Analysis

The United States’ recent promise to ship advanced M1 Abrams battle tanks to Ukraine was a swift response to a serious problem. The problem is that Ukraine is losing the war. Not, as far as we can tell, because its soldiers are fighting poorly or its people have lost heart, but because the war has settled into a World War I-style battle of attrition, complete with carefully dug trenches and relatively stable fronts.

The problem now with where the US and NATO have gotten themselves is all they know how to do is escalate when they have pretty much nothing left to escalate with.

A growing portion of Americans think that the U.S. is giving too much support to Ukraine, as the Biden administration and other western allies have taken steps in recent weeks to escalate their backing of the country in its war against Russia.

The Kremlin has put necessary mechanisms in place to galvanise the defence industry and the economy to meet the needs of the military operations in Ukraine. From a long-term perspective, one historic outcome of the conflict is going to be Russia’s emergence as an unassailable military power that draws comparison with the Soviet Red Army, which the West will never again dare to confront. This is yet to sink in. 

The Australian military analyst Gray Connolly said of this interview between Romanov and the late William F. Buckley that, “Careful viewers will note a remarkable continuity of issues and outlook that persists to this day.” (Romanov’s comments regarding Ukraine starting at the 16:00 mark are particularly interesting. – Ed.)

Tucker Carlson talks with former Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard about comments made before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee last week by US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland.

Woodward, who rose to fame during the 1970s with the Watergate scandal and resignation of former President Richard Nixon, told Gerth the Russia probe “wasn’t handled well.” He even went so far as to accuse the mainstream press of having “cheated” the public out of the truth.

Woodward urged modern newsrooms to “walk down the painful road of introspection,” as they look back on their failures with the Russia-collusion stories. He also described Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the matter as having no teeth — but said it was good enough to serve as anti-Trump fodder for the media, just the same.

In an interview with UnHerd’s Freddy Sayers, Professor John Mearsheimer shares his view of how the West and Russia got to this point.  

News that the U.S. plans to send M-1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine makes clear that our proxy war effort is definitively divorced from military reality.  The Abrams, by the Pentagon’s own admission demands intensive maintenance and highly trained crews. Furthermore, unlike any other vehicle on the battlefield, it has poor mileage and runs on jet fuel, thereby necessitating a whole separate fuel supply system. (Then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forced the Army to buy this jet-engined monstrosity back in the 1970s in order to save the failing Chrysler Corporation.)

In his most recent book, The Tragedy of Ukraine: What Classical Greek Tragedy Can Teach Us About Conflict Resolution (De Gruyter, 2023), professor Nicolai N. Petro argues that the conflict in Ukraine has deep domestic roots. Reconciliation will require untangling these roots and embracing a change of heart, or catharsis. Classical Greek tragedy can assist in this, he argues, because it once performed a similar therapeutic function in Athenian society.

Notwithstanding the vicissitudes of the last 75 years, Kennan’s advice remains relevant today. A federation allowing for regional autonomy in eastern Ukraine and perhaps even in Crimea could help both sides coexist. Many analysts tend to portray the current conflict as “Putin’s war,” but Kennan believed that almost any strong Russian leader would eventually push back against the total separation of Ukraine. Finally, the realities of demography and geography dictate that Russia in the long run will remain the principal power in these often tragic “bloodlands.” For the sake of both regional stability and long-term U.S. security, Washington needs to sustain a hardheaded, clear-eyed empathy for the interests of the Russians as well as of the Ukrainians and other nationalities.

Former Fox News analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano talks with Col. Douglas Macgregor on the current state of the war in Ukraine.

Today, January 27th, marks 50 years since the signing of the Paris Peace Accords which effectively ended American participation in the Vietnam war. One of the consequences, according to Georgetown University international affairs scholar Charles Kupchan, was that an “isolationist impulse” made a “significant comeback in response to the Vietnam War, which severely strained the liberal internationalist consensus.” [Read more…] about ACURA ViewPoint: James W. Carden: Ukraine and The Lost Lessons of Vietnam

Much to the chagrin of traditional Georgia watchers in the West, an undeniable return of great power competition has compelled the current political leadership in Tbilisi to pursue a more pragmatic foreign policy.

The battle between Russia and the West for Moldova has been ongoing since the Soviet collapse, despite the country’s constitutional ban on joining alliances, presumably applying only to military ones. That battle has been slowly escalating ever since the February 2014 Western-backed Maidan putsch, rise of the oligarchic-ultranationalist Maidan regime, Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and the Donbass conflict. Many aspects of the situation in Moldova mirror those that led to war in Ukraine: (1) a cleft state cobbled together as a result of World War II; (2) a ‘stateness problem’ with divisions between pro-Western and pro-Russian elements; (3) corresponding ethnic and religious cleavages; (4) NATO and EU encroachment on the country in opposition to Moscow’s interests and security; (5) Russian gas supply issues; and (6) worsening tensions inside the country exacerbated by Western and Russian involvement.

By threatening Ukrainian membership in NATO, and ignoring objections to the alliance’s expansion across Russia’s political spectrum, the administration contributed to an invasion few thought would happen.