Obama’s pathetic response to Putin’s invasion of Crimea

Early in the Ukraine crisis, when the Europeans were working on bringing Ukraine into the EU system and Vladimir Putin was countering with threats and bribes, one British analyst lamented that “we went to a knife fight with a baguette.”

That was three months ago. Life overtakes parody. During the Ukrainian prime minister’s visit to Washington last week, his government urgently requested military assistance. The Pentagon refused. It offered instead military ration kits.

Putin mobilizes thousands of troops, artillery and attack helicopters on Ukraine’s borders and Washington counters with baguettes, American-style. One thing we can say for sure in these uncertain times: The invasion of Ukraine will be catered by the United States.

Why did we deny Ukraine weapons? Because in the Barack Obama-John Kerry worldview, arming the victim might be taken as a provocation. This kind of mind-bending illogic has marked the administration’s response to the whole Crimea affair.

I have never been an isolationist.

I have always been a super hawk.

I have always been a super hawk on defending our friends, like Israel, Kuwait, and Taiwan.

And, in years past, on defending western Europe, South Korea, South Vietnam, and Japan.

I lived through the most dangerous years of the Cold War, including the Berlin Wall, and the Cuban missile crisis, where I had a front row seat from south Florida.

To this day, I believe John Kennedy was a weakling who caused both those crises.

Crimea is different.

A majority of people living in Crimea do not want to be an ethnic minority ruled by a chaotic, authoritarian Ukraine government.

A majority of Crimeans do not want to live and work in Ukraine's train wreck economy.

As to Putin, the man has no moral compass, but he does have political common sense.

He would need to re-establish a violent police state to control the old territories of the Soviet Union.

Is he capable of doing that?

Sure.

Will he do that?

I will need to see a lot more evidence then I have seen so far.

For instance, if Putin threatens the Baltic countries like Latvia and Lithuania, then, yes, I'm on your side, and we should definitely risk military action.

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