The case for supporting Ukraine
Dear Editor:
Vladimer Putin last week said that Russia will not end its war against Ukraine until his country achieves “denazification,” “demilitarization,” and neutrality in Ukraine; i.e., no peace until Russia controls all of Ukraine and purges its perceived enemies. It is also clear that Russia’s ambitions include control over Georgia, Moldova, the Baltic states, and Poland, in effect reinstating Russian control over eastern Europe as during the Soviet Union.
A victory in Ukraine will embolden Putin to press ahead with this ambition and that would likely drag the United States into conflict, not merely with weapons, but with lives. In that sense, Ukraine becomes a test of the West’s resolve to keep Russia within its boundaries, and Putin is sensing weakness. The United States support is hobbled in Congress and Europe’s support is hobbled by Hungary’s Orban.
Americans are understandably weary. The war is nearing two years, and people want to deal with priorities closer to home – the border, for example. The border is important and it is a here and now problem, while Russia’s threat to Europe is a potential and future problem.
But consider that a wider war in Europe almost certainly involves NATO and the possibility that nuclear weapons would be used. And even if a European war remained conventional, the cost in money, lives, and destruction of economies would be enormous.
Abandoning support to Ukraine will also lead other adversaries to see the United States as weak and abandoning its leadership in the world. That opens the door to China’s ambitions for Taiwan; North Korea’s ambitions for South Korea; and Iran, whose proxies are already attacking U.S. forces, may escalate. And in South America Venezuela has begun threatening its neighbor, Guyana. All of these risks are heightened when the United States is perceived to be weak and isolationist.
I support Ukraine because Russia’s war is illegal and the suffering of the Ukrainian people is horrific. But even more horrific is the potential for a wider war or other dictators seizing an opportunity to emulate Putin’s attack on his neighbor.
For these reasons, the United States and Europe must provide the weapons and other support that Ukraine needs to win its war against Russia.
Oscar N. McNeil,
Waterford
Comments
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You do realize that the current debt burden per American taxpayers is $260,000. You do realize that there have been global and credible proclamations of severe influence peddling between Ukraine and the people begging to give them money instead of just weapons to fight with. Can you even name more than 4 cities in Russia worth bombing if they launch first compared to what the USA has to lose? You do remember someone in leadership literally sold our national strategic reserves of oil to China while the rest of us paid higher prices for gas due to supply shortages? Have you considered that perhaps giving Ukraine the $6 billion someone in leadership gave back to Iran might have been helpful to the cause instead of what it is obviously being used for in the Middle East?