Category Archives: defense policy

Biden-Harris Administration’s Level of Preparedness for its Afghanistan Withdrawal

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How prepared was Biden-Harris? What is an outcome of that level of preparedness?

…a news outlet said it obtained leaked notes from the White House Situation Room that showed “just how unprepared” it was to evacuate Afghan nationals who assisted Americans during the conflict.

Per AXIOS, the news outlet in question:

  • Hours before the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan’s capital on August 15, 2021, senior Biden administration officials were still discussing and assigning basic actions involved in a mass civilian evacuation.
  • …they’d just decided they needed to notify local Afghan staff “to begin to register their interest in relocation to the United States….”
  • …they were still determining which countries could serve as transit points for evacuees.

Biden-Harris, though, is disputing all of that. The Spokesperson for his National Security Council, Emily Horne, insists,

While we’re not going to comment on leaked internal documents, cherry-picked notes from one meeting do not reflect the months of work that were already underway[.]

Wow. I’m not sure I’d want to insist that the debacle of Biden-Harris’…departure…from Afghanistan was carried out in accordance with carefully developed, long-time prior planning.

If that’s the quality of Biden-Harris planning, it’s no wonder that Russian President Vladimir Putin is just weeks away from invading and conquering Ukraine, and People’s Republic of China’s President Xi Jinping isn’t far behind in his plan to invade and conquer the Republic of China. Those Presidents are playing chess while our President is playing Chutes and Ladders.

Germany “Helps”

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Germany has offered to ship to Ukraine 5,000 helmets and says it will “transfer” a field hospital (typically with 50-100 beds) to Ukraine in February. Ukraine had asked Germany, with its military establishment of more than 260,000,

to provide at least 100,000 helmets and protective gear….

5,000 helmets and a field hospital for an active duty establishment of more than 400,000 that’s backed up by a reserve establishment of 250,000. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko was generous to call the helmet offer a joke. What kind of support will Germany send next, pillows? he wondered.

German law also prevents Germany from shipping weapons into a war zone or a region that might become a war zone. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz further has excused his government’s behavior by claiming lethal aid would only fuel the situation, and he’d rather find a “diplomatic” solution.

Of course, Scholz knows better. What would—what is—fueling the situation is leaving Ukraine dangerously weak in front of the Red Army, encouraging Putin to invade and conquer. The only “diplomatic” solution resulting is Ukraine’s defeat and occupation.

If Germany were serious about helping Ukraine, it would alter its law to allow arms shipments—directly from Germany or (for instance) via transfer of German-originated arms from Estonia’s establishment—into the nation that’s about to be overrun by Russia. It would correct its “thinking” on the matter and recognize that a well-armed and strong Ukraine is what makes a diplomatic solution possible.

No, Klitschko understated the matter. The German “offer” is insulting, and Scholz’ excuse-making is illustrative just how deeply is Germany kowtowing to Russia.

The Utility of Sanctions on Russia

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The Biden-Harris administration is prepared—or so it says—to impose additional, broad-reaching, and heavy sanctions on Russia, if the latter follows through on its impending invasion of Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin has made efforts to sanction-proof his nation’s economy:

padding the country’s foreign reserves, buying gold, and pivoting some exports to China.

On the other hand, Biden-Harris threatens those additional sanctions:

Senior administration officials said the US could ban the export to Russia of various products that use microelectronics based on US equipment, software or technology, similar to the US pressure campaign on Chinese telecom giant Huawei Technologies Co. US officials have previously said that measures under consideration also include cutting off Russian banks’ access to the dollar and possible sanctions on Russian energy exports.

Leave aside the question of whether Putin’s moves would work against these new sanctions. Leave aside, also, the delayed effects that even unopposed economic sanctions have before they start to bite and that Putin already will have conquered and occupied Ukraine before those effects begin.

There are problems for Biden-Harris and for Putin regarding the new and improved sanctions.

For Biden-Harris, the problems will center on the porous nature of the sanctions’ imposition. People’s Republic of China President Xi Jinping will enthusiastically move to bypass the sanctions and increase PRC trade with Russia.

Worse will be Europe’s…imperfect…compliance with the sanctions. Germany, in particular, will ignore the sanctions, however secretive it tries to be about it. Germany has moved itself into far too great energy dependency on Russia and will trade for Russian oil and gas quite freely. Additionally, French President Emmanuel Macron has shown himself entirely willing to compromise with Putin on the matter of Ukrainian relationship with Russia and with western Europe and on Russia’s relationship with the European Union. Also, France’s own need for Russian energy, while not as great as Germany’s, is quite significant. Together, these two economies are strong enough to create large holes in the sanctions.

The problem for Putin centers on that PRC move to ignore the sanctions. Putin already has made a critical resource exploitation deal with Xi that allows the PRC to move citizens into central and western Siberia to develop the oil, gas, timber, and metals resources there. That’s a move that tacitly allows the PRC to colonize Siberia, which mainland Chinese governments for centuries have considered Russia to have stolen.

Beyond that, Russia and the PRC have the combined (if heavily weighted to one side) economic power and overall resource self-sufficiency to be independent of the West’s economic regime. However, whether or not they combine efforts that closely, the closer economic ties that Putin will need—and get—from the PRC, pushed by those added Biden-Harris sanctions, will emphasize the relative economic sizes of Russia and the PRC: a GDP of $4.3 trillion in purchasing power parity vs $29.4 trillion. Putin will be running the very serious risk of reducing Russia to the equivalent of satrap of the PRC.

Yap, Yap, Yap

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President Joe Biden (D) keeps threatening sanctions if Russian President Vladimir Putin invades Ukraine. Putin keeps being unimpressed.

American President Joe Biden continues to threaten economic sanctions and trade restrictions on Russia if it further invades Ukraine, while Russian President Vladimir Putin appears undeterred by the warnings.

On the one hand, a porch dog is yapping.

On the other hand, with some apologies to Merle Haggard, Putin is continuing.

Big wheel’s rollin’; Big wheel’s rollin’, movin’ on

Or, with apologies to Tina Turner:

So we’re going to take the beginning of this song
And do it easy
Then we’re going to do the finish…rough

Because no one, least of all Putin (or PRC President Xi Jinping, who’s enjoying the performances), takes Biden-Harris seriously. Ex-President Barack Obama made our nation a laughingstock. Biden-Harris is just, plain dangerous.

Germany as Mediator?

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A Deutche Welle article cites German luminaries as thinking Germany can mediate the “dispute” between Russia and Ukraine.

For instance, here’s Christoph Heusgen, Under-Secretary for Foreign and Security Policy in the German Chancellery from 2005 to 2017 and upcoming Munich Security Conference Chairman:

Germany overall has assumed a more active role in world politics, and people are asking for this. There are lots of expectations that we play an important role, and we do this. You know, I mentioned the Ukraine crisis. We do this when you look at the Balkans where we are very active.

Reiner Schwalb, ex-military attaché for Germany in Moscow, though, gave the game away (as did Heusgen in the above).

Berlin is a point of contact between Europe and America from the American perspective. Despite our history, the German-Russian relationship has a certain stability. There is a great economic exchange, with cultural exchange and scientific exchange, and repeated attempts by Germany to cooperate more intensively with Russia.

“From the American perspective” is a cynically offered irrelevancy. What’s central are two aspects of the German-Russian relationship. One is this “great economic exchange.” That’s an exchange that’s based on and strengthened by Germany’s dependence—voluntarily entered into by the German government—on Russia for its energy.

The other aspect is that “repeated attempts by Germany to cooperate more intensively with Russia” business. Cooperate with Russia, especially with Russia holding—and having already demonstrated that it does—the whip hand on German energy.

Regarding Heusgen, his “look at the Balkans where we are very active” brag. Germany also has been very active in the Baltics vis-à-vis Ukraine—barring Estonia from transferring badly needed arms to Ukraine if those arms originated in Germany.

Germany as mediator—a risible concept.