Bold Action to Defend Ukraine Needed NOW

Under the leadership of brave President Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian people have repulsed week of Russian onslaught. Most of the world has rallied to their side. Sympathetic countries have imposed unprecedented sanctions. Ordinary people have taken to the streets in cities large and small, waving Ukraine’s blue and yellow flag. And Russia has been ostracized by organizations and groups of every sort.

The Russian Central Bank has been barred from all transactions in the United States and the European Union. Key Russian banks have been removed from the SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) system. Top Russian banks are under severe restrictions. Individuals in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s governmental and financial inner circles are on travel ban and asset freeze lists in various jurisdictions. The US has blocked access to credit for Russian energy companies and the EU has banned Russian aircraft from its airspace.

In the non-governmental world, people are protesting in a variety of ways. FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association, soccer’s international governing body) has suspended Russia from World Cup play. The Formula-1 Grand Prix, scheduled for Sochi in September, has been canceled. The European Broadcasting Union has barred Russia from the popular Eurovision Song Contest. Russian-distilled vodka is disappearing from liquor store shelves and bars across America. The rock band Green Day has cancelled its Moscow performance. And, in a personal affront, World Taekwondo has stripped Putin of his Black Belt.

While the Kremlin is unlikely to crumble if Russian footballers miss Qatar 2022, such gestures should not be discounted. For all its bravado, Russia craves worldwide acceptance, and this broad-based protest sends a strong message of rejection. It also signals our own leaders that their people support action against Russia.

As for financial sanctions, though unprecedented, they will not achieve much overnight. As US President Joe Biden explained on February 24:

“No one expected the sanctions to prevent anything from happening. This is going to take time. It's not going to occur, [Putin’s] going to say, ‘Oh my God these sanctions are coming, I'm going to stand down.’ He's going to test the resolve of the West to see if we stay together, and we will. We will, and it will impose significant costs on him.”

There are three problems with this approach. First, the financial sanctions do not cut off Putin’s vital lifeline, energy purchases from the west. Second, Putin is trying to convince western leaders that truly effective sanctions may just get them into the war they so desperately want to avoid. Third, Ukraine does not have time—this is war, not a doctoral dissertation on international economics.

This raises a fourth problem. Despite much ado, the west, with Washington in first place, does not know what its objectives are. Is our objective to punish Moscow months after the fall of Kyiv? Or is it to prevent the fall of Kyiv, thereby bolstering the world order that the US, its allies, and friends have been building since 1939? Make no mistake—this is a war against the west, against liberal democracy, against the post-World War 2 order. This war is, for now, being fought in Ukraine, but it is about so much more. We cannot allow Putin to win.

After failing even to comprehend his 2008 invasion of Georgia, sleeping through his 2014 seizure of Crimea, watching Russia perpetuate frozen conflicts, and mumbling diplomatic protests at Moscow’s creation of four fictitious statelets in eastern Europe, we must say loudly, “This will not stand!”

If Putin succeeds in overrunning Ukraine and installing a puppet government, who will be next? Finish the job in pesky Georgia? Moldova? Might Putin pivot toward Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania? Or try to grab the Suwalki Gap, that strip of Poland that connects the three Baltic countries to the rest of NATO?

Of course, Russia attacking a NATO country might be a huge mistake, but is a war between NATO and Russia the way we want to prove that? No. It would be far better to show Putin that he has made a huge mistake in attacking Ukraine.

Finally, although television pundits over-intellectualize it, the humanitarian situation in Ukraine is dire and the barbarity of this attack is only going to worsen. It matters.

What is to be done?

First, let us put aside the political polemics. We can argue about what could have, should have or would have been done later. Second, we must be clear about our objective: to prevent the fall of Ukraine.

Third, we must close the gap on sanctions—no more energy purchases from Russia.

Fourth, we must set up an effective supply chain to get the Ukrainians what they need now—every hour counts. They need Javelin and Stinger missiles, small arms, and personal protective equipment. They need Soviet/Russian fighter aircraft that their pilots are trained to fly. (Some east European NATO countries still have some of these.) We must also be prepared for this conflict to turn into a siege or semi-siege operation. To sustain the resistance, Ukrainians need food, water, medicine, blankets, etc.—the necessities of life.

Moreover, as Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has warned, the Russians will likely try to close off the border between Ukraine and Poland, through which many of the western supplies flow. We need a contingency plan to keep the border open, map out alternative routes and keep the supply chain moving. We should also consider fulfilling President Zelensky’s request for some kind of no-fly zone over Ukraine.

This point will evoke a loud cackle from the folks who seem to believe that that we will fall over the edge of a flat earth if we set even a big toe into Ukraine. There is nothing in the North Atlantic Treaty that precludes operations beyond NATO’s borders. Indeed, NATO spent over twenty years on two missions in Afghanistan on the premise that we should defend forward against threats that could eventually come to us at home. If ever there was a situation—inches from NATO’s border—that could affect NATO countries at home, it is Ukraine.

That does not mean that we should go charging off into a war in Ukraine—the Ukrainians have not asked us to do that. However, neither should we cave to Putin’s threats, peering over a border fence as Ukraine perishes. It is time for the west, led by the US, to muster half the courage demonstrated by the Ukrainian people.

Copyright © 2022, David J. Smith