More Foreign Policy Bad News
August 24, 2017
Mattis is in Ukraine expressing his support for supplying Ukraine with advanced weapons. Trump will decide this. In the article’s photo, Poroshenko is all smiles.
Mattis’s comments on this issue are all wrong. He doesn’t think this is an escalation, but of course it’s an escalation. He doesn’t forecast what Russia might do in response, but he should. He doesn’t understand that in the event of renewed hostilities (they’ve actually never fully stopped), Russia will escalate in support of Donbass and Crimea. He doesn’t mention that this is a threat to Russian territory in Crimea, but it is. Mattis doesn’t think this facilitates more intensive and aggressive war-making by Ukraine, but it certainly does because they will think they have an edge and that they have American weaponry and support at their backs. Mattis views the Donbass (and the Crimean?) political breakaway movements as things that Ukraine has a right to suppress, but they are not. They are not insurgencies designed to replace the government in Kiev. They are secessionary in nature.
Why should an American Defense Secretary be in Ukraine supporting its government anyway? It’s not only that Ukraine is a black hole politically and economically, but also that it is a distant land far removed from the security of America. And security of Americans is the only conceivable constitutional justification for getting involved there.
Involvement of the U.S. with Ukraine, through the coup, has already had unintended bad consequences, namely, it resulted in Obama placing sanctions on Russia and creating a long-term bone of contention over Crimea. It has separated Russia from the U.S. It has undercut their cooperation. It has led to more intense demonization of Putin. It has solidified the anti-Russia contingent in America and within its government. It has led to a more dangerous world. Now, Mattis wants further involvement. He’s wrong. He’s advocating more of the same stupid policy of U.S. allying itself with Kiev.
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