Washington Frames Terms of Ukraine Victory as Russia War Heats Up

Tomorrow is Ukrainian Independence Day, and Secretary Blinken is now framing victory in the country’s war against Russia as a return of all Ukrainian territory to its rightful owners. “We must continue to insist that Crimea is Ukraine, just as Donetsk and Luhansk are Ukraine, and just as every other part of the country is Ukraine,” the secretary said. Mr. Blinken made the declaration while addressing the Crimea Platform Summit, a virtual forum for heads of state and foreign ministers from more than a dozen countries. In speech after speech, countries affirmed their support for Ukraine’s claim to ownership of the peninsula that Russia annexed by force in 2014. In addition to Mr. Blinken’s message, the state department issued a dire warning for all Americans to leave Ukraine promptly. Foggy Bottom “has information that Russia is stepping up efforts to launch strikes against Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and government facilities in the coming days,” the warning said. A confluence of events make the warning all the more ominous. In addition to Independence Day, tomorrow will mark six months since Russia’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine. Moreover, Moscow is in a full revenge mode since Saturday’s killing of a 29-year old television star, Daria Dugina, at Moscow.The spy agency FSB has determined, without providing evidence, that agents of Ukraine were behind Saturday’s car bombing, which might have targeted Dugina’s father, the nationalist writer Alexander Dugin. Moscow’s most prominent A-listers attended today’s memorial service, and it quickly turned into a rallying cry for Ukraine war victory.President Putin and the foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, sent condolences. The head of the paramilitary Wagner Group, which has been committing atrocities in eastern Ukraine, Yevgeniy Prigozhin, attended the memorial. “This ultimate sacrifice, the highest price we pay, can be justified only by victory,” Mr. Dugin said in eulogizing his daughter.Sometimes described as Mr. Putin’s Rasputin, Mr. Dugin predicted the Ukraine war long before anyone in the West saw it coming. He is a leading promoter of the idea that to restore Russia to its past glory, it must replace America as world leader. That thinking has long been Mr. Putin’s goal as well. He tested it by invading parts of Georgia in 2008, when President Bush did little to push back beyond issuing condemnations. Moscow took over Syria after President Obama refused to act on his self-described “red line.” Mr. Obama similarly wagged fingers, but not much more, when Mr. Putin invaded Crimea. No wonder that following the disastrous Afghanistan evacuation Mr. Putin concluded that America would do little to oppose an invasion of Ukraine — a country he considers part of greater Russia. Prior to the invasion, Washington was skeptical about the Kremlin’s intentions.Afterward, rumors were spread that Mr. Putin was ill and about to leave the stage anyway. Those gave way to such a luminary as a former secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, advocating compromise with Moscow by allowing it to annex parts of Ukraine in order to end the war quickly. Those voices are fading now. Today Washington announced that for Independence Day, America will send a new $3 billion weapons assistance package to Ukraine, the largest such aid tranche so far. As Mr. Blinken’s speech shows, Washington opposes compromise on Ukrainian territory. Yet would such declarations suffice?“It is going to be a long war,” a Russia watcher at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Ivana Strander, tells the Sun. Mr. Putin, she says, plans on a prolonged European skirmish, and is counting on battle fatigue in the West.Germany and other European countries are already war-weary as the Kremlin signals plans to cut gas deliveries for the coming winter. Mr. Putin hopes unrest in Africa and the Mideast as a result of the war-caused Ukrainian grain shortage will cause a wave of refugees into Europe, further weakening the continent’s resolve. “The only way we can make the war shorter is to arm Ukrainians with everything they need to win,” Ms. Strander says. “We are doing much more in August 2022 than we did in February, let alone last year,” when America may have been able to deter invasion by arming Ukraine with offensive weapons, she says, adding, “but it’s not enough.”If Ukraine falls, or even if Russia keeps parts of it after a ceasefire, Mr. Putin’s appetite would surely only grow: He already has designs on Moldova; Russia’s Serbian allies are undermining Kosovo and North Macedonia; and the Kremlin is trying to involve its satrap, Belarus, in the Ukraine war.As Mr. Putin attempts to rebuild the Soviet Union, each success could tempt him to next go after the Baltic states that are members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which he has long suspected is a “paper tiger.” The best way to avoid have to send GIs to, say, Lithuania, as NATO’s Article Five could require, is to assure that all of Ukraine is independent of Russia.

Washington Frames Terms of Ukraine Victory as Russia War Heats Up

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