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Nearly any conversation about Ukraine in recent months has become preoccupied with whether a desperate
Vladimir Putin
might use a tactical nuclear weapon. That possibility, however concerning, should not deter us from staying focused on the higher stakes Mr. Putin put in motion by invading Ukraine.
Across the more than four decades of the Cold War—a struggle between the ideological opposites of Western freedom and Soviet communism—the great fear, other than nuclear war, was of a ground war between Russia and the U.S.-led forces of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Cold War military doctrine held that this war likely would start with a massive Russian tank invasion through Germany’s Fulda Gap.
The West, led by
Ronald Reagan
and other significant national and religious leaders, won the Cold War. No one seethed more at the Soviet Union’s defeat than Russia’s current leader, Vladimir Putin, serving then as a KGB agent in East Germany.
In February, Mr. Putin restarted his cold war against the Western victors with a tank invasion. Instead of the Fulda Gap, Mr. Putin sent a tank army to capture the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.
No one should delude oneself, however hard some try, into thinking that Mr. Putin’s intentions were merely to reannex Ukraine and go home to live in peace with the world. After conquering Ukraine, Mr. Putin would have established a military presence on Ukraine’s western borders.
He would have begun political, economic and military pressure against countries on NATO’s eastern flank—Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, Slovakia, Hungary. His goal over the long term would be de facto reabsorption.
Similar pressure would be applied to the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, plus Sweden and Finland, whose quick decision to join NATO demonstrates that these countries understood immediately the broader implications of the Putin invasion.
Ukraine hasn’t figured much in the U.S. midterm elections, which are properly focused on political accountability for the highest rate of inflation experienced in most Americans’ adult lifetimes and widespread, often unchecked civil disorder. But the midterms will be succeeded quickly by politicians positioning themselves for the 2024 presidential election, and U.S. support for Ukraine is going to be an issue.
For now, only the most churlish isolationists can fail to be moved by the success of Ukraine’s daily effort to resist, and even defeat, everything the Putin military machine has thrown at it.
Ukraine’s army is continuing its advances against an ineptly led Russian force in the country’s east and is attempting as winter approaches to retake the southern city of Kherson. Meanwhile, Mr. Putin, pushed by allies such as Chechen leader
Ramzan Kadyrov,
initiated bombardment of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure on Monday, presumably to create a winter with little heat or water. The U.S. said Wednesday that North Korea is covertly shipping artillery shells to Russia.
From afar, it is difficult to appreciate, much less comprehend, how Ukrainians continue to survive this onslaught. I spoke about it a few days ago with
Jim Hake,
founder of the U.S. military-support group Spirit of America, which we’ve written about here. The organization has been deeply involved the past year in getting supplies into Ukraine, including the building of a Ukrainian armed-forces radio station.
Mr. Hake is an entrepreneur, and after returning last week from Ukraine, he makes a good case that Ukraine’s success is due both to a refusal to be erased by Mr. Putin and to its private sector’s instinct to innovate on the fly. A mobile app, for instance, alerts people to air raids.
He notes especially the contributions of the so-called territorial defense forces, an under-the-radar collection of skilled volunteers in towns across Ukraine who largely organize local resistance to the Russians. Or, as he puts it, “People who can do something are doing something.”
It is a sad irony that some in the U.S. have decided this is the moment to pull back American support for Ukraine, which is the fateful but willing nation fighting Mr. Putin’s assault on freedom and sovereignty.
The House Progressive Caucus sent President Biden a letter recently urging him to start direct negotiations with Mr. Putin to end the war. Quick denunciation of the letter forced caucus chair Rep.
Pramila Jayapal
to withdraw it. The always-mercurial
Tulsi Gabbard
then denounced the left for caving to “the warmongers” in the Democratic Party.
On the right, Citizens for Sanity ran an ad during the World Series saying that Mr. Biden’s domestic failures are a consequence of the financial and military support the U.S. is giving Ukraine.
Russia, China and Iran are now in an informal alliance whose explicit goal is to replace the U.S. and its liberal values. Ukraine is now their central, active battlefield. Mr. Putin is bombarding Ukraine’s infrastructure and civilians with Iranian-made drones and ballistic missiles.
Xi Jinping
has committed China to a “no limits” partnership with Russia.
Besides themselves, the Ukrainian people are sacrificing and dying to protect the West from these determined enemies. Once the U.S. presidential campaigns begin, we will find out soon enough which candidates recognize this reality.
Write henninger@wsj.com.
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