Parsing The Right's Case Against Aiding Ukraine

Recently I ran across two essays that outline what I take to be the right-wing case against aiding Ukraine. I have some suspicion that neither is completely ingenuous, but I'll take their points at face value. The first is by Michael Walsh, 'Not Worth the Bones of a Single Grenadier' at a site called The Pipeline, which seems to carry National Review types like John O'Sullivan. He begins with an argument we'll see again:

Bismarck was right about the Balkans, but he might as well have been speaking of the Ukraine, a troubled land (its name means "borderland"), oft-conquered, rarely independent, generally restive, and almost always miserable. Like the Kurds, the Ukrainians are for reasons of geography basically a people without a country. . .

But the same might be said about half of Europe; Poland wasn't a country at all throughout the 19th century; Belgium didn't emerge until 1830 and has been twice invaded since then by Germany, which itself didn't exist before 1871. Czechoslovakia became independent in 1918, was partitioned by Germany in 1938, reemerged in 1945, but split into two separate states in 1993. Does Walsh propose some sort of exemption for Ukraine from the ongoing process of European national development? Does he think there might be a way to declare a timeout for Ukraine from history?

The Ukraine won its independence after the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991. As part of the deal, the Ukrainians were persuaded/coerced by Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin, among other signatories to the Budapest Memorandum of 1994, to surrender the nuclear weapons stationed on their soil. The key point for Russia was that the Ukraine, as a buffer state between itself and the West, should never be allowed to threaten the Russian homeland. . . . The idea was that Russia wouldn't threaten its former Warsaw Pact states and in return NATO wouldn't edge up to Russia's borders.

That may be, but a search in the text for the number "2014" brings no hits before the comments. But according to Wikipedia,

In February 2014, Russian forces seized or blockaded various airports and other strategic sites throughout Crimea. The troops were attached to the Russian Black Sea Fleet stationed in Crimea, which placed Russia in violation of the Budapest Memorandum. . . . After the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, and US stated that Russian involvement was a breach of its Budapest Memorandum obligations to Ukraine and in violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity.

For some reason, omitting Putin's 2014 breach, Welsh claims it's the West's fault:

The West, of course, welshed on the deal, and has gradually been impressing other satellite countries near Russia's western border into the service of a now-explicitly anti-Russian (as opposed to anti-Soviet, as it was formerly). North Atlantic Treaty Organization: Albania and Croatia in 2009 and, more recently, the military powerhouses of Montenegro and North Macedonia. More are likely on their way, including Finland and Sweden, historically both enemies of Russia.

But isn't it the case that Putin's 2014 invasion of Crimea, and now his invasion of the rest of Ukraine, has made all these countries nervous not about the old Soviet Union, but about contemporary Russia? This in fact is the substance of Walsh's argument -- the rest of his essay is a general denunciation of Biden in thoroughly predictable terms:

The biggest cheerleaders for the Ukraine in the current war have turned out to be, surprise, Joe Biden and his always-wrong, America Last foreign policy establishment, headed by secretary of state Anthony Blinken, a retread from both the Clinton and Obama administrations. Biden and his noxious family have long used the Ukraine—the most corrupt country in Europe—as their personal piggybank and money laundromat, and in the recent past he has openly boasted about his ability to legally blackmail Ukrainian officials into doing his bidding. His word as a Biden!

The mention of Blinken, though, is worth pursuing, which I'll do in a moment. But let's move to the second essay from the right-wing perspective, Putin’s Last Laugh by Rod Dreher at The American Conservative. After reviewing European doomsday predictions about the economic consequences of the war, Dreher sums up:

[W]hen Western leaders responded to Putin's invasion with an open attempt to destroy the Russian economy -- I quoted some of the statements by EU figures here yesterday -- what did they think Russia would do? It's incredible that seemingly intelligent people in the West live under the illusion that because Russia's invasion of Ukraine is illegal and immoral, that Russia should sit back and allow the West to destroy its economy without retaliating.

As far as I can tell, what he's saying is that although Russia broke every norm from the UN Charter to the Budapest Memorandum, Western leaders should have been aware that a guy who would do that would also turn off the gas piepelines. Or something like that. So what's his point, exactly? That because Putin would retaliate, the West should do nothing? He goes on,

So, how can we be surprised that Russia is using its energy weapon against the West? Again: we in the West have been waging economic war on Russia since the invasion (as well as sending Ukraine weapons and intelligence). You may think that waging economic war was and is the right thing to do morally, but you surely cannot be such a hypocrite as to say that Russia has no right to do what it's doing to the West now -- and you surely cannot be such a fool as to believe that this was not inevitable.

So he acknowledges Putin's invasion of Ukraine is a violation of international norms and intenational law, BUT:

To be clear: none of this excuses Putin's invasion of Ukraine. The loathing of Putin and Russia over this invasion, though, made it impossible for very many people in positions of leadership to think clearly about what was at stake in this conflict.

And that's essentially the end of his argument. He cites the example of an Irish cafe that may need to close if its electricity bill skyrockets. Well and good. Does this mean the West should not have imposed economic sanctions on Russia? He basically says Putin is despicable, but we shouldn't let this cloud our judgment. So what is his policy prescription? I will even grant him the possibility that sanctions, as in cases like Cuba or Iran, often don't have much effect, but Dreher must be aware that the US and NATO are doing much more than boycotting caviar -- they're sending tens of billions in direct military aid.

The military aid is having direct effect, forcing Putin to call up reserves to the point of potentially destabilizing his regime. If Dreher is against economic boycotts, is he also against military aid? Oddly, he isn't clear about this at all. So what should the West do? He actually has no prescription other than to suggest anything it does that actually has enough effect to make Putin retaliate is a bad idea. But hasn't there been a consensus since Hitler and the Sudeten crisis that appeasing dictators is a a bad idea, and avoiding small sacrifices in the short run means making much bigger ones later?

Walsh brings up Anthony Blinken as the enabler of current policies on Ukraine that date back to the Clinton administration. Indeed, Anthony Blinken's father, who passed away only this past week, was apparently a key figure:

Donald Mayer Blinken (November 11, 1925 – September 22, 2022) was an American businessman and diplomat. He served as the United States Ambassador to Hungary from 1994 to 1997. His son, Antony Blinken, is the current Secretary of State to United States President Joe Biden. . . . His father and mother were of Jewish descent and his father was originally from Kyiv (now the capital of Ukraine). His grandfather was author Meir Blinken.

I've been wondering where current US Ukraine policy originated, and this may be a partial answer. My developing view is that the Blinken family represents an unaccustomed strain of at least partial competence in the current administration, and it is somehow consistent with the George Kennan-Averell Harriman policies of an earlier generation. The right-wing objections to it amount to appeasement.

I've also been wondering who's powerful enough behind the scenes to prevail on Biden not to interfere in Ukraine, and conversely, to say only what he's told to say about policy. The Blinkens may be at least a lead.