Washington, D.C. – For much of the 20th century, the world was at war. That ended, in as much as those things can, with the collapse of the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, the global alliances that were created by the West to keep the peace during the Cold War survived and today still drive much of U.S. foreign policy.
Whether they should is a question people started asking with greater frequency once Donald Trump became a candidate for president. He, it will be recalled, openly questioned America's ongoing commitment to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization because our European allies were not putting as much into the alliance as they had promised to.
The reassessment was healthy, something that Vladimir Putin's currently-foundering incursion into Ukraine has demonstrated. Before Trump, NATO's cohesion and fighting strength had declined. The member states were deluded into believing the Russians no longer posed a threat to them or anyone else.
They know better now – and Trump's pressure on the other NATO countries to increase their expenditures on our mutual defense has played a significant role in keeping Putin from taking Kyiv.
None of that matters to the American people because policy leaders have failed to explain it to them. President Joe Biden repeatedly bragged during the early months of the war about how he had rushed to Ukraine's assistance and marshaled the other NATO countries to do likewise. Now he's largely silent and has mostly been since he announced the U.S. military would be sending much-needed Abrams tanks to help the Ukrainian army fight off the invaders.
With fewer people talking about the war, it's no wonder support for it among likely American voters is slowly dissipating. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was greeted as a hero of Churchillian proportions when he addressed the U.S. Congress was denied a request to appear during the Oscars, one of the world's most-watched television programs.
The Hollywood people who produce the broadcast are sensitive to what America is thinking. It's their job. They sensed people didn't want to hear another pitch for money. The Oscars isn't a telethon. They can tell support for the war is declining, something confirmed by a recent Rasmussen Reports poll that showed 50% of likely U.S. voters believed the Russian invasion of Ukraine has made America's national security situation worse.
According to the survey, 45% of those polled believe it would be better for American interests if Ukraine keeps fighting until the Russian invasion is completely defeated while 41% think it would be better if Ukraine negotiates for peace. Another 14% are not sure.
That's a huge shift. Last July, 63% said Ukraine should keep fighting until Russia completely ends its invasion. None of this is happening, by the way, because some fringe Republicans are questioning what America's interests in this conflict are and whether the stakes are worth the cost.
They are. Ukraine may not be a member of NATO, so the Article V guarantee of mutual support doesn't apply. It is an emerging democratic state being hammered by an aggressive, expansionist Russian leader who dreams of reassembling the geographical mass once known as “Greater Russian” into a single nation before he, one way or another, must leave office.
This makes Putin's invasion a threat to the U.S. long-term national security interest just as Hitler's reoccupation of the Rhineland, assumption of the Sudetenland, and the annexation of Austria were in the 1930s. Americans are not good at seeing what's around the next corner unless someone points it out to them.
One would expect the responsibility for that to be taken up by Biden, but he's been remarkably silent. Instead, it's been Republicans like Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell who have been out there trying to alert the American people and the world, as he did at the recent Munich Conference when he enumerated the reasons for America to support Ukraine until the conflict is settled.
If the 20th century was a time of world war, as I previously said, then the 21st century may just be a time of long wars. We've already got Iraq and Afghanistan under our belt. Thanks to Biden's fecklessness, one ended poorly while the jury is still out on the other. Ukraine may be a third. It may go on for a long time, something the American people must be made to understand.
The responsibility for this falls on the president who, importantly enough, has yet to articulate his vision of what victory looks like. Is America arming Ukraine so that it may defend itself and preserve was remains of its territorial integrity or does victory come only after the Russians are pushed out? “We” can still have an interest in the outcome of “their war” even if we've no troops there on the ground fighting it.
Biden has to explain all this to the American people. It's what Kennedy and Reagan and Clinton did. He has to outline our strategy and let the people vote on it the next time they go to the polls. Right now, the war is losing support because it is costing so much at a time when the U.S. economy is underperforming, the people believe Washington is too deeply in debt to address the nation's domestic problems and, oddly enough, because so few people are still talking about it.
Neglect and attrition along with lack of attention are lousy reasons to let freedom go up the stovepipe. Yet that's what the president is offering now.
He needs to do better and it's in his best interests to do so. His strongest supporters are most likely to view complete victory for Ukraine as better for U.S. interests. Among voters who strongly approve of Biden's job performance, 72% said it would be better for American interests if Ukraine keeps fighting until the Russian invasion is completely defeated.
By contrast, among voters who strongly disapprove of Biden's performance, just 28% see a complete Ukrainian victory as better for U.S. interests, while 56% favor a negotiated peace with Russia.
The Rasmussen Reports survey of 972 U.S. likely voters was conducted March 14-16, 2023. The error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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What a header! Is a guardian angle more like a right angle, an obtuse angle or an acute angle?
Why won’t conservative pundits speak to the consequences for the US, Europe, Africa, and even S. America should Russia achieve its centuries-old goal of conquering all countries between it and the Black and Baltic Seas? What does it portend if Russia can gain numerous deep warm water ports to support a true Blue Water Navy?
Also, why won’t they speak to the near certainty that should Putin prevail, China will attack Taiwan and enforce its territorial claim to its Dash Nine Line in the S. China Sea?