A Word to the Wise …
In the eight months since the start of the Russo-Ukraine War
of 2014, the international community has reluctantly recognized Russia’s
aggressive nature as well as its historical manifest destiny to subjugate
Ukraine and the other former captive nations and restore the glory of “holy
mother Russia.”
World leaders and national lawmakers have condemned Russia
for invading Ukraine and occupying Crimea and eastern regions of Ukraine. The
United States, Canada and European Union have instituted economic sanctions
against Russia.
These comprehensive sanctions and rapidly declining oil
prices have visibly hurt Russia, forcing it to issue a plea to the EU to lift
sanctions in exchange for waiving counter measures but not exiting from
Ukraine.
Despite daily evidence of Russia’s military escalation
against Ukraine, military excursions around the world, and east European fear
of Moscow’s aggression, western leaders are not taking their demands and
threats against Moscow to the next level that would hopefully expel Russia from
Luhansk, Donetsk and Crimea. Their trepidation-laced procrastination,
inactivity and rhetoric are only exacerbating the political and diplomatic
situation and increasing civilian and military deaths.
The free world – and that geopolitical description has
returned to relevancy today – is confounded about what to do next. Should it
station more troops near Ukraine? Should it proclaim Russia an international
terrorist state and expel it from global events? Should it provide Ukraine with
military armament or lethal arms so it can protect itself and subdue Russian
invaders?
Among several outspoken legislators, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is resolutely in Ukraine’s corner. In an interview last week that appeared in
Euronews.com, McCain urged the White House to demonstrate global leadership and
stand up to Putin’s belligerence and invasion of Ukraine.
“In other words we have to have a robust policy to give the
lesson, one, to Vladimir Putin that he can’t just move across Europe,” McCain
said. “I said that if we didn’t stand up to Vladimir Putin and help the
Ukrainians that he would move further south and consolidate his control over
eastern Ukraine.”
The Arizona senator said Russia seized Crimea, solidified
its positions in eastern Ukraine, moved more tanks and equipment into Ukraine,
and slaughtered more than 4,000 Ukrainian soldiers.
“Are you worried about provoking Vladimir Putin? Are you
crazy? Look what he’s doing? He is winning. He is, for the first time since the
end of WWII a country is being dismembered in Europe and we won’t
give them weapons to defend themselves. My, my! Listen those 300,000 people I
saw in Maidan in sub-freezing weather, they don’t want to be part of Russia,
they don’t want to see their country dismembered as is happening today and they
deserve our help, by providing them with weapons. I mean, to think that we
shouldn’t, and worry about provoking Vladimir Putin….”
Despite his pugnacious observations, McCain doesn’t believe
that they would provoke a hot war with Russia.
“I know of no scenario where that would happen. But wouldn’t
it be nice if these people who are having their homeland invaded to have some
weapons with which to defend themselves.” he suggested.” I would like to see
the Europeans, particularly through NATO, provide the Ukrainians with
weapons with which to defend themselves from Russian aggression. He’s now got
control of eastern Ukraine. In recent days he’s moved more tanks and equipment
into Ukraine and he’s going to take Mariopul, so he has a land bridge to
Crimea. Then he will be contemplating what kind of price he has to pay to move
over to Moldova.”
Canada, among other US allies, is similarly on board with
verbal and practical support. Its Defense
Minister Rob Nicholson has called on Russia to get out of Ukraine, saying
that what’s happening there is “completely unacceptable.” Ottawa is providing
Ukrainian troops with millions of dollars of aid, including winter wear.
US military commanders comprehend the renewed global threat
posed by Russia. General Philip Breedlove,
four-star US Air Force general who serves as commander, US European Command, as
well as the 17th Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO Allied Command
Operations, has been warning of Russia adventurism since before the start of
the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014.
Breedlove believes that US and NATO must enhance their
military presence in Europe because of Russia’s belligerence.
“Because of the increased pressure that we feel in Eastern
Europe now, and because of the assurance measures that we are taking in the
Baltics, in Poland and in Romania, we require additional rotational presence. What
we are doing is working with the Army and other services to use their
regionally aligned forces to get them forward, to get their experience forward,
to bring that capability to interact with our partners and allies,” he said.
Breedlove told Department of Defense News that among the
challenges faced by the European military command is a revanchist Russia.
Noting the recent uptick in Russian air incursions over
Europe, Breedlove said, “What is significant is that across history, most of
these incursions have been very small groups of airplanes, sometimes singletons
or at most, two aircraft. What you saw this past week was a larger, more
complex formation of aircraft carrying out a little deeper -- and I would say a
little bit more provocative -- flight path.”
He criticized the Ukraine-Russia border as being wide open
and completely porous with “Russian equipment, resupply, training flows back
and forth freely across that interborder space.”
Breedlove earlier this month strongly warned that Russia is
seeking to militarize Crimea. He said Moscow’s actions are forcing the West to
beef up its military capabilities, and it is discussing plans to put aircraft
in Ukraine’s Crimea region that have a full range of capabilities, including
possibly tactical nuclear weapons.
“Hybrid war is what we are coming to call what Russia has
done clearly in Crimea and in eastern Ukraine,” Breedlove indicated, saying
that Moscow has brought military, political and economic pressure on Ukraine,
eroding the border and shifting it toward a line of demarcation further west. “I’m
concerned that the conditions are there that could create a frozen conflict,”
one that creates a new reality.
A frozen conflict would be devastating for Ukraine, potentially
mirroring the one that exists in the Middle East with random urban terrorist
attacks, bombing and drive-by shootings taking countless innocent lives from Luhansk
to Lviv.
Breedlove, speaking later in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia,
said: “What worries me the most is that we have a situation now that the former
international border between Ukraine and Russia is completely porous, it is
completely wide open.”
He added: “Forces, money, support, supplies, weapons are
flowing back and forth across this border completely at will and that is not a
good situation.”
“Across the last two days we have seen the same thing that
OSCE is reporting. We have seen columns of Russian equipment – primarily
Russian tanks, Russian artillery, Russian air defense systems and Russian
combat troops – entering into Ukraine,” Breedlove said. "I am concerned
about the increased movement."
During his all-important visit to Ukraine last week, when he
met with President Poroshenko and other
top officials, Breedlove emphasized the strategic importance of Crimea, saying at
a press conference: “We are very concerned with the militarization of Crimea. The
capabilities that are being installed in Crimea will bring an effect on almost the
entire Black Sea.”
He said cruise and surface-to-air missiles on the peninsula,
which Russia seized from Ukraine in March, could be used to “exert influence”
over the strategic region.
Russian militarization of Crimea and the Black Sea region
will pose definite, amplified problems for Turkey, Greece, the European Union,
NATO as well as Ukraine and destabilize the region. Polish news media took note
of Breedlove’s comments about Russia’s militarization of Crimea, saying that it
could lead to Moscow’s expansion throughout the eastern European and Black Sea
region.
While in Ukraine, Breedlove made his boldest warning, saying
that Russia has enough troops along Ukraine’s border to mount a major incursion
and Moscow is using its military might to affect political developments inside
Ukraine. He said a large number of Russian troops are active inside Ukraine,
training and advising separatist rebels.
“We are going to help Ukraine’s military to increase its
capacities and capabilities through interaction with US and European command,” Breedlove
said, adding that it “will make them ever more interoperable with our forces.”
Another high-ranking military professional, Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling (ret.), who
commanded the 1st Armored Division and US Army Europe before retiring in 2013, has
advocated more aid for Ukraine. He said in a recent interview with Army Times:
“My military background has taught me that those who adapt
during conflict the fastest, tend to survive. Ukraine is adapting, and fast.
Faster than they have in the past.
“They are no longer talking about gradual change,
eradication of corruption, elimination of the old guard, budget reform, and
military transformation. They have developed plans to do all these things, and
they have a group of young mavericks who are smart and up to the task of
leading and acting. War and the specter of potential destruction provide a
passion and energized focus that quickly overcomes inertia.
“We must help them. Vice
President Biden also visited Ukraine in November, and while he likely did
not give Ukraine all the support they need, I sincerely hope he has offered
more support in a variety of areas. The U.S. needs to continue actively
supporting Ukraine, even as we are faced with other crisis.
“We must expand economic sanctions against Russia. We must
find new ways to counter the information campaign Mr. Putin is waging. We must
influence NATO and EU nations to make the continued hard choices that show Mr.
Putin we stand united in not allowing this attack on a sovereign nation to
stand. And, we must increase our training, advising, and assisting Ukraine's
military in the face of bold aggression.”
Indeed, one aggressive response by NATO could be a new
fast-reaction force, considered the centerpiece of its response to Russia’s
annexation of Crimea. Unfortunately, it is proving harder to set up than
expected because of shortages of vital equipment and arguments over funding. NATO
leaders meeting in Wales in September agreed on a new “spearhead” force of up
to 5,000 ground troops with air, sea and special forces support as part of a
plan to reassure eastern European allies nervous about Russia’s actions in
Ukraine. NATO leaders envisioned a force able to quickly reinforce eastern
Europe in case of trouble. Some units would be ready to move in two days,
compared with the five needed by NATO’s current response force.
“We’ve found that standing up that capability has more
difficulty involved than perhaps the alliance expected when it took the
decision at Wales,” Britain’s ambassador to NATO, Adam Thomson, was quoted as saying. “We have moved so far away from
the capabilities that the alliance developed for collective defense through the
Cold War.”
Faced with the prospect of having to defend themselves, Lithuania,
Ukraine and Poland are planning a joint brigade that will provide an
opportunity for Ukraine to learn from Lithuania’s and Poland’s experience of NATO
integration and to develop efficient armed forces.
The plan grew out of a meeting between Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite and Poroshenko.
Grybauskaite, a staunch supporter of Ukraine, announced that Lithuania would be
providing Ukraine with military aid, but did not specify if this would include
weaponry or be of the non-lethal kind.
Contrast these calls for aid for Ukraine with knee-jerk appeals for Ukraine to
settle the crisis with Russia expressed last week.
John Thornhill in
the Financial Times wrote that Ukraine and west must offer Russia a deal to end
the war. Nikolas Kozloff opined in
Huffington Post that Ukrainians should reconsider their Cossack (sic) pride in
dealing with Russia. Samuel Charap
said in Foreign Policy that it’s high time for Ukraine to bargain for peace
with Russia. European Council President Herman Van Rompuy suggested the solution to the conflict in Ukraine
can be the federalization and decentralization of the country.
All of these are examples of panic talk by officials and
pundits who do not have any creative ideas in their minds except not wanting to
embarrass Russia by forcing it to concede defeat in Ukraine.
The onus of a solution must not be placed on Ukraine, which
did not invade Russia. Ukraine is the victim not only of this Russian invasion
but of nearly 400 years of Russian occupation, persecution and russification.
The free world must force Russia to admit its flawed scheme,
withdraw its army from Ukraine, cease aiding its mercenaries and pay
reparations. The free world must support Ukraine at all levels to accomplish
this, including increasing sanctions at a time when the Russian economy is
tumbling every day.
However, NATO boots on the ground is not a viable option because
it would be dangerous especially if a Russian regular soldier or mercenary were
to shoot and kill an American soldier. The ramifications would be too difficult
to imagine.
It would be unjust if Ukraine were to be forced to
compromise. Once and for all, the free world must muster all of its political
and moral strength, and loudly, in unison confront Putin for his aggression and
stare him down to submission.
A popular contemporary rhetorical question asks what would
happen if the free world were to step up its support for Ukraine and opposition
to Russia? A more practical question would be is what would happen to the free
world if Ukraine and the other former captive nations were re-subjugated by
Moscow? Which way would the balance of power pendulum then swing?
Russia’s crimes have been exposed for everyone to see and a
word to the wise about the scope of support for Ukraine should suffice.
