If there’s anything consistent in this world today, it that former Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs John Bolton loves wars in which Other People have to fight. Mr Bolton, who chose to avoid service personally in the Vietnam War, a war he supported, wants the war between Russia and Ukraine to rage on and on and on, to an impossible conclusion.
In an OpEd for The Wall Street Journal, he concluded:
Mr. Putin’s postsummit remarks emphasized that Russia’s aims—essentially re-creating the Russian Empire, hadn’t changed a scintilla. Russia holds roughly 20% of Ukraine’s territory, doubling from the approximately 10% seized in 2014 in the first phase of Moscow’s annexation plan. If a cease-fire line traces what Moscow now holds in phase two and negotiations drag on, Mr. Putin will gain time to restore his economy, rebuild and repurpose his army and navy, and prepare for phase three. He has patience, waiting eight years between the first two efforts at reuniting “little Russia” (as Muscovites call Ukraine), with the rodina, or motherland. In response, Ukraine requires security guarantees, including from Washington — about which Mr. Trump remains exceedingly vague, his recent positive noises notwithstanding.
Kyiv should reject this scenario unequivocally, not embrace it, with one major caveat. Ukraine must have assurances that European and U.S. military assistance will continue at appropriate levels to allow them to resist further Russian advances, and begin regaining lands, to achieve the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s stated goal of restoring the country’s full sovereignty and territorial integrity. This will force Mr. Trump and the Europeans to decide whether they are prepared to accept Russian aggression or resist it.
Who here believes that Ukraine can ever “begin regaining lands, to achieve the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s stated goal of restoring the country’s full sovereignty and territorial integrity,” without American and/or European NATO troops on the ground, directly fighting Russia, a nation with a strategic nuclear arsenal? That’s World War III, something that at least one of us believes is a bad idea.
How much consideration does this really take? Yes, it’s a bad thing that Russia has been able to invade Ukraine, and seize roughly 20% of its territory, but some things are worse. World War III would be worse, and World War III between nations with nuclear arsenals?
Let’s tell the truth here: John Bolton is an idiot.
