FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
February 23, 2022
Contact: press@defensepriorities.org
WASHINGTON, DC—Today, Russia invaded Ukraine. Defense Priorities Policy Director Benjamin H. Friedman issued the following statement in response:
“Any Russian invasion of Ukraine is a tragedy and an act of territorial aggression that should be condemned and sanctioned. No one should be confused about who is at fault.
“But Russia’s culpability does not let the United States off the hook for failed diplomacy and negligent Ukraine policy. President Biden should have offered to take the idea of NATO expansion to Ukraine—a terrible idea under any circumstance—totally off the table. That might not have been sufficient to prevent war, but it was worth trying, and combining it with talks on other European security matters like missile defense, missile deployments, and military exercises, could have worked. Admitting that Ukraine won’t join NATO is less a concession than an admittance of the geopolitical reality that the U.S. and NATO will not fight a nuclear-armed Russia for Ukraine. Russia’s interests there, however unjust, are far stronger.
“Washington let Ukraine get attacked rather than relent on the principle that it might defend Ukraine later, a truly tragic and deranged position.
“The war is also a result of failed security policies in Kyiv, namely a failure to look reality in face and cut an unpleasant deal with Russia to stave off attack. That meant implementing Minsk II and agreeing to be neutral between Russia and the west, for starters. By cheering on Ukraine, by giving it military aid, and especially by refusing to rule out defending it via NATO in the future, Washington gave its leaders false hope that they could avoid the compromise their security required. That was negligent.
“Ukraine’s fate is awful, and a reminder that international politics is tragic and states should not rely on distant powers, however gaudy their rhetoric, for security. The United States should never have put itself in the position of being seen as Ukraine’s protector, the state that either fights or negotiates to save it. That we wound up there shows the poverty of U.S. security strategy; its failure to make choices and accept that trying to be dominant everywhere is impossible and dangerous.”
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