Biden Lost in the Fog of War

By JED BABBIN

The lasting symbol of the Russian invasion of Ukraine that began last Thursday should be the tank flying a big red hammer and sickle flag of the Soviet Union as it crossed the Russian border into Ukraine. It was no accident.
 
Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union the “evil empire.” Thanks to him — and Margaret Thatcher and Pope John Paul II — the Soviet Union lost the Cold War and fell apart. Former KGB Colonel Vladimir Putin said that the fall of the Soviet Union and the dissolution of its empire was a major geopolitical catastrophe.
 
Putin is now trying to put the “empire” back in “evil empire.” And, as usual, President Biden and his administration are appeasing Putin.
 
It’s easy to discount morons like climate czar John Kerry. Kerry’s Monday statement — bemoaning the massive emissions that are resulting from the Russian war on Ukraine — said that he hoped nations’ leaders wouldn’t lose their concentration on climate change and that, “I hope President Putin will help us to stay on track with respect of what we need to do for the climate.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on Biden and our NATO allies to impose those sanctions before the invasion, not after it. His plea fell on deaf ears.

Kerry’s statement, I predict, will stand as the dumbest thing said in 2022 regardless of what Alexandria Cutie-Cortez and Bernie Sanders might say.
 
It’s not so easy to discount what Biden and his team of idiots are saying and doing. There’s apparently no one in the Biden administration with an IQ above room temperature.
 
Biden has, for months, said that the U.S. was committed to preserving the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. He promised devastating sanctions against Russia if they invaded it.
 
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on Biden and our NATO allies to impose those sanctions before the invasion, not after it. His plea fell on deaf ears.
 
Worse still, Biden and Co. are neither imposing such sanctions now nor are they cutting off their reliance on Russia.
 
Secretary of State Tony Blinken said we would continue buying Russian oil. That, of course, is not the worst of it.
 
Biden still wants Putin’s help to talk Iran into a revival of the 2015 Obama nuclear weapons deal. For those just joining us, the 2015 deal was accurately described by former president Trump as the worst deal ever. Trump canceled the deal in 2018 and Biden is obsessed with reviving it.
 
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Both the oil purchases and plea for help with Iran are shameful acts of appeasement toward Putin.
 
If Biden were serious about punishing Russia economically, he would insist that all Russian banks be removed from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication — SWIFT — mechanism for bank transfers. SWIFT provides a virtually instant means of clearing bank transactions between nations. If Russian banks were removed from it, Russians would have to use hard currency to buy or sell anything on the international market.
 
The EU gets about forty percent of its natural gas from Russia. That prevents Russian expulsion from SWIFT and Biden is satisfied with pretending that Russian banks are being expelled. Some Russian banks are being expelled but those necessary for EU nations — Germany and Italy in particular — to pay for Russian gas are undisturbed.
 
What Biden should be doing is undoing his anti-energy policies. Reopen federal lands to oil and gas drilling. Issue permits immediately for the Keystone XK pipeline and the other pipelines Biden has blocked, and make us energy independent again as we were under Trump.
 
If Biden did these things, we could greatly increase our oil and gas exports to Europe, making them less dependent on Russia. But he’ll do none of these things.
 
None of the sanctions Biden and others are imposing will have any effect on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. What is having a major effect is how well the Ukrainian air and ground forces are fighting.
 
The Ukrainians are fighting exceptionally bravely and well. Putin has reportedly only committed about half of the troops — some 75,000 — that had been massed on Ukraine’s borders with Russia and Belarus. The Russians have, surprisingly, failed to establish air supremacy and are suffering significant losses to Ukrainian air forces.
 
Ukraine’s military and civilians are fighting well on the ground. Ordinary citizens have volunteered and have been armed by the Ukrainian government with automatic weapons. They have, as of this writing, kept Russian troops from seizing the capital city of Kyiv but not Kharkiv, another major city. Russian forces are trying to seize electric power plants — both nuclear and conventional — to turn out the lights in Ukraine.
 
Meanwhile, the inevitable humanitarian disaster is happening in real time. More than 120,000 Ukrainians have made or are making their way to Poland. Roads to the Polish border are jammed.
 
Zelensky, an accidental president and former TV comic, has proved himself a brave statesman. He turned down a Biden offer to be evacuated with his family. Zelensky said, “The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride.” If the roles were reversed would Biden have proven as brave? I doubt it. Zelensky isn’t Churchill, but he’s standing tall while Biden simpers in Delaware.

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