Putin’s Disaster

Alliance

This week, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) got stronger.  NATO has a strict policy, every member must agree for the alliance to accept new members – every, single one of the thirty members.  It’s difficult to imagine that any thirty nations could all agree on any single issue.  But here we are, Finland was already accepted, and this week, Turkey dropped their opposition to Sweden joining ($20 Billion worth of F-16’s from the US to Turkey didn’t hurt).

When I was studying world strategies in the 1970’s, one of the ideas was to “contain” Communism.  The United States had a series of Treaty Organizations; NATO, CENTO, SEATO, stretching around the world and surrounded the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the People’s Republic of China.  The idea was to create a physical barrier to further Communist expansion.  (Containment was the justification for the Vietnam War, “…better to fight Communism in Southeast Asia than in the fields of Iowa”.  We misjudged what the Vietnam War was all about.  Now Communist Vietnam stands as a bulwark against Communist China – go figure).

Russian Democracy

When the Soviet Union collapsed, the “mission” of NATO seemed in jeopardy.  There was no reason to protect against Communism, when Communism itself demonstrably failed.  Many talked about abandoning NATO, including some of the core countries of the European Union.  Others thought we should ask the newly “democratic” Russia to join in, as a way to support the reformed Yeltsin government there.  And, when President Trump talked about disbanding NATO, he wasn’t really crazy, he was just really late.  

Because Russia didn’t remain a democracy.  The rise of Vladimir Putin created a whole new kind of Russian autocracy, one based on a criminal oligarchy.  It wasn’t about the good of the Russian people, it was about the profits of the oligarchs surrounding their former KGB operative turned President.  And as Putin solidified his leadership, he began to look beyond Russia’s borders, lusting to re-form the USSR. Putin reasserted Russian military dominance in the south:  Azerbaijan and Georgia.  Then he looked at the Baltic States, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia; and the major nations to Russia’s west, Belarus and Ukraine.  

The other states of Eastern Europe, all formerly in the “Soviet Bloc”, were already in NATO.  When the Baltic states looked for protection, NATO agreed.  And that put NATO directly in the path of Putin’s plan for Russian expansion.  

Russian Hegemony

Putin and his minions intervened in elections and made sure that the leadership of Belarus and Ukraine remained sympathetic to Russian hegemony.  And while Lukashenko in Belarus maintains control and close ties with Putin, the Ukrainian’s “Revolution of Dignity” in 2014 removed the Russian backed President Yanukovych, replacing him with more democratic leaders.  In response, Putin sent troops into the Eastern Ukrainian provinces of the Donbas and the southern province of Crimea, where Russia maintains its major warm-water naval base at Sevastopol. 

Putin’s incursion into Ukraine raised the alarm in the rest of Europe.   The US responded with economic sanctions against Russia, but the oligarchs remained firm in their commitment to Putin.  And with President Trump’s actions, the perception was that NATO was weaker.  The Eastern European members were looking in fear to their East.  But without assured United States’ support, those members were left “in the wind”.  

Putin’s Mistakes

America remains embroiled in internal political conflict since 2016.  The “pandemic” election of 2020, the Insurrection of January 6, 2021, and the ugly withdrawal from Afghanistan all gave the perception that the United States was so self-involved, it couldn’t (or wouldn’t) react to a Russian move on Ukraine.  In fact, Putin thought that a major crisis might further fracture NATO, with the US stepping away from its responsibilities.  That was his first mistake.

Putin’s second mistake was in misjudging the determination of the Ukrainian people.  He thought that a “lightning strike” of Russian troops on the capital, Kyiv, and against President Zelenskyy, would quickly topple the government.  Putin could then replace Zelenskyy with someone more sympathetic to Russia, perhaps even Yanukovych again.  But the “lightning” fizzled, strung out in a seventeen mile traffic jam north of the capital.  And Zelenskyy proved to be an inspirational leader, able to maintain Ukrainian unity against Russian pressure.

Putin’s third mistake was in depending on his own armed forces.  In a government where profit to the oligarchs is the most important factor, a well-supplied and trained military just isn’t that crucial to the cause.  While Russian tanks had a feared reputation based on World War II, the reality is that the commanders couldn’t even communicate without cell service, allowing Ukrainian forces to zero-in and kill the leaders of the Russian attack.  

And finally, Putin failed to recognize that his actions gave NATO a “reason to be”.  NATO existed to offset the Soviet Union, now it was clear that Russia was still an expansionist danger.  Not only did NATO, led by the Biden Administration, unite in support of  Ukraine; but two “neutral” nations, Sweden and Finland, determined to join the alliance.  They not only have extensive borders with Russia, but have strong military forces themselves to add to NATO’s strength.

NATO

Putin’s four major mistakes have left him weakened, so much so, that some of his oligarch allies are “testing” his control.  He involved Russia in the biggest land war in Europe since World War II in Ukraine; one that Russia seems ill-equipped to win.  And Putin has done something that didn’t seem possible just a few years ago:  uniting NATO nations together, and making the alliance even stronger.

There is nothing more dangerous than a cornered Putin.  He’s under threat, from Ukraine, and from NATO.  And he’s vulnerable within.  We saw the Wagner Group, a private army under control of a Putin ally, threaten to march on Moscow itself.  Perhaps the greatest proof of Putin’s weakness is that his “ally”, Yevgeny Prigozhin, wasn’t executed for treason.  In fact, Putin had a “meeting” with him, after the Wagner troops turned around and went back to their bases.  That doesn’t look like strength.

But Putin still commands the Russian Strategic Forces; nuclear weapons in missiles, bombers and submarines.  And he still controls the Russian “special services”.  Just last week a twenty-eight year old bank Vice-President “fell to her death” from a sixth floor apartment balcony (Daily Mail) in classic Russian secret police style.   Putin may be weakened, but he’s not finished.  

That’s even more reason to continue to strengthen and grow NATO.  Ukraine has not been invited to membership, yet.  But once the current conflict is over, don’t be surprised to see it as the next “newest” member, blocking one more area of Russian expansion.  It’s the only thing to do, whether Putin remains in power, or one of his “buddies’ finally pitches him out (the Kremlin window?).  Because Russia is likely to remain a “rogue” nation for a long while.  And NATO is the “balanced” response to Russian expansion. 

Ukraine Crisis

Author: Marty Dahlman

I'm Marty Dahlman. After forty years of teaching and coaching track and cross country, I've finally retired!!! I've also spent a lot of time in politics, working campaigns from local school elections to Presidential campaigns.