It appears that Vladimir Putin was right about Western support for Ukraine in their war against Russia. Putin believed from the start that NATO and the West didn't have the stomach for a long conflict and would eventually fold and ask for terms from Russia.
This may be the last winter of the war.
“Our figures confirm the impression of a more hesitant donor attitude in recent months,” says the Germand-based Kiel Institute’s Christoph Trebesch, who heads the Ukraine Support Tracker. “Ukraine is increasingly dependent on a few core donors that continue to deliver substantial support, like Germany, the U.S., or the Nordic countries. Given the uncertainty over further U.S. aid, Ukraine can only hope for the EU to finally pass its long-announced 50 billion euro support package.”
Meanwhile, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy continues to insist that before Ukraine stops fighting, they will recover "every single inch" of Ukrainian territory conquered by Russia. That's a fool's promise and given more to buck up his nation's morale than anything else.
That said, Putin is not under pressure to strike a deal for peace. With no urgency, Putin can afford to stand back and allow Ukraine to wither on the vine as his allies begin to disengage.
Hesitation and political maneuvering in Western democracies contrast with decisive moves by Russia’s autocratic leader, Vladimir Putin. Last week, Mr. Putin signed an increase to boost defense and security spending for next year some 70 percent to $157 billion. He also decreed an increase in Russian forces by 170,000, to 1.3 million soldiers. This beefed up military spending is accompanied by sharpened imperialist rhetoric from the Kremlin.
Russia’s former president, Dmitry Medvedev, wrote last month in an article on Russian-Polish relations that Moscow now has a “dangerous enemy” in Poland. “We will treat it precisely as a historical enemy,” wrote Mr. Medvedev, who is now deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council. “If there is no hope for reconciliation with the enemy, Russia should have only one and a very tough attitude regarding its fate.”
Would Putin invade Poland, a NATO member? Russia is a decade away from being able to compete with the U.S. militarily. Putin knows this and is looking for signs of weakness in the alliance. He may have found it as support for Ukraine ebbs.
Ukraine's summer offensive was a failure with minimal gains and heavy losses. With Russia loading up for its own offensive, the U.S. and major donors to Ukraine are going to have to decide whether they should continue with a maximum effort to defend Ukraine or if a serious approach should be made to Putin to end the conflict.
Joe Biden sees anything short of a total victory for Ukraine as the only viable outcome to the war. That's a recipe for another "Forever War" and the real possibility of a third world war. Only highly skilled diplomacy can keep us out of a nuclear war and so far, we haven't seen that from anyone in the Biden administration.
“We can’t let Putin win,” Biden warned in his statement responding to the Republican failure to support Ukraine funding. “If Putin takes Ukraine, he won’t stop there.”
There's no evidence for that statement. Taking Putin's threats at face value is foolish. But if getting funds to help secure the border can only be done by withholding support for Ukraine funding, Republicans believe they have little choice.
House and Senate Republicans are backing renewed construction of a border wall, former President Donald Trump's signature goal, while deeming large numbers of migrants ineligible for asylum and reviving a controversial policy under which asylum seekers are told to remain in Mexico while their immigration case is heard.
Biden said he was willing to make "significant" compromises on the border issue but said Republicans will not get everything they want. He did not provide details.
"This has to be a negotiation," he said.
The United States has the perfect right, guaranteed in the UN charter and affirmed by numerous treaties, to protect its border no matter how many asylum seekers want to cross. We get to decide who enters. Biden has given up that right to appease his hard-left faction.
If Biden wants funds for Ukraine (and a majority of Republicans want that also), he's going to have to deal on the border, not just make token changes.
