None
of our myriad blunders over the last 30 years—not our criminal invasion
of Iraq, nor our absurd attempt to create a democratic, pluralistic
state in Afghanistan, not our reckless, arguably illegal, creation of
Kosovo, or our foolish terminating of the Iran Nuclear agreement, or our
brutal bombings of Serbia and Libya, or our drawing and then redrawing
of redlines in Syria, not even the militarily and strategically inane
enlargement of NATO—can rival the wanton, needless tragedy of Ukraine.
Just a modicum of common sense, a little less hubris, a little more
understanding of how the world works, a less hypocritical view of the
world and even just a slightly deeper knowledge of history and human
nature could have forestalled this horror.
Too much of US foreign
policy is now a toxic blend of self-righteous indignation, sophomoric
idealism, and a frustratingly inconsistent and irritating moralism. Over
the last few years there have been a number of articles bemoaning the
loss of an American bipartisan foreign policy. That is, tragically, a
baseless worry. With remarkable consistency from Clinton and Bush to
Obama and Trump and now Biden, our presidents have been uniformly
disappointing in pursuing foreign policy blunders.
But before
anything else, let’s make one thing clear: Russia has blood on its
hands. The scale of destruction and slaughter is deplorable, yet it is
hardly unexpected. The Russian military has never been anything but a
blunt instrument, and if any American or European official expresses
surprise by the level of violence now being inflicted on Ukraine, he
should immediately resign. The military response was predictable and
unsurprising. The real failure here is not the excess of Russian
military violence, but the stunning absence of vision and wisdom on the
part of our diplomats and political leaders. “War is hell,” as that
rarest of human beings—an American adult—once put it. That is why we
have diplomats and politicians who are supposed to find reasonable means
to avoid war. Saying Russia has pursued a ruthless war cannot absolve
us from all blame, although that is what our typically cowardly,
clueless leaders are already striving to do. But that is also to have
been expected: that is, after all, what children do: deflect blame.
1 Corinthians 13:11
How
do we behave like children? Let me count our childish ways. Perhaps the
most obvious way is the manner in which we keep insisting that reality
is more important than perceptions. It is genuinely bewildering how many
officials kept responding to mounting Russian concerns about NATO
enlargement by matter-of-factly responding that NATO poses no threat to
anyone. Is that really an answer to those who live in fear, regardless
of how misplaced that fear may be? Shouldn’t we have at least tried to
provide some tangible assurances and guarantees that NATO will not
threaten Russia, instead of blithely, inexorably, seemingly ruthlessly,
moving NATO closer and closer to Russia’s borders?
I wish we
could chalk it all up to ignorance, but these are well-educated children
who manage our foreign policy. They know how many millions of Russians
died to stop the Nazis; they even know that it was Russian blood far
more than American and British blood that won World War II. They know
about Napoleon and they know about Charles XII and even about Batu Khan.
They know very well the depth and reach of Russian paranoia and yet
they scoffed. Even though our foremost expert on Russia, George Kennan,
warned way back in 1998 that NATO enlargement would “inflame the
nationalistic, anti-Western, and militaristic tendencies” of Russia and
would “restore the atmosphere of the cold war to (our) relations.” Even
though such hardliners as Kissinger and Brzezinski warned against
offering Ukraine NATO membership, their words went unheeded. As
Kissinger put it, “the West must understand that, to Russia, Ukraine can
never be just a foreign country. …Ukraine to survive and thrive, …
should function as a bridge” between Russia and the rest of Europe.
Instead, it will now serve as a wall—or perhaps, a crater—between them.
None
of this is to discount the justifiable fear felt by Russia’s neighbors,
who have suffered whenever Russia invaded/“liberated” them. (This is
especially true of Ukraine, which naively handed over its entire nuclear
stockpile in 1994 in exchange for guarantees from both the Western
powers and Russia that its territorial integrity would be safeguarded.)
It was for the US to bridge that chasm of distrust and fear, and foster
trust and provide assurances to both sides in the current crisis. We
failed miserably. Somehow, inexplicably, we thought we could forestall
this war by exercising our economic might—but only childlike Americans
would think economic pain could convince any country to forsake its
perceived security. This is especially true of Russia where suffering
for one’s homeland is almost a national sport. From the Russian
perspective, regardless of the reality, this war was a matter of life or
death.
Another childish thing is to see one’s own actions in a
far more positive light than those of the other. For example, putting
more troops ever closer to Russia and supplying Ukraine with more and
more military equipment served only to exacerbate tensions, but we could
only see those steps as being supportive of Ukraine and preserving the
peace. Yet we all know that a cornered bear is far more dangerous and
Putin’s calculation was rather straightforward: attack now before even
more military equipment is sent to Ukraine or risk far greater
casualties a year or decade from now.
NATO, we hear ad nauseum,
is a purely defensive military alliance and decades of European peace
prove it. Unless you are from Serbia, of course. There was nothing
“defensive” about NATO’s 78 days of bombing Serbia, during which
hundreds (at least) of civilians were killed. Serbia had not attacked
any NATO country; Serbia posed no threat to NATO. While there are
legitimate arguments that may have justified military action—such as the
brutal treatment of Serbia’s Muslim minority—it was not in keeping with
any notion of mutual defense as set forth in the NATO charter. And if
NATO can interfere once in a country like Serbia that did not threaten
it, why should any country near NATO’s perimeter feel safe from a future
attack? Again, I agree that NATO poses no real threat to Russia. Being
afraid of NATO is like being afraid of the guests at your grandmother’s
tea party, but so what? What I think or Biden thinks or Blinken thinks
is irrelevant to those responsible for Russia’s security. Russia’s long,
dreary history of multiple invasions has warped its historical
perspective. We should have found diplomatic ways to assuage those
fears, rather than “inflaming” them.
NATO’s “Open Door” Now a “Closed Casket”
Yet
another infantile notion tossed about by diplomats and politicians who
should know better is that “any sovereign nation should be able to join
whatever alliance it wants to join.” Thus, NATO’s much-heralded and
incredibly imbecilic “open door” policy. You hear this senseless
blathering and you just want to scream: Grow up! Invitations to join
NATO have the air of someone being invited to join a social club rather
than a military alliance. And getting invited has all the trappings of
getting an invite to high tea with the Queen. If Putin made one
strategic error it was in taking NATO too seriously. But Russian
paranoia always trumps good sense, just as American inconsistent
moralism always wins over pragmatism.
If there is one thing that
is especially irritating about spoiled children it is their double
standards. When they do something, it is completely understandable, but
when someone else does the same thing, it is unreasonable and
provocative. At least when I went to school, the teachers touted the
Monroe Doctrine as a cornerstone of American power and prestige. And we
have been wielding that power over the Western Hemisphere for two
centuries without ever thinking any neighboring country has some
inalienable right to join a foreign alliance. Throughout the Eighties,
especially, our resolve to prevent Latin American countries from
determining their own future caused considerable bloodshed. For years we
financed a ruthless regime in El Salvador that had death squads
exterminating thousands of civilians, including Archbishop Oscar Romero,
while he celebrated Mass at the altar. In Nicaragua, we violated our
own laws to undermine a communist takeover. And even regarding tiny
little Grenada, we were so nervous and frightened by that unthreatening
Marxist regime, we invaded. We reacted far worse (given the weakness of
the threat) to those mere footholds of communism than Russia has to the
stranglehold it feels from NATO. One can only imagine what our reaction
would be if in another decade or two Mexico tries to allow China a
military base on its territory.
And then there is that other
example of American hegemony: the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. If
Ukraine can join NATO, shouldn’t Cuba—having been invaded by Cuban
dissidents financed by the US—have been allowed to have Russian missiles
to ensure against any further invasions? We retain this moral
disconnect: we want to both preserve our right to forbid Western
Hemisphere countries from allying with foreign states, but we also want
to preserve the myth that each sovereign country has the right to join
whatever military alliance it chooses. The Cuban Missile Crisis ended
with Russia backing down. As former Secretary of State Dean Rusk
triumphantly put it: “We’re eyeball to eyeball, and I think the other
fellow just blinked.” More childish bravado. The real reason we avoided
nuclear war in 1962 was that the Russians, realizing that we genuinely
feared for our existence if those missiles were installed, backed off.
They didn’t argue that US perceptions were absurd and that America had
nothing to worry about from a few nukes in Cuba. If only we had as much
sensibility when it came to Russian fears about Ukraine joining NATO.
Russia showed wisdom, even courage, during the missile crisis by
reaching a compromise with us; we, petulant as ever, showed neither
virtue regarding the current crisis, refusing every effort at a genuine
compromise.
The David and Goliath Syndrome
It is
impossible not to feel sympathy for the brave Ukrainians who are
standing up to Russia. Not only are they brave, but staggeringly
outnumbered. What child doesn’t dream of heroically standing up against a
larger, better equipped adversary? So we easily fall into the emotional
trap of conflating courage with goodness. We all tend, unthinkingly, to
see bravery as affirmation of the rightness of a cause. The Spartans at
Thermopylae were brave, as were the Nazis at Stalingrad. Thomas Becket
was brave, and so too were the 9/11 hijackers. It’s a clever ploy by
advocates for either side in a conflict to emphasize the courage of
their favored group, but in any conflict, there is both courage and
cowardice on both sides. Courage is admirable and even enviable, but
courage has nothing to do with the wisdom or rightness of a cause.
Neither does smallness. For more than a decade in the 1960s and 1970s,
Vietnam duped many sentimentalists in the West to look upon it as the
good guy simply because it was fighting a much larger opponent; many of
these sympathizers were later surprised when their Vietnamese heroes
invaded Cambodia shortly after the war with America ended. It is
difficult for children, but we should try to look beyond the current
carnage and the pull on our heartstrings, to see more clearly the root
causes of this horror. And we should never forget that for all his good
qualities, even King David, once he attained power, had some seriously
dangerous, even murderous, inclinations.
Name-Calling and Chest-Thumping
Even
before retiring nearly seven years ago, I had grown weary—and wary—of
how many of my diplomat colleagues could not refer to our Russian
counterparts as anything but “thugs” and “scum.” Thugs was an especially
favored term tossed about with great fervor and a child’s moral
outrage. How could it be possible to ever develop any genuine rapport
and reasonable accommodation with Russia if even our diplomats are so
ill-tempered and righteously indignant? As mentioned in an earlier essay
from five years ago (“Russia: Friend or Foe”), even high officials who
should know better, such as the then-Assistant Secretary for European
Affairs, began a conference by characterizing the earlier dispute
between Ukraine and Russia in Manichean terms of absolute good against
absolute evil. Such a hyperbolic, childish description should have been
met with derisive laughter, but nearly all those sage and august
ambassadors attending the conference quaffed down the kool aid eagerly.
And
then there is our Commander-in-Chief. Chest-thumping is so unseemly, so
childlike, it would be laughable, if it didn’t cause such mischief. Is
it just coincidence that Putin chose February 21, the eve of the
invasion, to announce that Russia was recognizing the two Ukrainian
breakaway provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk? February 21 was exactly two
years after President Biden’s now infamous, still ludicrous, tweet
insisting that Putin did not want him to become President because he was
the only candidate who had ever “gone toe-to-toe” with him.
Amateur Hour at the State Department
Choosing
your best pal for your sports team, regardless of his or her
qualifications, is not something any adult would do. And while there is
some benefit to having people around you that you are comfortable with,
there are few people less qualified as leaders than professional
staffers: people who progressed in their careers primarily by being
well-trained guard dogs for their masters. Other than being
extraordinarily devoted and efficient in catering to their bosses, they
have remarkably little to commend them. Sycophancy is a poor quality for
leadership. Professional sycophants are the worst possible leaders in
times of crisis: they bluster and whine, they are full of
self-righteousness and fear. They should be ashamed for helping to
precipitate this horror. But they aren’t. They are children. And they
are American officials. They are not to blame. For anything. Ever.
A Few More Childish Things
One
should never host a block party and then snub one of your neighbors by
not inviting him. Children like to exclude those they don’t like so
much, but it often makes matters worse. The US should have taken
Gorbachev’s plea to join NATO seriously, rather than mocking it like
snooty little triumphalists.
One should never think that
compromise and accommodation are synonyms for appeasement. Children like
to think of things in black and white; grown-ups know better. But too
many of our leaders have been stuck in a time warp—the only years that
matter to them are the decade from 1938-1948, and that decade began with
Chamberlain shamelessly appeasing Hitler. But even children should be
able to see that not every opponent is another Hitler and that not every
dictator is out to conquer Europe. But to Biden and the leaders of both
political parties, the other 5,000 years of history are but a mere
footnote; all they understand is a decade that is irrelevant to this
crisis. We would have done better to have focused on parallels with
World War I and even the Peloponnesian Wars.
One should always
put oneself in the other person’s shoes. Another lesson that children
often fail to appreciate, but that our diplomats at least should aspire
to. There is a simple question we should all have asked ourselves: What
would I do if I were the Russian president? Hopefully, you would be less
tyrannical, less corrupt, more tolerant, more democratic. But would you
risk the security of your country? Would you sit by idly as an
adversary moved ever closer to your borders? How would history judge
you? How would your own people judge you if you left them vulnerable to
encirclement and attack?
One should never gloat over those who
lose. Who will lose and what will be lost is still unclear, but all
those American armchair cheerleaders should understand that the only
thing worse than a Russian victory would be Russia’s defeat. A swift
victory would have been better for all involved, and a protracted war of
attrition will cause far greater destruction and loss of life, and
ultimately have a dangerously destabilizing impact on both Ukraine and
Russia. But war is almost always a brutish slugfest, and this one is no
different.
One should always be clear in one’s own mind about the
value of things. This is a particularly difficult concept for children
to grasp. At its inception, we joined NATO to protect our vital national
interests in Europe. Protecting Ukraine, therefore, is obviously not in
our vital national interest or else we would already be engaged
militarily, as we would if Germany or France had been invaded. But if
Ukraine is not in our vital national interest, then should it even be
considered for NATO membership? How does joining NATO magically make
Ukraine more important to us? Haven’t we, perhaps, already overextended
ourselves in Europe? There is broad consensus in America that we would
fight, even risk nuclear war, if one of our traditional European allies
was attacked. Would there be that same consensus if say Bulgaria or
Montenegro were attacked? Do Americans even know Montenegro is in NATO?
Does the average American even know Montenegro is in Europe?
And the Winner Is….
Russia
is culpable, but we ought not to ignore our own culpability. Of course,
we meant well. Children almost always mean well, as if that is an
excuse for repeatedly doing things wrong. Appallingly self-satisfied
about our moral superiority and hubristically dismissive of Russian
history and xenophobia, we have helped plunge Europe into a conflict as
useless and avoidable as was World War I. That our hatred of Russia far
outweighs our affection for Ukraine is now obvious. Like a latter-day
Brutus, America should candidly confess that it is not that we loved
Ukraine less, but that we hated Russia more. And like the Hungarian
people in 1956, the Ukrainians have been horribly led astray by the
West. As have the Russians. They genuinely believed that after the fall
of the Soviet Union they would be welcomed into Europe and not remain an
adversary. Recently, a Russian TV commentator, Dmitry Kiselev, starkly
explained why Russia would be willing to launch nuclear warheads at
Western Europe: “The principle is: why do we need the world if Russia
won’t be in it?”
As we have greatly miscalculated Russia’s sense
of betrayal and alienation, Russia has greatly miscalculated Ukrainian
tenacity and patriotism. In a recent, rousing speech the Ukrainian
President, Volodymyr Zelensky, declared that “If Ukraine fails, the
whole of Europe will fail.” This heroic, defiant warning has been met
with the usual emotional outcry of support that one has come to expect
from the childlike masses—reality must never get in the way of
sentiment. But we have already failed. We have all already fallen into a
no-win situation. It doesn’t matter how this ends, whether with the
collapse or humiliation of Russia, or the incorporation of Ukraine into a
larger federation of Slavic states, or anything in between, we lose. We
lose.
There is only one clear winner regardless of the outcome
of this crisis and that is China. China will bring Russia ever closer
into its orbit as Europe pushes Russia further away. This does not bode
well for the future. The whole point of the US opening to China
half-a-century ago was to create a new counterweight to the Soviet
Union, and for a while that worked. But now it will be the US, along
with its European allies, that will have to contend with two belligerent
nuclear powers that have grown closer to each other and more suspicious
of the West. Time is running out. For all the horrors of war, war
sometimes provides an opportunity to fix long-festering problems. If we
had the vision and the courage, we could ensure a good outcome that
would preserve Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty and also
assuage Russia’s fears. But that is not likely, even though a decade
from now we will find ourselves in a far more precarious global
situation, all because we failed to bring Russia into the European fold.