, Europe is completely capable of dealing with the situation with little help from the U. S. Just not quickly. To the best of my knowledge at this point France has the only military among our NATO allies at the highest level of readiness and the French military is pretty overextended already. That’s the risk of the underspending on defense our NATO allies have been enjoying for decades. Now the risk is an issue.
Said another way at this point Russia can and will do pretty much whatever it wants to do.
The sanctions are BS. The only action that they will care about relates to alternative supplies of oil, and the oil price. But Biden apparently cannot buck the progressives on this.
In my opinion the Europeans have been able to spend on their social programs on the backs of US, as you state. You Trumpster, you. We can no longer afford this. We are all but broke.
And yes, Putin, I am sure, looks at Biden as a weak dope. He will pursue his goals ruthlessly.
Out of idle curiosity, how is the local Ukrainian-American community taking all this. I noticed a Ukrainian language paper and a few web sites in the greater Chicago area.
Something else to watch would be what the troops in the Kalingrad enclave in Poland are up to.
Yeah, Russia seems to have the upper hand, and some are saying playing Biden for a fool. In the meantime Biden is canceling oil leases, has earlier ended the keystone pipeline, and anything else associated with fossil fuel production. Biden has taken us from an energy independent position to a major importer of oil, while pinning our higher gas prices to the Russian/Ukraine issues. It’s all erroneous thinking coming from this administration and bad foreign policy implementation dooming this country to paying for Biden’s climate change agenda. And yet, we continue to hash over the irrational twists and turns of Putin and Biden’s strategy in intellectual terms, rather than pure, raw political gamesmanship.
What can the French military (or any military including the US) do?
If you are talking about NATO’s eastern border countries they already received extra forces and considering the Russian force posture they aren’t likely to be targets of any (planned) Russian aggression.
If you are talking about military support for the Ukraine — I don’t how any military help from France (or even the US) that Ukraine got would deter Russia now; indeed it may even enrage Russia.
I found this was an interesting analysis of the escalating tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
https://www.fpri.org/article/2022/01/moscows-compellence-strategy/
Short story; this analysis would indicate this event didn’t come out of the blue; the West may well have missed very clear signals in the past year of what the Russians considered red lines and dangerous provocations.
Interestingly enough; if this analyst is right, Putin’s goals in this war (if it comes to pass) are remarkably similar to Deng Xiaoping in the Sino-Vietnam war.
I am with CO here. Putin knows we wont go to war. We have close to no leverage. The Fence wont go to war either.
Steve
If I’m hearing analysts who accurately worried about the situation since early fall last year — its not the immediate campaign in the Ukraine where the risk of NATO/Russia direct conflict is high.
Its what happens 5/6 months down the line. Coercive economic measures could give way to threatening measures like deploying strategic arms or positioning large amounts of offensive forces near Russian borders; and then Russia would counter with its forces. Also, the spillover from any conflict could leave Eastern Europeans to do something without coordinating with the US. A localized war can easily become a regional war — its happened in that region before.
As I’ve mentioned there have been a series of red lines crossed:
dissolution of Yugoslavia, bombing of Serbia
expanding NATO contrary to promises
removal of Moammar Qaddafi in Libya (going beyond SC authorization)
Siding with the rebels in Syria, going as far as supporting Al Qaeda
Siding with the putsch against the legitimate government in Ukraine
Kaliningrad is in Russia, and has been since 1945. Prior to that it was in the German Empire, in Prussia. Kant’s home town. It was never in Poland, which itself is a recent construction.
The long term goal of Putin and the Russian establishment is the reunification of Ukraine, or most of it, with Russia. They will likely succeed. After that the Baltics are on the menu. Then the Central Asian republics, and maybe even eastern Poland. The whole Tsarist empire reborn.
None of the borders in Europe are stable, not even those in the British Isles. Remember the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Yugoslavia, Austrian Trieste, Alsace-Lorraine…?
When Elizabeth dies, will the Stone of Scone stay in Edinburgh?
Here’s a list of actions that analysts consider provocative to Russia in the last couple of years. Paraphrasing from the link I had above.
1. Turkey selling drones to Ukraine. Those drones were considered a key element in Azerbaijan’s victory over Armenia in 2020. They were used in the Donbas against separatists in Oct. Changes the balance of power between Ukraine and its separatist areas.
2. UK sent a frigate inside Crimean territorial waters. UK also signed a naval arms deal with Kyiv. It provides for the joint production of missile boats, minehunters, and other naval weapons.
3. US signed a “strategic defense framework” and “charter on strategic partnership” with Ukraine.
4. Sanctioned Russian websites, and jailed a pro-Russian media tycoon and his TV stations.
5. US went from not giving equipment to giving defensive equipment to giving offensive equipment with conditions (not to be used in the Donbas) to giving offensive equipment with no conditions.
I knew some of this but I was surprised to the extent of Ukraine / NATO cooperation. Some of it wasn’t coordinated (Turkey is pursuing its own agenda with its drones), but the end perception to Russia is the same, Ukraine’s military is much more capable then 2014.
None of those actions justify war. But I think when the history books look on this; they will ask questions why policy makers didn’t the risks involved.
Any of you live near a military base, things are looking pretty busy these days.
Seems we keep leaving out Russian actions like all their meddling in East Ukraine, Georgia, etc. Not sure why people want to portray Russians as innocents.
Steve
I don’t think Russia is innocent but I do think it has security interests. I’ve been trying to explain them. At least to me they are remarkably transparent. How experts in DC could not recognize them baffles me.