Canceling his Thursday, Feb. 24 meeting with 72-year-old Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, 59-year-old Secretary of State Anton Blinken signaled that all bets were off now that Russian invaded Ukraine. President Joe Biden, Blinken and 45-year-old National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan have been warning of an “imminent” Russian invasion for over five weeks. Almost daily, the White House told the press “the Russians are coming,” at least to Ukraine. While the forecasts look prophetic now, they actually missed the mark for weeks, provoking Putin into going into the Russian-speaking Donbass area where the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk already established autonomy from the Kiev government for the last eight years. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has antagonized Putin asking for NATO membership since taking office May 20, 2019.
Blinken’s cancellation dashes any hope in global financial markets that there’s any chance that diplomacy can return world order. Putin’s decision to move his forces into Donetsk or Luhansk doesn’t really affect world commerce, other that driving fossil fuel prices through the roof. Germany’s 63-year-old Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced today, nothing new, that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline would be put on hold until further notice. Biden asked Scholz to use Nord Stream 2 as a bargaining chip to stop a Russian invasion, apparently not working at all. Germany hoped, after spending $11 billion to have a cheap source of natural gas into the foreseeable future, a commitment former Chancellor Angela Merkel made to ending Germany’s reliance on coal and nuclear power. Blinken’s announcement immediately affected tomorrow’s markets in Asia and Europen, opening in hours.
Speaking with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba at his side, Blinken said the Thursday meeting with Lavrov was off. “Now that we see that the invasion is beginning and Russia has made clear it’s wholesale rejection of diplomacy, it does not make sense to go forward wit that meeting at this time,” Blinken said. Calling the invasion a “wholesale rejection of diplomacy,” Blinken forgets that he offered Putin and the Russian Federation nothing in the way of diplomacy over the last five weeks. Biden had a golden opportunity to move diplomacy forward Feb. 12 when he could have compromised on Putin’s requests for legally binding security guarantees when it came to Ukraine and Eastern Europe. Putin asked Biden to stop supplying Ukraine lethal weapons and make a commitment to banning Ukraine from NATO membership, two easy things to do.
So when Blinken wants to blame Putin for a “wholesale rejection of diplomacy,” it sounds a bit like the kettle calling the pot black. Biden, Blinken and Sullivan ignored or rejected Putin’s requests for security guarantees over the past five weeks, leaving Putin no choice but to get the West’s attention. Putin thought it apparently wasn’t enough to station over 100,000 Russian troops near the Ukraine border. Maybe now Biden will take Putin’s request for security guarantees more seriously. “The United States and I personally remain committed to diplomacy if Russia is prepared to take demonstrable steps to provide the international community with any degree of confidence that it is serious about de-escalating and finding a diplomatic solution,” Blinken said. Biden, Blinken and Sullivan have slammed Putin for the past five weeks, refusing to acknowledge his requests for security guarantees.
Zelensky wasn’t happy that when push-came-to-shove, no Western power was willing to commit troops to protect Ukraine’s borders. Considering his options, Zelensky listens carefully to his Foreign Minister Kuleba who’s ready to rumble with Russia. “To fight for every inch of our land, and every city and village,” striking a more belligerent tone on how to solve the current crisis. Kuleba, like Zelensky, hoped that the U.S. was ready to put boots on the ground in Ukraine. When that didn’t happen, Zelensky and Kuleba talked about the differences between talk and action. “The world must respond with all its economic might to punish Russi for the crimes it has already committed and ahead of crimes it plans to commit,” Kuleba said. Kuleba warns the world that Ukraine might very well use its new vast arsenal of offensive and defensive weapons to repel Russia from Ukrainian land.
Biden and his national security team have it within their power to take diplomacy seriously this time around. If Biden continues to ignore or reject Putin’s requests for legally-binding security guarantees, Russia won’t leave Donetsk and Luhansk anytime soon. Zelensky and Kuleba can threaten to use force all they want but they’re no match for the Russian military. Blinken’s decision to cancel a meeting with Lavrov is exactly the wrong thing to do if the U.S. is really committed to a diplomatic solution. “I consulted with our allies and partners, all agreed,” Blinken said, that the Thursday meeting should be cancelled. If lines of communication break down, there’s little hope, like with Crimea, that Putin will leave Donbass anytime soon. All the sanctions in the world won’t stop Putin from pursuing other revenue streams from like-minded regimes around the planet.
