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Victor Davis Hanson: Americans Differ on Ukraine and Gaza
American Greatness ^ | 4 Apr, 2024 | Victor Davis Hanson

Posted on 04/04/2024 6:21:41 AM PDT by MtnClimber

What are we to conclude about these contradictory wars and American attitudes toward them? The more democratic and defensive the power, the more Americans support it—but only up to a point.

When Russia invaded Ukraine, Americans overwhelmingly supported Ukraine—as they did with Israel after October 7.

No wonder: Ukraine was surprise attacked by Russia, and Israel was by Hamas.

It seemed an easy binary of good versus evil: both the attacked Ukraine and Israel are pro-Western. Both their attackers, anti-Western Russia and Hamas, are not.

Now everything is bifurcating. And the politics of the wars in America reflect incoherence.

Both Ukraine and Israel are portrayed in the media as supposedly bogging down in their counteroffensives.

More pro-Israel Republicans are troubled by Ukraine’s strategy, or lack thereof, in an increasing Somme-like stalemate.

Yet more pro-Ukrainian Democrats are turning away from Israel as it dismantles Gaza in the messy, bloody slog against Hamas. The left claims either Israel cannot or should not defeat Hamas, or at least at the present cost.

So the left pushes Israel to a ceasefire with Hamas.

It blasts Israeli “disproportionate” responses.

It demands that Israel avoid collateral damage.

It pressures it to form a wartime bipartisan government.

It lobbies to cut it off from American resupply.

It is terrified that Israel will expand the war by responding to aggression from Hezbollah and Iran.

Yet on Ukraine, the left oddly pivots to the very opposite agenda.

It believes Ukraine should not be forced to make peace with Russian “fascists.” It must become disproportionate to “win” the war.

President Zelensky deserves a pass, despite cancelling elections while suspending political parties.

America must step up its resupply to Kyiv with more and far deadlier weapons.

Ukraine has a perfect right to hit targets inside Russia.

(Excerpt) Read more at amgreatness.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs
KEYWORDS: vdh; victordavishanson
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1 posted on 04/04/2024 6:21:41 AM PDT by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber

The opinions of the left in these conflicts is interesting.


2 posted on 04/04/2024 6:21:58 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page. More photos added.)
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To: texas booster

VDH ping


3 posted on 04/04/2024 6:22:25 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page. More photos added.)
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To: MtnClimber

The Left always chooses evil.


4 posted on 04/04/2024 6:24:44 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy (It's not "Quiet Quitting" -- it's "Going Galt".)
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To: ClearCase_guy

Ah no. Freepers supporting Russia have unknowingly joined the Iranian Axis of evil supporting Hamas. The right has also chosen evil


5 posted on 04/04/2024 6:27:51 AM PDT by bert ( (KE. NP. +12) Hamascide is required in totality)
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To: MtnClimber

No, Americans do not.

Americans and liberals do.


6 posted on 04/04/2024 6:34:21 AM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either opinion, or satire, or both.)
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To: All

Biden set to sell up to 50 F-15 fighter jets to Israel for $18 billion
Biggest arms sale to Tel Aviv since start of war against Hamas’ Oct 7, 2023 attack
Daily Mail ^ | April 1, 2024 | Nick Allen
Posted on 4/2/2024, 9:49:12 AM by Angelino97

The White House is set to approve an $18 billion arms sale to Israel including several dozen F-15 fighter planes. It would be the biggest arms sale by Washington to Tel Aviv since the start of Israel’s war against Hamas on October 7. The sale has been under consideration since the United States received a formal request in January 2023.

Speeding up the delivery was among the main requests from Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant when he visited Washington last week. Gallant held talks with U.S. officials including Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. The F-15s need to be built and would not arrive in Israel for several years. Israel wants to increase its air power not just to fight Hamas but to deter the threat from Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah.

The military package includes a large number of F-15 aircraft, aircraft munitions and support services, training, maintenance, and many years of contractor support during the lifecycle of the aircraft, which could be up to two decades. CNN reported that the agreement may include up to 50 F-15s.

(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...


7 posted on 04/04/2024 6:37:25 AM PDT by Liz (This then is how we should pray: Our Father wIho art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. )
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To: MtnClimber

Left unimpeded, Israel would have Gaza cleaned up in a month.
Ukraine will get their ass handed to them, when the neocons get their grift.


8 posted on 04/04/2024 6:48:54 AM PDT by Fireone (Who killed Obama's chef?)
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To: bert
"Ah no. Freepers supporting Russia have unknowingly joined the Iranian Axis of evil supporting Hamas. The right has also chosen evil"

I mildly support Israel but I absolutely do not support the Ukraine. Please do attempt to explain to us why George Washington was wrong for being against foreign wars and empire. In reality both Israel and the Ukraine are none of our business. We have more things to be concerned with at home like a communist purge.

Neocon Zeepers are as bad as or worse than leftists.

9 posted on 04/04/2024 6:51:45 AM PDT by wildcard_redneck (He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither.q)
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To: wildcard_redneck

George Washington was the original isolationist.


10 posted on 04/04/2024 7:01:47 AM PDT by bert ( (KE. NP. +12) Hamascide is required in totality)
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To: Liz

The difference in these two situations does not lie in morality. It lies in capacity for victory.

In any protracted war (and putting aside the use of nukes), victory goes to the side with the resources necessary to fight over the long haul and the political will to use those resources. See “The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers” by Paul Kennedy.

Russia is a much larger country than Ukraine. Its political will is largely concentrated in a single person. (Not a system I would want to live under, but it has its benefits).
A person who is apparently prepared and willing to let his country absorb as many casualties as necessary, and keep fighting as long as it takes, to achieve victory. Because it will eventually win a sufficiently protracted war.

Ukraine stood up bravely to the Russian invasion. With help from the west. But the political will to continue to provide that help is flagging. And, unlike Russia, Ukraine is reaching the point where it is running out of soldiers willing to fight the war.

Therefore, Ukraine needs to cut the best deal it can and quit. The alternative is that it will eventually be overrun and reabsorbed into the Russian Empire.

In a perfect world, this poor alternative would not be the only alternative. In a perfect world, Russian aggression would be repulsed and defeated. Too bad this is not a perfect world.

Israel-Hamas is the exact opposite situation. Israel is the entity with staying power in that conflict. And it has shown that it is willing to stay with the war and absorb the necessary casualties until victory over Hamas, which appears to be only about one campaign away.

Israel would be foolish to follow Biden’s terrible advice and quit now. Having already absorbed most of the cost, it should pursue its war until final victory.


11 posted on 04/04/2024 7:05:21 AM PDT by TheConservator ( For Libtards, barring Trump from the presidency is worth destroying 235 years the rule of law)
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To: MtnClimber

The Left believes whatever the TV tells them to believe. To them, critical thinking is racist-or-something.


12 posted on 04/04/2024 7:11:46 AM PDT by UnwashedPeasant (The pandemic we suffer from is not COVID. It is Marxist Democrat Leftism.)
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To: bert

Moscow’s steadfast allies are Hamas, Iran, North Korea, and weak-minded Freepers.

One would think that when VIP Russians discuss “reversing the illegal transfer of Alaska” that Americans would be angry with Russia and its Duma and its dictator. When Russians brag about their ability to win nuclear wars then one would think that America should take the promise of future Russian aggression seriously. When one sees the mindset of dictator Putin blaming Poland for the 1939 invasion you would think they would cease defending such an evil man. How can one invade the Republic of Georgia and then Ukraine and still have so many Americans rushing to the dictator’s defense?


13 posted on 04/04/2024 7:12:08 AM PDT by Monterrosa-24 (Saludemos la patria orgullosos)
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To: MtnClimber

When ham ass attacked Israel, I pointed out to my wife that on average, the world is anti-semitic, and Israel’s support would be short lasting.


14 posted on 04/04/2024 7:46:55 AM PDT by Uncle Miltie (DEI = Didn't Earn It!)
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To: bert

No more proxy wars for foreign interests.


15 posted on 04/04/2024 8:35:31 AM PDT by mrmeyer (You can't conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him. Robert Heinlein)
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To: MtnClimber

“Ukraine has a perfect right to hit targets inside Russia.”

Yes...but it’s a foolish thing to do.


16 posted on 04/04/2024 9:11:28 AM PDT by FreedomForce
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To: MtnClimber

Book:

The Russians Are Coming, Again: The First Cold War as Tragedy, the Second as Farce

Synopsis:

Synopsis:

Karl Marx famously wrote in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon that history repeats itself, “first as tragedy, then as farce.” The Cold War waged between the United States and Soviet Union from 1945 until the latter’s dissolution in 1991 was a great tragedy, resulting in millions of civilian deaths in proxy wars, and a destructive arms race that diverted money from social spending and nearly led to nuclear annihilation. The New Cold War between the United States and Russia is playing out as farce – a dangerous one at that. The Russians Are Coming, Again is a red flag to restore our historical consciousness about U.S.-Russian relations, and how denying this consciousness is leading to a repetition of past follies.

Kuzmarov and Marciano’s book is timely and trenchant. The authors argue that the Democrats’ strategy, backed by the corporate media, of demonizing Russia and Putin in order to challenge Trump is not only dangerous, but also, based on the evidence so far, unjustified, misguided, and a major distraction. Grounding their argument in all-but-forgotten U.S.-Russian history, such as the 1918-20 Allied invasion of Soviet Russia, the book delivers a panoramic narrative of the First Cold War, showing it as an all-too-avoidable catastrophe run by the imperatives of class rule and political witch-hunts. The distortion of public memory surrounding the First Cold War has set the groundwork for the New Cold War, which the book explains is a key feature, skewing the nation’s politics yet again. This is an important, necessary book, one that, by including accounts of the wisdom and courage of the First Cold War’s victims and dissidents, will inspire a fresh generation of radicals in today’s new, dangerously farcical times.
About the Author:
Jeremy Kuzmarov is Jay P. Walker Assistant Professor of American History, University of Tulsa. He is the author of Modernizing Repression: Police Training and Nation-Building in the American Century and The Myth of the Addicted Army: Vietnam and the Modern War on Drugs, as well as numerous articles and reviews in professional journals, popular magazines, and newspapers.

John Marciano is Professor Emeritus at SUNY Cortland, is an antiwar and social justice activist, scholar, and trade unionist. He is author of The American War in Vietnam: Crime or Commemoration? and Civic Illiteracy and Education: The Battle for the Hearts and Minds of American Youth, as well as, with William L. Griffen, Teaching the Vietnam War.

Source:
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=31615254266&searchurl=an%3Djeremy%2Bkuzmarov%2Bjohn%2Bmarciano%26sortby%3D17&cm_sp=snippet-_-srp1-_-title1


17 posted on 04/04/2024 9:39:06 AM PDT by jacknhoo (Luke 12:51; Think ye, that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, no; but separation.)
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To: jacknhoo

I’m reading this one. It’s pretty interesting. I don’t agree with everything I’ve read so far, but it gives some insight into why Russia is waging war as there are.

The Russian Art of War: How the West led Ukraine to Defeat by Jacques Baud

https://www.amazon.com/russian-art-war-Ukraine-defeat-ebook/dp/B0CRS4XM4B/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.ePGwCHlupkNEUmXwiWzHYjBfpjqfJSiVLP-qx5apHC1XfKnsXdPYXjZNVGb62h91JtikbqlKbdH-IPBEjhBSDV47K2u83LJ_LdFk5QQE0U1Tho7X75lf955zM1CyOeoZtoBJMNe6uJUIeXz0zyKdI2xoAI9cXp-DEyFTjb2JCwJTJ9c7_lvL6c6-if_g3lxrtQJGOhEwD83qhPebnsWYuIkxwZ1a7QQ5-uKWu23ZpxA.Txfbz5GRc_MAy1gIci0DD-uscI8aLQISh2KDz9grgTA&qid=1712249416&sr=1-1


18 posted on 04/04/2024 9:55:49 AM PDT by FreedomForce
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To: mrmeyer

Le5 Israel do what it has to, but stay out of it. Ukraine Russia needs to end today.


19 posted on 04/04/2024 11:55:22 AM PDT by cowboyusa (AT THIS POINT, I'M WARMING TO AN AMERICAN PINOCHETE. )
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To: ClearCase_guy

“The Left always chooses evil.”

Two for two in these cases...


20 posted on 04/04/2024 3:46:57 PM PDT by BobL (A society built on MERIT cannot survive on DEA (ref. South Africa, and now USA))
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