ResCon1

Vivek Ramaswamy’s Dangerous and Demagogic Foreign Policy Views

Vivek Ramaswamy’s Dangerous and Demagogic Foreign Policy Views

By John R Guardiano on August 12, 2023

The glib millennial would have the GOP abandon its commitment to international leadership, forsake Ukraine, and appease Putin.

Thirty-eight-year-old Vivek Ramaswamy has never been elected to any political office—federal, state or local—and his half-baked ideas about America foreign policy show why he should be kept far away from the Oval Office.

Ramaswamy’s big idea is to turn Russia against China by ending American support for Ukraine, pledging that Ukraine will never become a member of NATO, and renewing economic ties with Moscow. This, he argues, is “a reverse maneuver of what Nixon accomplished with [Chinese dictator] Mao [Zedong] in 1972.”

Of course, Ramaswamy’s idea is ludicrous and unworkable: because despite whatever paper promises Russian dictator Vladimir Putin might make in order to fulfill his dream of conquering Ukraine, Russia and China today have strategic interests that coincide.

China and Russia. Both countries are opposed to the American-led, rules-based, liberal international order. And nothing America can do other than surrender, internationally, will appease or placate Putin’s Russia and Xi Jinping’s China.

By contrast, back in 1972, Mao’s China and Soviet Russia were already strategic adversaries that viewed each other with suspicion and alarm. The Sino-Soviet split had occurred more than a decade earlier, in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

“…Frequent border skirmishes between the Soviets and the Chinese verged on all-out war,” notes history.com.

The situation today, obviously, is very different. Russia and China have put their historic differences in the rearview mirror to combat what they see as the greater and more immediate threat: the United States. Hence their 2022 “no limits” partnership or pact.

In short, Ramaswamy’s big idea is a pipe dream. It will never happen—or, if it does happen, it will prove as endurable and prophetic as Neville Chamberlain’s 1938 pledge, “peace for our time.”

The cost and collateral damage, meanwhile, will be deep-seated and profound. Ramaswamy’s attempt to appease Putin and forsake Ukraine will rupture NATO and probably result in the alliance’s demise as frontline states in Eastern Europe and the Nordic region rebel and vow to go their own way.

As for Asia, Ramaswamy promises to “deter China from annexing Taiwan by shifting from strategic ambiguity to strategic clarity.” But appeasing Putin will alarm and frighten American allies in Asia, who, consequently, will doubt the resolve, staying power, and commitment of the United States.

And with good reason. Ramaswamy says the United States should promise to defend Taiwan “until 2029 but not afterward.” By 2030, he argues,

we will have full semiconductor independence from Taiwan; significantly reduced economic independence on China; stronger relationships with India, Japan, and South Korea; and stronger U.S. homeland defense capabilities to protect against cyber, super-EMP, and nuclear attacks.

In other words, by 2030, America finally can withdraw, militarily and diplomatically, from Asia and Europe and revert back to fortress America, defense of the homeland, and protection of the Western Hemisphere.

Disaster. This would be a geo-strategic disaster for the United States. It would cede leadership of the world to China and Russia, who would now write the rules that other countries would be forced to follow and obey while America hid behind its phantom moat in the Western Hemisphere.

If we were living in 1723 or 1823, such an approach might be tenable. But it’s 2023. Americans are too engaged in the world, economically and commercially, to revert back to a foreign policy of fortress America.

Our economy, which depends heavily on international trade, will suffer in a world led and shaped by China and Russia, not the United States.

Demagoguery. Equally bad, Ramswamy engages in rank demagoguery to explain and defend his foreign policy of appeasement.

The Biden administration may be aiding Ukraine, he says, “to make good on a bribe from a nation whose state-affiliated company paid off the President’s son,” Hunter Biden.

Never mind the utter lack of evidence to support this nonsensical charge. And never mind that virtually all of Europe, too, has acted to aid Ukraine after it came under savage and unprovoked assault from Russia.

Ramaswamy also demagogically asserts that America must adopt his foreign policy of appeasement to avert “a potential nuclear war with Russia.” Never mind that, throughout the Cold War, the United States averted nuclear war precisely by checking and not appeasing Russian aggression.

The bottom line: Vivek is too naive, too inexperienced, and too gullible to trust with the reins of American power. He would surrender American international leadership to the likes of Xi and Putin. He would abandon and forsake our allies in Europe and Asia.

He would bring America home when Americans increasingly are going abroad. And he would revert back to a foreign policy of fortress America in a world in which isolated fortresses cannot long survive and prosper.

Simply put: Ramswamy’s dangerous and demagogic foreign policy views make him entirely unfit to be President of the United States.

Feature photo credit: YouTube screenshot courtesy of Fox News Sunday.

What the Korean War Can Teach Us about Ending Russia’s War on Ukraine

What the Korean War Can Teach Us about Ending Russia’s War on Ukraine

By John R Guardiano on August 5, 2023

In Ukraine, President Biden is drawing exactly the wrong lessons from President Truman’s mishandling of the Korean War in 1951.

Opponents of American aid to Ukraine often tout the Korean War as a model for ending the war in Ukraine. The United States, it is argued, wisely refrained from “escalating” in Korea, instead signing an armistice that ended the conflict, thus allowing for a cold but endurable peace.

The Communists retained control of North Korea, but failed to achieve their objective of conquering all of Korea.

In the same way, argue the opponents of American aid to Ukraine, Russia should be allowed to retain control of Crimea, the Donbas, and other parts of southeastern Ukraine nominally or firmly in its control.

This will allow a free, sovereign, and independent Ukraine to coexist alongside Russian-occupied Ukraine—just as free, sovereign, and independent South Korea has coexisted for decades alongside Communist North Korea.

Then and only then, they insist, can the war end and peace be realized or achieved.

In fact, the Korean War is instructive to American policymakers, but not in the ways that opponents of American aid to Ukraine think.

The Korean War is an example of American self-deterrence that needlessly prolonged the war and the horrific human cost of that war. The United States eschewed a relatively quick victory for a bloody and prolonged stalemate or tie.

For this reason, the Korean War is a cautionary tale of what America should not do when aiding and abetting a country fighting for its survival against a tyrannical foe.

For starters, the war dragged on for three long, inconclusive, and interminable years in which American casualties mounted. Why? Because U.S. President Harry Truman refused to pursue victory out of a misguided fear of “escalation” and “World War III.”

Truman and Biden. Most historians today laud Truman’s caution and restraint in Korea—just as most observers today laud Biden’s caution and restraint in Ukraine. But Truman was wrong then and Biden is wrong today.

Truman is seen as wise because he is juxtaposed against U.S. Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who failed to anticipate the Chinese intervention in Korea, and whose insubordination and bellicosity subsequently resulted in his dismissal by Truman.

Biden, likewise, is seen as wise because he is juxtaposed against Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Putin and his henchmen often intimate that he might use nuclear weapons. Zelensky, meanwhile, is constantly beseeching Biden to send Ukraine more and more advanced weapons.

For this reason, Biden is often seen as wiser and more sober-minded than Putin and Zelensky. Truman, too, is typically remembered as more rational and level-headed than MacArthur.

Limited or Total War? But the choice between a prolonged war of indecision on the one hand and a global nuclear conflagration on the other hand is a silly and fallacious choice that did not exist then and does not exist now.

“Between the extremes of Truman’s restraint and the possibility of global war,” write Rep. Michael Gallagher (R-Wisconsin) and Aaron MacLean, “numerous options existed.

Truman’s decision to renounce nuclear threats and to restrict combat operations to Korea and its airspace prolonged the war and, paradoxically, extended the period in which it could have escalated.

In truth, shortly after MacArthur had been relieved of his command by Truman on Apr. 11, 1951, the United States was well on its way to routing the Chinese and North Koreans, reuniting the Korean peninsula, and ending the war with Korea wholly free and intact.

However, Truman and his military appointees on the Joint Chiefs of Staff put the kibosh on Lieutenant General James Van Fleet’s May 28, 1951, request “for a major offensive into North Korea to complete the destruction of the Chinese Armies,” reports Robert B. Bruce in Army History magazine (Winter 2012).

Instead of military victory, the United States pursued a negotiated solution in Korea and thus gave Communist forces a sanctuary in North Korea. As a result, the war dragged on for two more long years and at a horrific human cost.

In Ukraine, Biden, too, has called for a negotiated solution, while deliberately withholding from Ukraine advanced weapons—including, for instance, long-range precision artillery, tanks, jets, and aircraft, which would allow the Ukrainians to more quickly and aggressively attack Russian positions and drive Russian forces out of Ukraine.

Biden also has refused to use U.S. air and naval forces to safeguard the shipment of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea. The reason: he fears “escalation” and “World War III.”

But in truth, Russia is exhausted militarily and is in no position to “escalate” its war on Ukraine.

Sure, Russia has nuclear weapons, but the use of tactical or battlefield nukes serves no military purpose and gives Russia no battlefield edge other than shock value.

Korea 1951. And the same was true of Chinese and North Korean forces in June 1951. They were exhausted, militarily, and did not even possess nuclear weapons. Russia, a North Korean ally and supporter, did have nuclear weapons, but in numbers dwarfed by the United States.

Moreover, although Russian leader Joseph Stalin conceived of the Korean War as a way to expand Communist influence and control, internationally, Russia was not directly involved in the Korean War and had no intention of becoming involved, as its focus was on Europe.

Ironically, as Gallagher and MacLean note, the Korean War ended only when former World War II Supreme Allied Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected president (in 1952) and “contemplated and discussed the possibility of escalation, even approving the development of war plans that involved the use of nuclear weapons.”

Then, too, Stalin died on Mar. 5, 1953. This was significant because Stalin was the foremost obstacle to peace in Korea. He had “insisted that the war continue despite the misgivings of Chinese and North Korean leaders,” writes Mark Kramer.

Putin, likewise, is the foremost obstacle to peace in Ukraine. Thus his death, resulting in regime change in Russia, certainly would greatly enhance the prospects of a peace agreement.

The bottom line: President Truman’s mismanagement of the Korean War 72 years ago does, indeed, hold lessons for President Biden as he manages the war in Ukraine today. But those lessons teach Biden what not to do.

Unfortunately, our president is drawing the exact opposite conclusion and the result is a needlessly prolonged war of indecision at a horrific human cost to innocent Ukrainians.

One of the chief lessons of the Korean War is that the fear of “escalation” against a weak and exhausted military enemy is a catastrophic mistake. In truth, the risk of “escalation” rises if the war is allowed to drag on and the enemy is permitted to regroup.

Ditto “World War III”. That was not a realistic concern in 1951 and it is not a realistic concern today, in 2023. However, by allowing the North Korean regime to survive, Truman increased the risk of World War III significantly in the intervening decades.

Likewise, in Ukraine. If Russia is not clearly and explicitly defeated, militarily, and expelled from all of Ukraine, it will regroup and resume its fight in Ukraine at a later date when it is better prepared. “World War III” then becomes more likely.

In short, there is no substitute for victory and there is no reason not to pursue victory. That was true in Korea 1951 and it is true in Ukraine 2023.

Feature photo credit: President Biden (L), courtesy of the Associated Press and President Harry S. Truman (R), courtesy of Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, published in NPR.

Reagan Would Have Supported NATO Membership for Ukraine Now

Reagan Would Have Supported NATO Membership for Ukraine Now

By John R Guardiano on July 9, 2023

So-called New Right Republicans betray the Reagan legacy that defeated the Soviets and won the Cold War.

In the 1980s, as Russian leaders rattled their nuclear saber and warned of the risk of nuclear war, President Ronald Reagan acted to strengthen and solidify the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

Reagan gave material aid and rhetorical comfort to the anti-Communist Polish trade union movement, Solidarity; and he deployed Pershing II and cruise missiles to Europe to counter the Soviet threat.

Reagan also spoke truth to Russian power, declaring that

the only morality they recognize is what will further their cause, meaning they reserve unto themselves the right to commit any crime, to lie, to cheat… [in order to] advance the cause of socialism.

The Soviet Union collapsed and fell apart, thanks in large part to Reagan’s policy of peace through strength and his refusal to be cowed and intimidated by Russian threats.

Russia’s War on Ukraine. Today, unfortunately, Russia is ruled by a man, Vladimir Putin, who laments the demise of the Soviet Union, and who is determined to resurrect the Russian empire. And NATO again is on the frontlines of the fight for freedom, as a neighboring, non-member state, Ukraine, fights to free itself of attempted Russian conquest and subjugation.

Ukraine, understandably, seeks membership in NATO. No country under NATO’s umbrella, after all, has been invaded or subjugated by Russia. By contrast, countries outside of NATO’s umbrella—i.e., Ukraine, Georgia, and Belarus—have been invaded and subjugated by Russia.

Ukraine does not expect NATO membership today, but would like today a pledge of NATO membership at the conclusion of its war with Russia. Ukrainians believe that would be the surest way to deter future Russian aggression and ensure the peace.

The ‘New Right’. Yet in the face of the Russian threat, the only thing some so-called conservative Republicans can offer up is the antithesis of Reagan. These faux conservatives push not for a real and lasting peace through strength. Instead, they advocate for a false and temporary peace through fear and appeasement.

Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, for instance, calls NATO membership for Ukraine “sheer lunacy” that will increase “the risk of nuclear war with Russia itself.”

Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) goes even further: “If Ukraine were a NATO ally,” he writes, “we’d have to go to war with Russia under Article V of the NATO Treaty… We don’t want war with Russia.”

“Absolutely not,” agrees Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky). “This [NATO membership for Ukraine] is exactly wrong—as usual… [A] war with Russia [is] something no one should want.”

As when Reagan was president, no one, of course, wants the United States to be immersed in a direct war with Russia. The question, then as now, is how to avert and avoid war, while protecting ourselves, our interests, and our allies worldwide.

Deterrence. Reagan believed in deterrence; and deterrence, in turn, required a credible American and allied military threat.

That’s why Reagan deployed the Pershing II and cruise missiles to Europe: to strengthen the NATO alliance. And that’s why he armed the Afghan mujahideen: to bleed and weaken the Soviet Union and to stop what was then widely perceived to be Russia’s quest for a warm water port.

For this same reason, deterrence, it is in the American national interest to arm Ukraine and to admit Ukraine into NATO.

Putin’s Russia is an enemy of the United States, which works assiduously to undermine American interests worldwide. Ukraine, by contrast, seeks to be part of the West and a part of the liberal order through which the West has grown and prospered mightily since at least the end of the Second World War.

NATO. Concerns by right-wing isolationists (or non-interventionists), such as Ramaswamy, Lee and Paul, that admitting Ukraine into NATO would force the United States into a direct shooting war with Russia are utterly fallacious.

As Randy Scheunemann and Evelyn Farkas point out, NATO’s Article 5—which holds “that an attack against one ally is considered an attack against all allies”—does “not mandate a specific response by member states.”

The United States and other NATO countries retain the right to decide how to support Ukraine, irrespective of whether Ukraine is a member of NATO.

For this reason, the United States and NATO, in planned coordination with Ukraine, could decide that by doing what they are now doing, arming Ukraine, they are fulfilling their Article 5 obligations.

Winning. What, then, is the value of NATO membership if it doesn’t change what is happening in Ukraine now?

Simple: it sends an unmistakable message of (long-term) support to Ukraine; it strengthens Ukrainian resolve; and it tells the Russians that, insofar as NATO is concerned, Ukraine will forever be a free, sovereign, and independent state.

In other words: there will be no negotiated settlement that rewards Russian aggression with the surrender of Ukrainian territory and people.

Equally important, after this war ends and a ceasefire is declared, NATO membership for Ukraine will deter renewed Russian aggression and prevent future wars.

This is something that President Reagan would have understood. It’s beyond disappointing that so-called “new right” Republicans just don’t get it.

Feature photo credit: Three leading isolationists or non-interventionists: Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), courtesy of Shutterstock/Rolling Stone; GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, courtesy of Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/NPR; and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), courtesy of Tom Brenner/New York Times.

Justices Sotomayor and Jackson are Clueless about America

Justices Sotomayor and Jackson are Clueless about America

By John R Guardiano on July 3, 2023

The Supreme Court’s left-wing minority, not its conservative majority, ignores the racial and ethnic reality of modern-day America.

In the Supreme Court’s landmark Harvard, UNC affirmative action case, left-wing Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson argue that because the Court’s conservative majority insists on a colorblind or race neutral legal standard, it is out of touch with modern-day America.

In truth, Sotomayor and Jackson have it exactly backwards. They are the ones who are out of touch with an America that is increasingly multi-racial and multi-ethnic. And they fail to appreciate that it is precisely because of this fact that our law and jurisprudence must, of necessity, be colorblind or race neutral.

Race Matters. First, let’s give the devil her due. Sotomayor and Jackson ague that race matters in America because America has always been stained and marred by racism. Therefore, the law, too, must be cognizant of the importance of race and take race into account.

American society “is not, and has never been, colorblind,” declares Sotomayor.

[Today’s] Court cements a superficial rule of colorblindness as a Constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society where race has always mattered and continues to matter.

“Deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life,” adds Jackson.

And having so detached itself from this country’s actual past and present experiences, the Court has now been lured into interfering with the crucial work that UNC and other institutions of higher learning are doing to solve America’s real-world problems.

Sotomayor and Jackson seriously distort and exaggerate the prevalence and significance of racism past and present. Isolated and suspect incidents of alleged racism, for instance, are taken to be emblematic of a “deep-seated legacy of racial subjugation [that] continues to manifest itself in student life” today.

Multi-Racial and Multi-Ethnic America. But the bigger problem is that their understanding of America too simplistic and dated. It is based on a 19th Century vision of a country that no longer exists, and which hasn’t existed for many decades. Their America is, both literally and figuratively, black and white, and not much else.

Sotomayor and Jackson ignore the fact that an increasing number of Americans are neither black nor white. Asian Americans, in fact, are the nation’s fastest-growing demographic group and, not coincidentally, the biggest victims of affirmative action in college admissions.

Not surprisingly, then, the lawsuit against Harvard was spearheaded by Asian Americans, who allege that this august Ivy League institution systematically discriminated against them. Sotomayor and Jackson try to deny this reality and pretend that it doesn’t exist, but the conservative majority found conclusive evidence to the contrary.

The “First Circuit Court,” writes Chief Justice John Roberts in his majority opinion, “found that Harvard’s consideration of race has led to an 11.1% decrease in the number of Asian Americans admitted to Harvard…

“Black applicants in the top four academic deciles,” he notes, “are between four and ten times more likely to be admitted to Harvard than Asian applicants in those deciles.”

Rigged Admissions. Sadly, this is no accident. The Supreme Court found that Harvard, UNC (and, surely, other elite colleges and universities) are deliberately rigging their admissions processes to discriminate against Asian Americans and to establish quotas for the number of Asian American students.

Yet in their dissenting opinions, Sotomayor and Jackson pretend that Asian Americans are not a significant demographic group and have no real cause for complaint. Jackson mentions Asian Americans a mere three times, once in a footnote, while never pausing to consider or grapple with their victimization through affirmative action.

Sotomayor, meanwhile, says that Asian Americans benefit from affirmative action because although they represent only about 6% of the U.S. population, they now make up more than 20% of Harvard’s admitted class.

This statistic, of course, sidesteps the issue of discrimination and ignores the fact that Asian American applicants to Harvard may be more numerous and better prepared, academically, than members of other demographic groups. So the 20% figure stripped of this necessary context is not very telling or revealing.

‘Diversity‘. Nor is the moniker “diversity,” which has become the justification or rationale used for racial preferences in college admissions.

Justice Neil Gorsuch observes that Harvard, UNC, and other elite colleges and universities exhibit little interest in non-racial markers of diversity. And they employ racial and ethnic classifications that “rest on incoherent stereotypes.”

The racial categories the universities employ in the name of diversity do not begin to reflect the differences that exist within each group.

Instead, they lump together white and Asian students from privileged backgrounds with “Jewish, Irish, Polish, or other ‘white’ ethnic groups whose ancestors faced discrimination” and “descendants of those Japanese-American citizens interned during World War II.”

Reality. Again, Sotomayor and Jackson ignore this demographic reality because, like Harvard, UNC, and other elite colleges and universities, they see an America that is only black and white. They don’t see the America that really exists in the 21st Century: multi-ethnic and multi-racial.

These two far-left justices also ignore the discrimination in college admissions that results from treating Asian Americans, and members of other racial and ethnic groups, as expendable.

“Plainly,” writes Gorsuch, “Harvard and UNC choose to treat some students worse than others in part because of race. To suggest otherwise—or to cling to the fact that the schools do not always say the quiet part aloud—is to deny reality.”

Equal Rights. Justice Clarence Thomas, meanwhile, does not deny the reality of racism in American life:

I, of course, agree that our society is not, and has never been, colorblind. People discriminate against one another for a whole host of reasons. But, under the Fourteenth Amendment, the law must disregard all racial distinctions…

Thomas expounds upon this point:

I am painfully aware of the social and economic ravages which have befallen my race and all who suffer discrimination… [However], two discriminatory wrongs cannot make a right…

This vision of meeting social racism with government-imposed racism is thus self-defeating, resulting in a never-ending cycle of victimization…

We must adhere to the promise of equality under the law declared by the Declaration of Independence and codified by the Fourteenth Amendment.

Racial Spoils. Given that America has moved far beyond black and white to include a multitude of races and ethnicities, it is hard to argue with this point. The alternative is a racial spoils system that awards rights, benefits, and privileges based on race and ethnicity, not merit and achievement.

Of course, affirmative action as it is described by Sotomayor and Jackson is benign. It aims not to hurt anyone, but to help African Americans who have been burdened by the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.

The problem with their approach is that it ignores the zero-sum nature of college admissions and the existence of other disadvantaged groups, principally but not exclusively Asian Americans, who are denied benefits and opportunity from this reverse discrimination.

Modern-Day Realities. In other words, what might have been feasible (albeit still Constitutionally suspect) in 19th Century America is no longer feasible in the 21st Century, when a myriad of races and ethnicities dot the nation’s demographic landscape.

For this reason, the jurisprudence of Sotomayor and Jackson is woefully out of date and disconnected from modern-day demographic realities. A colorblind or race neutral legal standard is the only kind of legal standard that can work and secure popular legitimacy in our multi-ethnic and multi-racial country.

Feature photo credit: Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor (L) and Ketanji Brown Jackson (R), AP/Getty images, courtesy of NBC News.

What Prigozhin’s Armed Rebellion Means for the Future of Russia and Ukraine

What Prigozhin’s Armed Rebellion Means for the Future of Russia and Ukraine

By John R Guardiano on June 26, 2023

Commentators routinely say we know nothing. In truth, we know a lot—about the role of NATO, the fear of “escalation,” and Putin’s likely successor.

The ramifications of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s aborted rebellion against the Russian military are still playing out and won’t be fully known for many weeks and possibly many months. However, the rebellion underscores or illuminates three key points of longstanding historical significance:

First, Putin’s war on Ukraine had nothing to do with NATO, NATO expansion, or phantom NATO threats to Russia.

Second, fears that Putin might “escalate” the conflict if the West somehow “provokes” him by fully arming Ukraine are misplaced and misguided.

Third, we can see the type of leader who might succeed Putin. The successor most likely will be an autocrat who is hostile to the West; but he also will be someone the West can tolerate or live with—provided Ukraine wins and Russia loses the war.

*******

First, Putin’s war on Ukraine had nothing to do with NATO, NATO expansion, or phantom NATO threats to Russia.

Many prominent observers have bought into this lie and it remains widely touted; but it was always a ruse used by Putin to try and legitimize his illegal and unprovoked war on Ukraine. Now, Prigozhin himself admits as much.

“The Armed Forces of Ukraine were not going to attack Russia with NATO,” Prigozhin admits in a video uploaded to Telegram Friday, June 23. “The war was needed for a bunch of scumbags to triumph and show how strong of an army they are.”

Prigozhin, reports the New York Times,

described his country’s invasion of Ukraine as a “racket” perpetrated by a corrupt elite chasing money and glory without concern for Russian lives. He also challenged the Kremlin’s claim that Kyiv had been on the verge of attacking Russian-backed separatist territory in Ukraine’s east when Russia invaded.

“The war wasn’t needed to return Russian citizens to our bosom, nor to demilitarize or denazify Ukraine,” Mr. Prigozhin said, referring to Mr. Putin’s initial justifications for the war. “The war was needed so that a bunch of animals could simply exult in glory.”

Second, fears that Putin might “escalate” the conflict if the West somehow “provokes” him by fully arming Ukraine are misguided and misplaced.

As we observed back in February, the Biden administration’s fear of “escalation” never made any sense. Russia has no real ability to “escalate,” militarily, and our objective ought to be to bring the war to a swift and decisive conclusion.

The real danger is a long, costly and drawn-out war or stalemate caused by American self-deterrence and our continued refusal to provide Ukraine with long-range precision weaponry, such as the the U.S. Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), and F-16 fighter jets.

This point has been underscored by Putin’s response to Prigozhin’s armed rebellion. As Michael McFaul points out:

Putin talked tough in his national address [June 24]. He sounded like someone preparing for a big fight. But when faced with the difficult decision of trying to stop Wagner mercenaries with major force, he backed down. In this game of chicken, we swerved off the road. He didn’t escalate. He didn’t need a face-saving off-ramp to declare victory.

When facing the possibility of really losing to Wagner mercenaries coming into Moscow, he instead capitulated. Rather than doubling down with overwhelming force to crush the mutiny, Putin accepted humiliation instead.

He was the rat trapped in the corner that so many Putinologists have told us to fear. But he didn’t lash out and go crazy. He didn’t take the riskier path of fighting a civil war. He negotiated…

The lesson for the war in Ukraine is clear. Putin is more likely to negotiate and end his war if he is losing on the battlefield, not when there is a stalemate.

Those who have argued that Ukraine must not attack Crimea for fear of triggering escalation must now reevaluate that hypothesis. The sooner Putin fears he is losing the war, the faster he will negotiate.

Third, we can see the type of leader who might succeed Putin. The successor most likely will be an autocrat who is hostile to the West; but he also will be someone the West can tolerate or live with—provided Ukraine wins and Russia loses the war.

No one has any illusions that a liberal reformer will emerge from the sewer of Russian politics. For the most part, the liberals have all fled the country. Russia, moreover, has no real liberal political tradition or history.

Even prominent dissident Alexei Navalny is a committed Russian nationalist, albeit, as Stephen Kotkin points out, “one who also says out loud that the war was a terrible idea and is hurting Russia.”

Navalny and Prigozhin, in fact, are two different types of nationalists who could could conceivably succeed Putin.

“…An authoritarian Russian nationalist who recognizes the war is a mistake and, whether fully intentionally or not, effectively ends the war, or at least the current active phase of it—that’s the one kind of person who could threaten [and succeed] Putin,” Kotkin explains.

This successor, he adds, would “recognize the separate existence of a Ukrainian nation and state”—not because he is a “good guy” or a liberal reformer, but simply because he bows to the political and military reality brought about by a war that his predecessor, Putin, and not he, foolishly started.

The bottom line: the role, or lack thereof, of NATO expansion in the run-up to the war; the significance, or lack thereof, of military “escalation” in the prosecution of the war; and the type of Russian ruler who succeeds Putin after the war—these three issues have all been brought into stark relief as a result of Prigozhin’s aborted rebellion against the Russian military.

Stay tuned. The best (or at least the most intriguing) is yet to come.

Feature photo credit: Russian dictator Vladimir Putin (L) and Wagner Group mercenary head Yevgeny Prigozhin (R), courtesy of the Toronto Star.