President Joe Biden’s political strategists thought a good old fashion war would be good for his sinking approval ratings. Biden did everything possible to alienate Russian President Vladimir Putin, telling him to pound sand, when it came to any talks about new security arrangements in Europe. Biden flat out rejected Putin’s “red lines,” including directly arming Ukraine with lethal weapons. So when the world wonders whether things could be different in Ukraine, they’d better believe that Biden could have played ball with Putin to avoid war. Putin gave Biden plenty of time to show his sincerity about working on new security arrangements but told the Kremlin that Putin’s wishes were all “non-starters.” So the horror of a war on the European Continent happened, not because of Biden’s forecasts but because what he failed to do to avoid armed conflict.
Putin views Ukraine as a puppet state of the United States, with Ukraine’s 44-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky seeking NATO membership since taking office May 20, 2019. Putin and Kremlin officials told Zelensky that joining NATO would be a “red line,” potentially prompting war. Yet Zelensky thumbed his nose at Putin working under the table to receive NATO advisers and offensive and defensive arms shipments. Putin said Dec. 21, 2021 that if the U.S. continued to arm Ukraine it would force the Russian army into making ”retaliatory military-technical measure,” precisely what happened Feb 23 when Putin ran his army into Donbass, to afford “peacekeepers” in the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, separatist territories only miles from the Russian border. Shortly after sending troops to Donetsk and Luhansk, the Russian army fanned out around the country.
So the Russian army has deployed to all parts of Ukraine, in a classic pincer maneuver, encircling all major Ukrainian cities and towns. After shunned by Biden for two months, Putin decided to give the U.S. some of its own medicine, launching a full-scale war to degrade Ukraine’s military build-up, aided-and-abetted by the U.S. and NATO. Zelensky has no one to blame but himself for taking all of Biden’s bait, accepting arms shipments and advisers, knowing, at some point, it would trigger a war. “If talks are possible, they should be help. If in Moscow say they want to hold talks, including on neutral status, we are not afraid of this,” said Zelensky adviser Mykahailo Podolyak. “We can talk about that as well,” hoping to find any way to get Putin to pause his assault on Ukraine. Zelensky had defied Putin’s demands for months, bypassing NATO membership to get arms to the U.S.
Any talk now that Ukraine would be willing to declare itself “neutral” like Switzerland, they can get Putin to back his plan to def-fang the Ukrainian military. Biden had no problem arming Ukraine, ignoring Putin’s requests for security talks and pushing Ukraine into a war with Russian. Now Biden leads a vast coalition of the feckless to slap Russia with economic sanctions, yet not touching Russia’s energy sector, the one area, like in Iran, where it would devastate the Russian economy. Biden’s advisers already worry about double-digit inflation, largely from runaway energy prices, something already going through the roof because the war. Biden’s strategists worry that more inflation at the pumps and elsewhere would kill Democrats chances to retain the House and the Senate in November’s Midterm elections.
Putin’s attack on Ukraine was more intended as an attack on Washington for meddling in Ukraine, supplying lethal weapons to the Black Sea country, once considered the breadbasket of the Soviet Union. Zelensky has already burned his bridges with Putin after spending months arming Ukraine with U.S. weapons. When Biden said he has “Uraine’s back,” little did Zelensky know that he’d be turning his back on Ukraine when it came to committing U.S. troops. Biden thought he would provoke war in Ukraine, then tell Kiev that the U.S. would not commit troops. Biden admitted to NBC News Lester Holt Feb. 13, that any shooting war with Russia would result in WW III. Whether that’s true or not is anyone’s guess. What’s known for sure is than not one EU or NATO country would commit any troops to Ukraine, knowing it could spread the conflict to other parts of Europe.
U.S. and European leaders can’t have it both ways: Calling Putin crazy for the Ukraine War, then saying they would not send troops after starting the war. Putin massed troops near the Ukraine border for months, sending a loud signal to Biden to start talking about new security arrangement in Ukraine and Eastern Europe. When Biden told Putin repeatedly that his ideas were “non-starters,” Putn said he would have to take “retaliatory military-technical measures.” Either Biden didn’t believe Putin or it was pure hubris to ignore the Kremlin’s requests, thinking nothing would happen. Let there be no mistake, Biden pushed Ukraine into its current mess, all because he refused to talk, discuss and negotiate with Moscow. Zelensky was stupid enough to think taking massive amounts of U.S. arms would not have consequences. Thank Biden for pushing Putin to the brink at the expense of Ukraine.
