TOM BURGUMImage may be NSFW.
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Staff Columnist
burgum@lbknews.com
This is my third column in which I have turned to Bernard Lewis, America’s Mideast expert, for a title. The first was January 2006, the second in August 2012. That Lewis’s judgment of the United States is appropriate again is disturbing; that it has never been more appropriate is both disturbing and frightening.
Farouq al Habid was the leader of a pro West, read United States, faction at the onset of the Syria revolution. He now regrets their choice of allies. He was quoted by Nicholas Kristof in his Sunday column in the New York Times. Habid said, “When we started the revolution, we thought we shared the same values as the West. But I’m ashamed to say our friends failed us. We should have had friends like China, Russia, Iran, because they were credible.”
Ouch!
The pro-West Syrians are not the only allies that have learned the hard way that, as Mr. Habid discovered, promises or threats made by the United States are no longer credible. When the Ukraine ended its relationship with Russia in 1991, the Ukrainians possessed at least a third of the Soviet’s nuclear arsenal. The Ukrainians were induced to surrender these weapons based a guarantee of independence by the United Kingdom and the United States which was signed in 1994. The Russian Federation was also a party to the agreement but everyone knew it was an offer to aid the Ukraine should it be threatened by Russia. So, you ask, how is that working out for the Ukraine in 2015?
Not so well, is the answer. Last Monday, the Telegraph, UK, reported that “up to 8,000 Ukrainians were fighting for their lives in what the Russian-backed separatists are calling the Debaltseve pocket as a midnight ceasefire deadline passes.” A headline in the Guardian, UK, last Monday told us that, “Fighting has escalated in eastern Ukraine as government and pro-Russia forces struggle for control of the besieged town of Debaltseve, leaving the new ceasefire in tatters on its second day.”
The cease fire the British papers write about was the one negotiated with the intervention of Francois Hollande, president of France, and Angela Merkel, German chancellor. No mention of any involvement, even mere consultation with the United States. Maybe even the French and Germans no longer believe we are credible.
In a September 9, 2014 story in the International New York Times, Jen Psaki, the State Department spokeswoman said, “Ukraine has also made a variety of requests for different types of aid, and we’re reviewing all of them to see how we can further support Ukraine in that regard as well.”
It is now the middle of February 2015 and the Ukrainians are still waiting for the State Department to complete the review. Despite all the appeals from the Ukrainian armed forces, all they have gotten is a modest package of non-lethal assistance. I think having a plentiful supply of lethal force would be a requisite if living with in driving distance of Moscow. The problem, or if you will, the excuse, is the fear that providing military assistance to the Ukraine will lead to an escalation in the fighting and provoke Moscow.
God forbid we should provoke Moscow. An angered Moscow might send troops into the Ukraine. But, the reason the Ukraine is asking for weapons is Moscow is already sending troops into the Ukraine. They aren’t dressed in Russian uniforms and Putin denies any involvement. Of course, no one believes him but he doesn’t expect to be believed. Putin fosters the fiction of no Russian involvement simply to provide the West and the United States with an excuse to avoid any serious aid for the Ukrainians. Indeed, the American position in this affair cannot only be characterized as treacherous, it now has the added vice of being ridiculous. While Ms. Psaki, and her State Department cohorts, are busy analyzing, the Russians have sent in the ultra modern T-80 tanks for which the Ukrainians have no answer. Nor does the United States. Our most recent offer of aid is $16.4 million that will be used for blankets and clothing, along with counseling for traumatized civilians.
The counseling might be a good idea. If you are staring down the barrel of a T-80 and you have no weapon that can disable it, you will likely need counseling should you be lucky enough to get out with your life. “Could be worse,” according to Mark Steyn, “he [Secretary of State, John Kerry] might have thrown in another James Taylor singalong. Then they really would need trauma counselors.”
Mr. Obama is confident that Putin will retreat from its resort to armed force, according to Radio Free Europe, because his actions were “scaring” his neighbors and Russia was completely isolated internationally. That, I think, is another of Mr. Obama’s famous overstatements. Russia is not isolated. Just last week Putin presented a Kalashnikov rifle to Egypt’s strongman, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Egypt’s state-owned newspaper called Putin “the hero of our time.”
Meanwhile, the new government in Greece is threatening to leave NATO and looking to Russia for financial and military support. Greek Cyprus has just completed a military rapprochement with Moscow. Whatever else it means, it does indicate that even the small, insolvent states don’t pay much attention to Mr. Obama’s call to isolate Russia. The Russians and Chinese government have concluded what also might be called a rapprochement and Russian cooperation with Iran is in full force. I have to admire Mr. Obama’s definition of “isolation.”
The world watches while Putin continues his effort to subdue the Ukraine and Ms. Psaki’s State Department continues their year long analyzing of Ukrainian needs. Is it any wonder that there is a growing number on the world state that think the United States is harmless as an enemy and treacherous as a friend?