Warning that 79-year-old President Joe Biden is not taking the Ukraine War seriously, 72-year-old Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that President John F. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev took the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis more seriously. Lavrov says that Biden has been pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war by feeding Ukraine unlimited cash and lethal weapons. While there are differences between the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Ukraine War, Lavrov makes a point that diplomacy between the U.S. and Russian Federation is at an all-time low. In 1962, Kennedy was not in a hot war with the Soviet Union, something very different today. Biden decided to pay Ukraine to fight a proxy war against the Russian Federation, spending close to $70 billion trying to topple the Russian Federation. So, the risks of WW III and nuclear war are far greater than 1962.
Biden changed the nature of the Ukraine war March 26 when he said in Warsaw, Poland that Putin should no longer remain as Russian president. Once Biden made it personal, that he wanted to get rid of Putin, the Kremlin took the war differently, saw the conflict a one between the U.S. and Moscow. Then, one month later, 69-year-old Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in Ramstein, Germany that the aim of the Ukraine War was to degrade the Russian military to the point it could no longer wage war. Kennedy wasn’t talking about destroying the Soviet Union in 1962. He wasn’t engaged through Ukrainian proxies in a war effort to topple the Kremlin. Yet that exactly what Biden’s doing with U.S. tax dollars. Ukraine no longer fights to get back its sovereign territory, it fights, as Ukraine’s 44-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky said, to get rid of 70-year-old Russian President Vladimir Putin.
When it comes to dangers of WW III or nuclear war they’re far greater today than in 1962 when a Cold War dominated relations Moscow and Washington relations. No one in the U.S. media, more driven by political agendas today, admit that the U.S. with Ukrainian proxies, is at war with the Russian Federation. “I hope that in today’s situation, President Joe Biden will have more opportunities to understand who gives the orders and how,” Lavrov said. “This situation is very disturbing,” referring to the fact that the U.S. fights a proxy war using Ukrainian troops against the Russian Federation. Lavrov said that Kennedy and Krushchev were far more responsible in resolving the crisis than Biden. Lavrov would like to see more effort on the part of Biden to move the Ukraine conflict from the battlefield to the peace table. Zelensky thinks he’ll have more leverage if he reclaims lost sovereign territory.
Everyday that the war goes on, more miscalculation, mishaps or mistakes can drive the conflict toward WW III or nuclear war. Lavrov wants both sides to take diplomacy more seriously, something rejected by Kiev. “The difference is that in the distant 1962, Khrushchev and Kennedy found the strength to show responsibility and wisdom, and now do not see such readiness on the part of Washington and its satellites,” Lavrov said. How anyone at the White House can dismiss Lavrov’s statements is anyone’s guess?” Lavrov tries to point to the real cause of the Ukraine War, that the West breached its agreement that NATO would not encroach on Russian national security in a post-Cold War world. With NATO adding more countries to its alliance, Putin felt he had to draw a line in the sand with Ukraine. Putin was uncomfortable with the U.S. setting up a puppet regime on his border.
In the big picture, the U.S. has far more national security interests with Moscow than Ukraine. While Biden saw the necessity of defending Ukraine, he’s trashed the historic relationship between nuclear-armed superpowers. Biden can’t have it both ways, fighting a proxy war against the Russian Federation and, at the same time, expecting to continue diplomatic relations. Biden’s dangerously close to break off of diplomatic relations with Moscow, something that would have disastrous consequences for both countries. Biden and Zelensky have spurned all of Putin’s peace overtures, putting out conditions for ending the conflict. Putin offered to end the conflict in March if Kiev would recognize Russian sovereignty over Crimea and the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk. Kiev did not have control of Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk before the war started Feb. 24.
Lavrov made a plea to Washington to show the same kind of wisdom that helped Kennedy and Khrushchev end the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. Everyday that goes by, Ukraine has more damage to its already dilapidated infrastructure. Today’s Russian strike on Kiev’s energy infrastructure is more retaliation for Ukraine’s strike on Russian naval fleet in Sevastopol, Crimea. How many more retaliatory strikes are Ukraine and Moscow willing to endure as the Ukraine War goes into it ninth month. Lavrov asked Biden to show the same kind of judgment as Kennedy when he was forced to compromise to keep Soviet ICBMs out of Cuba. Biden needs to ask himself how the Ukraine war benefits the U.S. or Ukraine, other that allow Zelensky to retaliate against Putin. Russian isn’t going to magically collapse as Biden and Zelensky wished. They’re destroying Ukraine daily without any benefit to Kiev and Washington.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
