Category Archives: defense policy

Is Europe Folding?

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European Union foreign ministers, citing momentum behind a new peace initiative, on Monday delayed for a week the implementation of sanctions against a new group of individuals and companies in Russia and eastern Ukraine, EU officials said.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius is…hopeful:

Things are beginning—just beginning, we must be careful—to move.

Here’s how things are beginning to move: Russian-backed rebels have renewed their attacks with their objective of expanding their hold on Donetsk Oblast, and Russians and Russian-backed rebels have renewed their assault on Mariupol with the objective here to build a land bridge to Russian occupied Crimea.

In response to Congressional moves for the US—finally—to begin supplying even defensive arms to Ukraine,

Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo pleaded with Washington to maintain “unity of action” with Europe.

The honorable gentleman from Spain has misspoken: he meant to say “unity of inaction.” While Ukraine burns.

No, the only peace initiative that has any legitimacy, the only peace agreement that can have any legitimacy, is one in which Russia withdraws from Ukraine. Completely.

Europe seems unwilling to do the things necessary to achieve that.

Their Minds Are Made Up

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Don’t confuse them with facts.

Congressmen John Lewis (D, GA), G.K. Butterfield (D, NC), and Earl Blumenauer (D, OR) have announced they’re going to skip out on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the full Congress on 3 March.

Never mind that this man on the scene might have some expertise about the Middle East and the threats posed by Islamic terrorists and by Iran. President Barack Obama has given them all the wisdom they need.

Blumenauer went so far as to say

I will refuse to be part of a reckless act of political grandstanding[.]

Because gathering actual facts independently of the Democrats’ approved analysis is political grandstanding.

This cowardice, or this arrogance—your call—is inexcusable by men who play a role in determining national policy.

Remember this in the 2016 elections in their districts.

Naïve or Incompetent?

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The European Union is targeting 19 individuals linked to the fighting in eastern Ukraine, including five Russians, in a new list of sanctions set for approval on Monday [9 Feb].

Yeah, that’ll show ’em.

The EU now has visa bans and asset freezes on 132 individuals and 28 entities.

This latest is in response to Russia’s and their rebels’ in Ukraine renewed offensives to expand the Donetsk Oblast territory they hold and to seize Mariupol, a key Ukrainian port on the Sea of Azov and a key city on the land bridge to Russian-occupied Crimea that Russia wants so desperately.

Never mind that these hand slaps haven’t bothered Russia’s MFWIC, Vladimir Putin. Never mind that he doesn’t think like western Europeans or Americans, and so is never likely to be bothered by the things that would bother western Europeans or Americans.

On the contrary, Russia has reacted with threats and so much sterner actions by the EU and the US are required. Unfortunately, the leaderships are too naïve or incompetent to take them. This…foolishness…is illustrated by our own Secretary of State John Kerry:

We are not interested in a proxy war. Our objective is to change Russia’s behavior[.]

All while ignoring the fact that to change Russia’s behavior, it’s necessary to (to coin a phrase) incentivize them to change their behavior: arm Ukraine so they have the wherewithal to defeat the Russian and Russian-backed rebels, drive the former out of occupied Ukraine, and recover their national integrity.

Update: The EU has chosen to delay even this latest round while French President François Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel travel to Minsk, the capital of Belarus, to beg Vladimir Putin anew for peace.

Threats

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Russian-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine and Russian troops there have renewed their offensive in an effort to expand their hold on the oblast of Donetsk and to seize the Ukrainian Sea of Azov port city of Mariupol as part of opening a land bridge from Russia to Russian-occupied Crimea. In response to this, western European leaders and President Barack Obama are making noises about extending existing sanctions and, perhaps, broadening them to include cutting Russia off from the international financial system. In response to this, Russia threatens.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said on Jan 27 that if Russia is cut off from the Swift international payment system as punishment for its actions in Ukraine, its response “will know no limits.” Andrei Kostin, the head of VTB, Russia’s second-largest bank, said excluding Russia from Swift would mean “war.” Igor Ivanov, the former foreign minister, said that a confrontation could involve nuclear weapons.

These are people with whom negotiation is impossible, with whom a negotiated withdrawal of Russia from Ukraine cannot be had.

Threats such as these should make any response impossible other than cutting Russia off from Swift, promptly. And arming Ukraine so they can defend themselves from this Russian aggression.

Jordan Understands the Threat

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Regarding the ISIS-held Jordanian pilot Lt Muath al-Kaseasbeh: in the aftermath of the Japanese journalists’ butcheries, Jordan’s King Abdullah II ibn al Hussein appears to be taking a hard line. Correctly so.

Elijah Magnier, chief international correspondent for Kuwait’s Al Rai newspaper, told MailOnline: “I have reliable contact in the Jordanian government who says a message has been passed to ISIS.

“It warns that if they kill the pilot they will implement the death sentences for Sajida and other ISIS prisoners as soon as possible.

“There are other prisoners in Jordan that ISIS would like to free.”

A thing that might color the King’s decision: Catherine Herridge of Fox News thinks the second Japanese journalist had already been butchered at the time of the “negotiations” for a swap. The pilot may already be dead, also.

I’m not sure al Hussein’s line would work in the United States; it would start us down a slippery slope to what for us would be a very dark place. But I’m not at all going to criticize the King of Jordan for taking such a step should he find it necessary.

 

h/t Belmont Club