By Charles V. Pena
Over two months into an unprovoked preventive war launched against a country that was not an imminent threat (or even a direct military threat), Russia has failed to overrun Ukraine. But it has inflicted significant physical damage and thousands of casualties, both military and civilian. And against stiffer-than-expected Ukrainian resistance, the Russian military is bogged down, having reportedly suffered tens of thousands of casualties and the loss of a naval warship. It’s probably safe to say that this is not what Vladimir Putin expected. So what should we expect from here?
First, it should be abundantly clear that this is not Adolf Hitler’s blitzkrieg of Poland in 1939. Nor is it the Cold War scenario of Soviet tanks pouring through the Fulda Gap to overrun Western Europe. So, those analogies are misleading at best, and unhelpful — even harmful — at worst. In other words, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is not the start of World War III or a threat to the fabric of democracy.
It is also important to acknowledge that the war in Ukraine is not a direct threat to U.S. national security. That is not to say that Russian military action in Ukraine isn’t threatening, but it needs to be put in proper perspective to understand appropriate responses and possible courses of action.
Paramount to that perspective is the fact that Russia has a strategic nuclear arsenal on par with the United States. That means direct U.S. military intervention could lead to a U.S.-Russia military confrontation that risks nuclear war. So far, the Biden administration acknowledges that reality. This also means that it is in the United States’s interest to ensure the conflict does not expand beyond Ukraine and become a wider war that could spark a NATO-Russia clash.
This piece was originally published in The Hill on May 13, 2022. Read more HERE.