It always seems \u201cnot enough\u201d. When a nation-state acts like a bully, attacking less powerful nations, the obvious response is for an even stronger nation-state to step-in and stop them. It\u2019s just like the school playground. The Bully can only be countered by anti-bully force. The vaunted \u201coutreach\u201d of modern militaries, that can drop paratroopers and missiles on a dime, and infiltrate \u201cspecial operators\u201d in the night, should be enough, to deter the bully-nation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But reality is so much more complicated than that mythical playground. There really are places where forces cannot go. And the old military maxim: you can\u2019t send an army where you can\u2019t feed an army, still holds true today. So when Russia invades Ukraine, while it \u201cfeels\u201d like the thing to do is send in the 101\u2019st and 82nd Airborne and the Third Marines and the rest, reality is that Russia is fighting from their home base. Even supplying from Europe, we are a long way from home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And there is the critical lesson of the Cold War to consider. There are three nations in the world that need to avoid \u201chead-to-head\u201d confrontations. The United States, Russia, and China are all capable of destroying each other, and everyone else, with nuclear weapons. There is no such thing as absolute military defeat of those nations \u2013 because in the last analysis, to back them to that wall means a totally devastating nuclear assault. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
So the \u201cplayground\u201d rules don\u2019t quite apply to those nations. If they act as bullies, they can be countered, but they can never be swept from the field. The end result of that is too terrible to contemplate. Vladimir Putin reminded us of that when he spoke of moving nuclear weapons into Belarus, closer to the NATO countries. With nuclear weapons; distance really isn\u2019t so critical. Our current level of targeting capabilities make proximity unimportant. But it\u2019s the discomfort of bombs ready to be launched, only fifteen minutes away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The real lesson of the Cold War, and the fall of the Soviet Union is that it was not achieved on the battlefield.\u00a0\u00a0It was won by a very \u201cAmerican Capitalist\u201d strategy.\u00a0\u00a0The US simply spent so much money, that the Soviet Union couldn\u2019t keep up.\u00a0\u00a0We built missile submarines and aircraft carriers, \u201cStar Wars\u201d anti-missile satellites (that didn\u2019t work) and M1 A1 Abrams tanks.\u00a0\u00a0We raced the Soviet Union to see who could build the \u201cbest\u201d weapons, but the race wasn\u2019t about the weapons.\u00a0\u00a0It was about the resources spent to build those weapons.\u00a0\u00a0The US spent nearly 6% of its Gross Domestic Product on weaponry.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But we forced the Soviet Union to spend nearly 20% of theirs.\u00a0\u00a0It ultimately wrecked their economy, and the Soviet government fell.\u00a0\u00a0the United States won the Cold War by destroying the Soviet economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We are a \u201cworld economy\u201d today. We know that gas prices here in Pataskala are likely to go up as the Russian oil supply is cut. Russia is dependent on the world economy to move it\u2019s natural gas and oil, and to get their computers and cell phones. If the world stops trading with Russia, the Russian economy will wither and die.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It won\u2019t happen overnight. It\u2019s a \u201ccold revenge\u201d, not the more satisfying hot action of confronting force with force. And sanctions work best like a vise, gradually tightening, cutting off sources in succession, over time. Just when they think things can\u2019t get worse, they do. So the \u201cwest\u201d cuts off some of Russia\u2019s largest banks but doesn\u2019t ban Russia from the world monetary system. That comes later. The major natural gas pipelines are closed, but some smaller ones remain open. The vise will close on them further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The world will sanction those powerful Russians who support Putin, but why not Putin himself? Once you sanction Putin, personally attacking his money and his family, how can you then get him to \u201cthe table\u201d to negotiate an end to the madness? In an authoritarian government like Russia\u2019s, if you \u201ctake out\u201d the top, there is no one left to talk to. So Putin is allowed to keep his wealth, as all around him, and his nation as a whole, suffers. The people of Russia will see that, and grow to resent his \u201cfortune\u201d, literally. The vise closes even tighter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fighting a long-term war in Ukraine is expensive, and the drain on the Russian economy won\u2019t be financed by Russian oil and natural gas. Sanctions will dry up those funds, even as the rest of the world adjusts to removing those sources from the market. The Russian military won\u2019t be able to access the funds they need to replace the bombs they drop, or the replacement soldiers they need to train.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Putin embarked on a military \u201cadventure\u201d in Ukraine this week, for the purpose of fulfilling his own dream of rebuilding the Russian Empire. As a dictator, he didn\u2019t ask the \u201cpermission\u201d of the Russian people, only of the Russian cabinet already beholden to him for their power. Russians are going to suffer: economically and personally, as the caskets of fallen Russian soldiers return for burial. Even if the Ukrainian Army falls, the Ukrainian people will continue to make their captured nation difficult to control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The danger is that before Putin fails at home, he will launch an attack we cannot ignore. Article Five of the NATO agreement demands that all of the nations of NATO respond to an attack on any one of them. That obligation has only been invoked once: after Al Qaeda\u2019s attack on the United States on 9-11. Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Hungary are all NATO members, and are all at risk of Putin\u2019s expansion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eventually, over months and perhaps years, the final lesson of the Cold War will be taught once again. The Russian people will suffer enough. And just like Christmas of 1991, they will make a change in their government. Let\u2019s hope that happens before Putin puts the world in a head-to-head conflict we can\u2019t ignore. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"