Posts tagged as “War and National Security”

Pretending otherwise will result in NATO negotiating with itself, appeasing Putin, and abandoning Ukraine.

Washington Post foreign policy columnist David Ignatius thinks the 1962 Cuban missile crisis might offer clues on how President Biden can simultaneously achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives in Ukraine, while also giving Russian dictator Vladimir Putin an “off-ramp,”or some “face-saving way out” of his dire predicament.

Ignatius, of course, is rightly concerned about Putin’s threat to use tactical or battlefield nuclear weapons. However, the historical template that he cites is misplaced and decidedly unhelpful.

Simply put, 2022 Ukraine is not 1962 Cuba, and pretending that it might be will lead President Biden and other policymakers astray.

• For starters, Russian missiles in Cuba were a direct threat to the American homeland. Which means they were an existential threat to the United States. Tactical or battlefield nukes in Ukraine, by contrast, do not threaten the American homeland. Nor do they threaten any NATO country.

Russian tactical nukes do threaten Ukraine, obviously. But pretending that they spell worldwide armageddon is hyperbolic and untrue.

• Second, when Russia deployed nukes in Cuba, the West had reason to believe it was facing a formidable military and economic power. No one has any such illusions about Russia today.

As the Financial Times notes, “the Russian economy is not globally significant, though individual sectors such as oil and gas do matter.” The Russian military, meanwhile, has show itself in Ukraine to be utterly incompetent and incapable of waging war, and it now teeters on the verge of collapse.

Russia does have the world’s largest arsenal of nuclear weapons, and that is, indeed, worrisome. However, Russia never has launched a nuclear strike against a NATO country because it knows that would result in an immediate retaliatory strike against Moscow.

Deterrence worked throughout the Cold War and deterrence will work today—if President Biden and other NATO leaders do not waver and remain resolved and determined.

• Third, in 1962 Cuba, Russian dictator Nikita Khrushchev was looking for an off-ramp. In 2022 Ukraine,  by contrast, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, clearly is not—something Ignatius himself admits.

Instead, by word and by deed, Putin has demonstrated that he interested in gobbling up as much of Ukraine as he possibly can now, while husbanding his resources for its complete subjugation later.

Given this reality, it is beyond futile to try and give Putin something he clearly does not want. We end up negotiating not with Putin, but with ourselves. This results in more self-defeating self-deterrence and appeasement.

• Fourth, 1962 Cuba was a communist territory firmly ensconced in the Soviet orbit. 2022 Ukraine, by contrast, is a Western democracy valiantly and heroically seeking to free itself of Russian domination or attempted Russian domination.

For this reason, it arguably made sense for President Kennedy to pledge (as he did) that the United States would not invade Cuba or intervene in Cuban internal affairs in exchange for the removal of Russian missiles there.

But given the very different status of Ukraine today, any substantive concession that the United States or NATO pledges to Russia re: Ukraine will result in the unconscionable abandonment of that country and its people. This is and ought to be a nonstarter.

Ukraine’s entry into the EU and NATO, for instance, is more necessary and inevitable now than it was before the Russian invasion.

• Fifth, like many observers, Ignatius laments Ukraine’s determination to defeat Russia on the battlefield and drive Russia out of all of Ukrainian territory. He laments this because Ignatius would like to see Ukraine give Putin something Russian can crow about and call a victory. That, after all, would make a “face-saving compromise” possible.

But the only thing a “face-saving compromise” can possibly mean is giving some Ukrainian territory to Russia and abandoning millions of Ukrainians to the tender mercies of Russian rule and domination.

Given all that we know about Russian rule, this is truly unconscionable and wrong. It also violates a fundamental principle, the territorial integrity of nations, that underlies the international order.

The danger of rewarding Russian military aggression should be obvious. The precedent established will inevitably result in other countries (China perhaps) unilaterally using military might to redraw the world’s national boundaries and territorial claims.

• Sixth, Ignatius suggests that Ukraine is still poised to lose to Russia. He says that Ukraine “needs a reality check about its longer-term battlefield prospects”

This is a remarkable statement. It might have made sense back in February, when Western intelligence estimated that the Ukrainian Army would quickly crumble, Kyiv would fall within days, Zelensky would flee the country, and Russian rule would be established.

In fact, as we now know, nothing of the sort happened. In fact, the opposite has happened. David has heroically beaten back Goliath. And David might well defeat Goliath if America and NATO stop slow-walking their delivery of aid to the Ukrainian military out of an utterly misplaced fear of “provoking” or “cornering” Putin.

“Despite the large quantities [of military aid] flowing to Ukraine,” writes Eliot A. Cohen,

the fact remains that it is not enough, and that the logistical system can handle more…

Some capable countries, [i.e., Germany], are unwilling to give at scale…

Most other countries, including the United States, continue to refrain from the level of industrial mobilization necessary. It is too much business as usual…

Some of the hesitancy, too, has stemmed from a patronizing wariness about Ukrainian capabilities. Yet if we have learned anything in this war, it is that the Ukrainians, smart and driven as they are, can absorb even the most advanced systems fast, and exploit them shrewdly.

At this point, they know more about high-intensity warfare than we do.

Exactly. There is a time and a place to negotiate and to try and offer one’s adversary an “off-ramp” or a “face-saving way out.” That worked in 1962 Cuba. It will not work in 2022 Ukraine. The differences between these two times and places are too stark, and pretending that they’re not will lead President Biden and other policymakers astray.

What America and NATO must now do is accelerate their military aid to Ukraine to ensure Russia’s utter and abject defeat.

At the same time, the West must ensure that Russia is under no illusions. Russian use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine will result in the swift demise of the Russian military there via conventional NATO military means.

Then and only then can a real and lasting peace be achieved.

Feature photo credit: Russian dictators Vladimir Putin (2022) and Nikita Khrushchev (1962), courtesy of the The Telegraph.

The risk of nuclear war is minimal and cannot be an excuse for American and NATO inaction as innocent Ukrainians are slaughtered and Ukraine is destroyed. 

The West and, indeed, the world is united in its revulsion over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and perpetration of war crimes to bring that proud nation to heel.

Yet, whenever anyone dares to propose that the United States and its NATO allies intervene to stop the horrific slaughter of innocent men, women, and children, the councils of caution ominously warn that we must sit on our hands because Vladimir Putin has nuclear weapons and intervening could mean “World War III.”

Now, of course, no one can completely discount the possibility of nuclear war should America and NATO intervene in Ukraine. That is a risk in any conflict involving countries armed with nuclear weapons.

But a fair-minded analysis must conclude that the risk is quite small; and that, short of invading Russia, the United States and its NATO allies can and should legitimately use military power to stop the slaughter of innocent Ukrainians.

First, some military and historical perspective: Both the United States and Russia have had nuclear weapons for the past 70+ years. Yet, despite being engaged in a Cold War for nearly four decades (roughly 1950-1990), both countries never engaged in a nuclear exchange, let alone a nuclear war.

Does this mean a nuclear war now or in the future is an impossibility? No, of course not. But this historical record is a compelling precedent and reason for optimism.

In truth, the Russians realize, no less than us, that a nuclear war would mean the annihilation of their country and ours. As Alexander Vindman explains:

I can say from my significant experience dealing with the highest levels of Russia’s military leadership that it has no interest in a bilateral confrontation with the U.S.

Russian leaders have zero desire for nuclear war, and they understand that they would inevitably lose in a conventional war. However, Russia excels at compelling the U.S. to self-deter.

Exactly. And Vindman, unlike many Western commentators, knows of what he speaks. He served as the director for European affairs for the National Security Council when Trump was president.

History. Some commentators, such as the New York Times’ Ross Douthat, note that when, in 1956, the Soviet Union invaded Hungary, America and NATO stood down. Likewise, in 1968, when the Soviets invaded Czechoslovakia, the West stood down.

Why? Because we did dared not risk a nuclear conflagration with Russia.

But those are fallacious and misplaced historical analogies, because during the Cold War, Hungary and Czechoslovakia were Soviet satellite states.

Ukraine, by contrast, is a free and sovereign state. And, through its fierce and heroic resistance to Russian military domination today, Ukraine shows that it has absolutely no desire to forfeit its sovereignty and independence to Russia.

“When the Ukrainians are willing to spill their blood, seemingly without limit, in a wholly admirable cause, American hesitation is heartbreaking,” writes Eliot A. Cohen, a professor at The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.

Nuclear weapons, he adds,

are why the United States should refrain from attacking Russia directly, not why it should fear fighting Russians in a country they invaded.

Only a few years ago, the United States Air Force killed Russian Wagner mercenaries by the hundreds in Syria; American and Russian pilots tangled in the skies over Korea and possibly Vietnam.

Nuclear deterrence cuts both ways, and the Russian leadership knows it. Vladimir Putin and those around him are ill-informed but not mad, and the use of nuclear weapons would threaten their very survival.

Military Doctrine. Other commentators, such as David French, note that Russian military doctrine reportedly allows for the use of tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield; and that Russia has a huge numerical advantage in tactical nukes.

Maybe so, but military doctrine is not some rigid and inviolable instruction that mandates strategic and tactical decisions; rather, it is a guide for military decision-makers.

Moreover, Putin’s use of tactical or battlefield nukes would risk a counterstrike that could utterly destroy Moscow and other Russian cities, and Putin knows this.

It’s also important to note that although Putin is a dictator, the Russian state necessarily involves many more people, functionaries, and decision-makers.

Thus an order to use nuclear weapons would have to pass through several hands in addition to Putin’s; and there is no reason to think that everyone in and around Putin is irrational and suicidal.