American missiles — by way of the Ukrainian army — are now being launched at Russia. Putin, in response, is rattling his nuclear saber.
If you haven’t paid attention yet, maybe those sentences are enough to persuade you to start.
The U.S. agreed to Ukraine’s use of the missiles that way because we generally have a strong interest in stopping Russia’s attempt to re-create its empire. Seems reasonable to further assume that the Biden administration gave the OK on the theory that when Donald Trump takes over, U.S. support for the Ukrainians will vanish, or at least slip.
It’s important for the U.S. to stand by Ukraine, because otherwise Russia will keep marching forward and the problem will grow exponentially larger. If they try this stunt on Poland, for instance, we’ve got World War III.
The missiles hit an ammunition depot; part of the point was to demonstrate to other Western powers that giving Ukraine more support will actually pay dividends in terms of stopping Russia’s imperial advance. The Biden administration also says that the game changed recently when North Korea sent 10,000 troops to help Russia, and so that’s why they gave the OK to the missile launch.
It seems that Americans have lost their taste for such ideas, though, given the election results. The likely future is that Trump will simply tell Ukraine that the war is over, and Russia will get nearly everything it wants — “nearly” because that will allow both Trump and Putin to say that they negotiated.
Given the immediate future, what really is the point of allowing American missiles to strike inside Russia? The optics allow Putin to claim he’d been attacked by the U.S., which means he’ll have cover to counter-attack in some manner. And while six weeks of lobbing missiles at the military infrastructure of Russia will slow them down some, the reality is that the future of that war is going to be determined by the next administration, not this one.
Perhaps there’s more to it that we’ll find out in the years ahead. At the moment, though, it seems futile.
— From Tribune News Service
