Will Kyiv Meet the Same Fate as Saigon, Which Fell Fifty Years Ago?

Fifty years ago on April 30, Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese, and the defeat was America’s, too.South Vietnam was our ally, whose forces we trained, armed and supported with our own troops, ultimately at the cost of more than 58,000 of our service members’ lives.The grim anniversary is a reminder that those we support to the utmost can lose, as President Trump works to prevent Kyiv from suffering a fate like Saigon’s.Vladimir Putin’s army occupies less than a fifth of Ukraine’s territory, yet three years after he began his full-scale invasion, Mr. Putin shows no willingness to end the war, despite the price his soldiers pay in their own blood every day.President Zelensky may well believe that an American-negotiated peace promises as little safety for his country as America’s negotiations with North Vietnam promised for Saigon.He certainly knows that’s a possibility, and the Ukrainian leader has so far been unwilling to risk any concession that might lead to complete defeat:If Mr. Zelensky concedes Crimea, why wouldn’t Putin press for the Donbas as well — and more of Ukraine next time, when he’s rested and ready to send his war machine rolling again?If peace doesn’t include a military security guarantee, either a path to NATO membership or something else that would set a power greater than Russia’s in the way of any further aggression, what will prevent it from turning out like the Paris Peace Accords that were supposed to have ended the Vietnam War in 1973, but in truth ended South Vietnam’s chances for survival?Mr. Trump and his administration, meanwhile, take a dim view of Kyiv’s prospects if there isn’t an agreement soon — what America has given Ukraine has kept the country in the fight, but our arms and aid haven’t turned the tide of the war. While Americans mourn the fall of Saigon, few wish we had stayed in the Vietnam War longer or believe doing so would have produced a different outcome.Ukraine doesn’t have the benefit of American troops fighting alongside its own, as South Vietnam did — if Kyiv is expected to win, it can only draw upon our dollars and our weapons.Impressive as those funds and material means may be, they aren’t enough to ensure victory. This is why Mr. Trump is determined to try something beyond what’s already been tried, and for now that means putting intense pressure on Messrs. Zelensky and Putin to negotiate.As large as Vietnam looms in the American experience, there is a precedent closer to home for Kyiv and Moscow alike for how a war like this might end.In 2008, Russia invaded another neighbor, the nation of Georgia, and set up puppet regimes — Abkhazia and South Ossetia — in Georgian territory. Georgia, like Ukraine, lost control over about 20 percent of its land, and Russia maintains military bases in the occupied regions to this day.Also like Ukraine, Georgia aspired to join NATO, as well as the European Union, and the Georgians have not given up that goal, though Russia’s violence has kept it at bay. Just as Mr. Zelensky has refused to legitimize Russian possession of Crimea, Georgia does not recognize the Russian-occupied territories as anything other than Georgian. Yet Georgia, a much smaller country than Ukraine — with fewer than 4 million people, compared to Ukraine’s nearly 40 million — quickly abandoned the idea of trying to fight Russia on the battlefield, and for the past 17 years, a parlous ceasefire has held.Faced with impossible military odds, the Georgian strategy has been to stick to principle regarding its territory and intention to seek NATO membership, but to wait as long as necessary to see those principles vindicated in practice.Ukraine is not only a much larger country than Georgia, but a very different one, and Russia’s brutal war upon the Ukrainians has been much larger and quite different from the one waged against the Georgians, too.But the Trump administration can learn something from the Georgian experience.If even a nation as small as Georgia would not concede any of its territory to Russia, Ukraine can hardly be expected to, no matter how remote prospects of reclaiming control over Crimea might be. Georgia’s example doesn’t provide any clues for resolving Ukraine’s need for a security guarantee — such a thing is most likely to be met, in present circumstances, by some commitment on Western Europe’s part separate from NATO.Yet in devising a practical peace, not every question of principle needs to be answered.Georgia survives by having its answers but deferring their fulfillment.That’s hardly the happiest of endings, and it’s a reprieve, not a relief, in the face of danger.Yet a reprieve is more than Saigon ever had, and any path that doesn’t lead to horrors like those of a half-century ago is one the president must try.Creators.com

Will Kyiv Meet the Same Fate as Saigon, Which Fell Fifty Years Ago?

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