The Flaccid President

 

When I last contributed my opinion in this space, I criticized Priest-King's amateurish

handling of the crisis in Syria which, as of this writing, has still not been resolved to our satisfaction: Bashar Assad is still in power and blasting the opposition with barrel bombs and long-range missiles, Syria's chemical weapons stockpile has yet to be completely controlled and destroyed and Russia continues to hold the

initiative in Syria and in the United Nations. This situation by itself would be embarrassment enough for the world's lone superpower but we must now add the ongoing humiliation in Ukraine. For about one week

in February, the Ukrainian people exulted in an historic victory, the deposition of the Russian puppet Viktor Yanukovych from the presidency, and the prospect of genuine democratic reform and closer relations with the West. The transformation of their country from Cold War satellite to modern liberal democracy and free-market economy, started in the Orange Revolution, was within reach, but then the

iron hand of Vladimir Putin slammed down hard. Russian forces overran Crimea, seized Ukrainian military bases, destroyed Ukrainian naval vessels and ensured approval of a popular referendum proposing secession of Crimea from Ukraine which led to prompt annexation by Russia, and are now massed on the Ukrainian frontier with the apparent intention of invading Ukraine proper and restoring their puppet to his former office, all in defiance of Priest-King's protests that this was "Cold War thinking" and Putin was "on the wrong side of history" and sanctions against a handful of his senior aides and exclusion - temporary exclusion, I might add - from the G8. Vladimir Putin is delivering a lesson in geopolitics that Priest-King is apparently too smart to understand, that soft warnings, half

measures and limp-wristed professors' lounge idealism are no match for men with guns.

Preventing an independent, pro-Western Georgia from integrating with the European Union and NATO was a strategic priority for Russia in 2008 so Vladimir Putin invaded that country, overwhelmed Georgia's military in five days, installed pro-Russian governments in the provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and was bombing the capital of Tbilisi before he decided to stop, demonstrating that he would act in his own interest, world opinion be damned. President George W. Bush, though he had started military cooperation with Georgia in the mid-2000's and invited Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili to the White House, was too distracted by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the presidential campaign
and the burgeoning financial crisis to offer more than lip service to the embattled Georgians, which was exactly the circumstance that Putin had sought - a preoccupied America, exhausted by seven years of war and unwilling to interfere in his plans. He followed this calculus again to throttle the West's plans to stop Iran's nuclear program and again to prevent U.S. military action against his ally Assad in Syria, exploiting the West's disinclination for conflict to protect Russia's strategic interests and flex his political

muscle, because for Vladimir Putin, power is what matters. Winning is what matters. He lost heavily when President Bush withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and again when Bush invaded Iraq in 2003. He bungled an assassination attempt against pro-reform presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko in Ukraine in 2004, bungled rigging an election, looked foolish congratulating his stooge Yanukovych on television and is determined never to lose like that again. He wants to restore Russia's former greatness and power, he was lionized by a preening liberal media during the Sochi Winter Olympics (hello, Bob Costas) and now he owns Crimea. Who's to stop him now?

And that is the crux of it. Our European allies shrink from confronting Russia for fear of losing a major energy supplier and inviting Russian military retaliation. Priest-King himself, besides being annoyed by

Putin's open disrespect and confused by his boorish behavior, sees the Ukraine crisis as a

distraction from his goal of deconstructing America into a Scandinavian free-love commune and is disposed to hang back and let the situation play out, which means death for the Ukrainian people. Really stopping Russia would be risky, something Priest-King studiously avoids, it would alienate his base of America-hating Left-wing intellectuals, and the possibility of protecting freedom and democracy is outweighed by his craven need for popularity. In contrast to the swaggering former KGB colonel, Priest-King has amassed a nearly unbroken record of failure where foreign policy is concerned, failure to secure Russian and Chinese support for tougher sanctions against Iran, failure to secure Chinese
protections for human rights and intellectual property rights, failure to defeat AI Qaeda, failure to secure our border with Mexico, scorn from Hugo Chavez, retreat in Iraq, a reluctant, half-hearted surge and then a retreat from lithe war we have to win," indecision during the Arab Spring and the Egyptian uprising and of course, the attack on our consulate in Benghazi that left the U.S. Ambassador and three others dead. He is furiously cutting our military at the same time that Iran's nuclear program is accelerating, that North Korea continues to launch missiles, that AI Qaeda is surging across North Africa and that Russia is massing 80,000 troops on the Ukrainian border, so he has given the Russian dictator
absolutely no reason to treat him as anything besides a ridiculous weakling, so he will continue to lead from behind while Ukraine burns to cinders.

But it doesn't have to be this way. If actually deploying U.S. troops to Ukraine is off the table, there are steps we can take that will put Vladimir Putin in such a twist that he will beg us to let him quit and go home:

• Freeze all Russian assets in the United States and Europe so Putin can't get his money and neither can anyone else.

• Immediately send combat materiel to Ukraine, especially anti-tank and air defense weapons, so the Ukrainians will have the substance to defend themselves.

• Deploy strong U.S. air and naval forces to the Baltics and Eastern Europe, forces capable of

bloodying Putin's nose, and insist that our NATO allies do the same.

• Cancel the planned cuts to the Defense Department.

• Guarantee Ukraine and Europe itself that we can meet all of their energy needs at a cheaper price than Putin can, and then actually do it. Cut Putin out of his biggest market and then watch the Russian economy sputter and die.

These measures would send the strongest signal short of war that we won't tolerate Russian mischief in Ukraine or anywhere else, without losing more lives or territory. They would bolster our allies' confidence in us that we'll come through in the clutch, they would put that whiny little mobster in his place and they would demonstrate once again why the United States won the Cold War. Unfortunately, these measures would have to be implemented by a strong, determined leader and Ronald Reagan's been dead for ten years, so we're stuck with the skinny pipsqueak currently living in the White House: Ifthere were ever a situation where one of those little blue pills would come in handy, this is it.