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Washington Is Prolonging Ukraine's Suffering -- Washington’s refusal to acknowledge Russia’s legitimate security interests in Ukraine and negotiate an end to this war is the path to protracted conflict and human suffering.
The American Conservative ^ | December 20, 2022 | Colonel Douglas MacGregor

Posted on 12/20/2022 1:59:12 AM PST by Cathi

Douglas Macgregor

Dec 20, 2022 12:03 AM

During a speech given on November 29, Polish Vice-Minister of National Defense (MON) Marcin Ociepa said: "The probability of a war in which we will be involved is very high. Too high for us to treat this scenario only hypothetically." The Polish MON is allegedly planning to call up 200,000 reservists in 2023 for a few weeks’ training, but observers in Warsaw suspect this action could easily lead to a national mobilization.

Meanwhile, inside the Biden administration, there is growing concern that the Ukrainian war effort will collapse under the weight of a Russian offensive. And as the ground in Southern Ukraine finally freezes, the administration’s fears are justified. In an interview published in the Economist, head of Ukraine’s armed forces General Valery Zaluzhny admitted that Russian mobilization and tactics are working. He even hinted that Ukrainian forces might be unable to withstand the coming Russian onslaught.

Yet, Zaluzhny rejected any notion of a negotiated settlement and instead pleaded for more equipment and support. He went on to insist that with 300 new tanks, 600 to 700 new infantry fighting vehicles, and 500 new Howitzers, he could still win the war with Russia. Truthfully, General Zaluzhny is not asking for assistance, he’s asking for a new army. Therein lies the greatest danger for Washington and its NATO allies.

When things go badly for Washington’s foreign policy, the true believers in the great cause always draw deeply from the well of ideological self-delusion to steel themselves for the final battle. Blinken, Klain, Austin, and the rest of the war party continue to pledge eternal support for Kiev regardless of the cost. Like the “best and the brightest” of the 1960s they are eager to sacrifice realism to wishful thinking, to wallow in the splash of publicity and self-promotion in one public visit to Ukraine after another.

This spectacle is frighteningly reminiscent of events more than 50 years ago, when Washington’s proxy war in Vietnam was failing. Doubters within the Johnson administration about the wisdom of intervening on the ground to rescue Saigon from certain destruction went into hiding. In 1963, Washington already had 16,000 military advisors in Vietnam. The idea that Washington was supporting a government in South Vietnam that might not win against North Vietnam was dismissed out of hand. Secretary of State Dean Rusk said, “We will not pull out until the war is won.”

By the spring of 1965, American military advisors were already dying. General Westmoreland, then commander of Military Assistance Command Vietnam, reported to LBJ: “It is increasingly apparent that the existing levels of United States aid cannot prevent the collapse of South Vietnam... North Vietnam is moving in for the kill... Acting on the request of the South Vietnamese government, the decision must be made to commit as soon as possible 125,000 United States troops to prevent the Communist takeover.”

The Biden administration’s unconditional support for the Zelensky regime in Kiev is reaching a strategic inflection point not unlike the one LBJ reached in 1965. Just as LBJ suddenly determined in 1964 that peace and security in Southeast Asia was a vital U.S. strategic interest, the Biden administration is making a similar argument now for Ukraine. Like South Vietnam in the 1960s, Ukraine is losing its war with Russia.

Ukraine’s hospitals and morgues are filled to capacity with wounded and dying Ukrainian soldiers. Washington’s proxy in Kiev has squandered its human capital and considerable Western aid in a series of self-defeating counter-offensives. Ukrainian soldiers manning the defensive lines facing Russian soldiers in Southern Ukraine are brave men, but they are not fools. The Spartans at Thermopylae were brave, and they still died.

The real danger now is that Biden will soon appear on television to repeat LBJ’s performance in 1965, substituting the word "Ukraine" for "South Vietnam":

Tonight, my fellow Americans I want to speak to you about freedom, democracy, and the struggle of the Ukrainian people for victory. No other question so preoccupies our people. No other dream so absorbs the millions who live in Ukraine and Eastern Europe… However, I am not talking about a NATO attack on Russia. Rather, I propose to send a U.S. led coalition of the willing, consisting of American, Polish, and Romanian armed forces into Ukraine, to establish the ground equivalent of a “no-fly zone.” The mission I propose is a peaceful one, to create a safe zone in the Western most portion of Ukraine for Ukrainian Forces and refugees struggling to survive Russia’s devastating attacks…

Disaster wrapped in rhetoric is not the way to save the people of Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is not a Call of Duty fantasy. It is an enlargement of the human tragedy that NATO’s eastward expansion created. The victims do not live in North America. They live in a region that most Americans can't find on a map. Washington urged the Ukrainians to fight. Now Washington must urge them to stop.

NATO’s governments are divided in their thinking about the war in Ukraine. Except for Poland and, possibly, Romania, none of NATO’s members are in a rush to mobilize their forces for a long, grueling war of attrition with Russia in Ukraine. No one in London, Paris, or, Berlin wants to run the risk of a nuclear war with Moscow. Americans do not support going to war with Russia, and those few who do are ideologues, shallow political opportunists, or greedy defense contractors.

When U.S. forces finally withdrew from Southeast Asia, Americans thought that Washington would exercise greater restraint, recognize the limits of American power, and pursue a less militant, and more realistic foreign policy. Americans were mistaken then, but Americans and Europeans know now that Washington’s refusal to acknowledge Russia’s legitimate security interests in Ukraine and negotiate an end to this war is the path to protracted conflict and more human suffering.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Douglas Macgregor Douglas Macgregor, Col. (ret.) is a senior fellow with The American Conservative, the former advisor to the Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration, a decorated combat veteran, and the author of five books.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; History; Military/Veterans
KEYWORDS: compromised; macritter; mtacniks; neocons4biden; notourwar; russia; swampniks; ukraine; ukraineslushfund; unitedstates; vatnik; zelenskyworshippers
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To: JonPreston
"The end of the American Empire is near. It’s time to return to a limited Constitutional republic."

Rubbish,there is no "American Empire" by any normal definition.

And here is the proof of it: conduct all the opinion polls you wish, in every country you can think of and you will not find a majority in any country who claim to belong to an "American Empire".
"The American Empire" is pure figment of imagination -- it doesn't exist, it will not disappear.

Now, America's military allies, friendly countries, partners in trade & commerce, countries with strong historical, family and community ties with Americans -- sure, we have many countries with shared interests.
Those will not suddenly disappear, regardless of what some say about the alleged "American Empire ".

But you are right, it is well past time to put the ratified Constitution back into our alleged republic.

81 posted on 12/20/2022 8:58:06 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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Comment #82 Removed by Moderator

To: BroJoeK
there is no "American Empire"


83 posted on 12/20/2022 9:02:48 AM PST by JonPreston
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To: tlozo

No, can we all admit that Ukraine is not our circus and we should not be involved?


84 posted on 12/20/2022 9:04:10 AM PST by packrat35 (Pelosi is only on loan to the world from Satan. Hopefully he will soon want his baby killer back)
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To: BabaOreally
if we help them win this war, our country will have a powerful ally and friend for centuries

..........

but if we stop pumping money in, well..................

85 posted on 12/20/2022 10:49:05 AM PST by norsky ( <P><img src=" "width=400"></img> <P> <a href= > </a>)
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To: Mr. K
Mr. K: "How is it OUR job to spend money on Ukraine defense- they are not even a NATO member."

If you ask me, do I think Democrats waste our money and jeopardize national security by sending hi-tech weapons to a war zone where they are subject of capture and reverse engineering by Russians and whoever else -- yes.

If you ask me, do I think Democrats are providing Ukraine just enough aid to prevent their defeat, but not enough for victory -- yes.

If you ask me, do I think a Russian victory over Ukraine would have catastrophic consequences world-wide, beginning with Taiwan and extending to any border dispute (India?) the US is not committed to defend -- yes.

If you ask me, do I think the US is better off spending $ billions now to avoid the need for $ trillions later -- yes.

As for what is "our job", we will suffer the consequences of Russian victory regardless of whether it was "our job" to prevent it, or not.
I don't think we would like those consequences.

86 posted on 12/20/2022 12:17:57 PM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: JonPreston
JohnPreston, sarcastically quoting: "there is no "American Empire"

Your map shows our friends, partners and allies.
None of them consider themselves to be subjects of the "American Empire".
For one thing, they don't pay us taxes, and for another, their contributions to their own national defense are strictly voluntary.

So it's not, by any reasonable definition, an "empire" and never was.
And yes, friends, partners and allies can well change over the years.
We win some, we lose some, but it has nothing to do with "empire".

"Empire" is just a fantasy.

87 posted on 12/20/2022 12:46:42 PM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: packrat35
packrat35: "No, can we all admit that Ukraine is not our circus and we should not be involved?"

A Russian victory over Ukraine would begin to restore the old Tzarist or Soviet Russian Empires and so would encourage more adventures by dictators world-wide against their weaker neighbors.
Taiwan comes first to mind.

Such events would confirm the tide of history's turning away from western traditionally liberal style democracies & republics and toward Orwellian and Aldus Huxley's dystopian Brave New World.

You will not like it, and it will not be easily reversed.

It's easier to stop Russian aggression in Ukraine than it will be once Ukraine is absorbed and amalgamated into the Russian bear's belly.

That's the basic argument.

88 posted on 12/20/2022 1:03:59 PM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: BroJoeK

Our friends? As long as they dance to the tune of the Liberal World 🌍 Order as brought to us by decades of corrupt Western politicos. Please wake up and take a look around. We stopped being the good guys after they shot JFKs head off.


89 posted on 12/20/2022 1:06:39 PM PST by JonPreston
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To: Mr. K

“”How is it OUR job to spend money on Ukraine defense- they are not even a NATO member.””

NATO exists to defend against Russia, and Russia just started the largest European war since WWII as they seek empire, our interest is Russia.


90 posted on 12/20/2022 1:25:12 PM PST by ansel12 (NATO warrior under Reagan, and RA under Nixon, bemoaning the pro-Russians from Vietnam to Ukraine.)
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To: BroJoeK

Are you joking? The highlighted countries hate the US and feel they are just American “vassals”. Do you not realize the hatred and disdain for Americans that our so-called “allies” possess. I cannot name any country that is a true, dependable ally.

The US is the most hated country in world history for a reason. The imbecilic, reckless warmongering Demonrats and Noecons are desperate to provoke a war with Russia.

Americans need to violently resist hostilities against Russia. This is NOT OUR FIGHT! Xiden is NOT MY PRESIDENT!


91 posted on 12/20/2022 1:59:50 PM PST by CrimsonTidegirl (The fate of all mankind, I see, is in the hands of fools.- King Crimson)
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To: JonPreston
JonPreston: "Our friends? As long as they dance to the tune of the Liberal World 🌍 Order as brought to us by decades of corrupt Western politicos."

Some are friends, some are partners, some are allies.
Some were friends back in the US Revolutionary War -- French, Dutch -- some are relatively new , like Ukraine.

As for whose "tune" they "dance to", countries like France have long "danced" to their own tunes, which only sometimes harmonize with our "tunes".

JonPreston: "Please wake up and take a look around.
We stopped being the good guys after they shot JFKs head off."

We don't even know who "they" are.
I think it was RFK Jr., who said recently, "they" were our own intelligence services.
As for who is, or is not, "good guys", the US has always tried to be "good guys" to anybody not actually waging war against us.

Sometimes that can be quite hard to do.

92 posted on 12/21/2022 6:47:28 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: BroJoeK

I don’t care to have us continue to be the world police force. And I don’t care about Ukraine or Russia. Let them fight it and out. A pox on them both.


93 posted on 12/21/2022 7:38:55 AM PST by packrat35 (Pelosi is only on loan to the world from Satan. Hopefully he will soon want his baby killer back)
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To: CrimsonTidegirl; JonPreston
CrimsonTidegirl: "Are you joking?
The highlighted countries hate the US and feel they are just American “vassals”.
Do you not realize the hatred and disdain for Americans that our so-called “allies” possess.
I cannot name any country that is a true, dependable ally."

So, are we agreed then that JonPreston's idea about an "American Empire" is utterly ridiculous?
Not only do our alleged empire "subjects" not pay us taxes or obey our orders, now CrimsonTidegirl informs us they don't even like us, in fact, they all hate us, right?

The reality is that in every war the U.S. fought, our allies were always just a "coalition of the willing", meaning only those countries whose self-interests coincided enough with ours to justify , in their own minds, helping us fight.

Countries which served with us again & again, through thick or thin, so to speak, we think of them as more than just allies, but genuine friends, and there are some of those, here & there, regardless of the current day's news headlines & administration.

CrimsonTidegirl: "The US is the most hated country in world history for a reason.
The imbecilic, reckless warmongering Demonrats and Noecons are desperate to provoke a war with Russia."

No, the USA is far from the world's most hated country, and far from the most feared.
Arguably, we are still the most loved.
But human nature being what it is, many countries just love to say, in effect, "USA, you take care of it," then they want to stand back and criticize us for doing too much of "this" or not enough of "that".

The real issue is, when it really matters, are they there to help out?
Well, in Ukraine, for example, European countries combined have contributed almost as much as the U.S. totals, according to the most recent list I've seen.

CrimsonTidegirl: "Americans need to violently resist hostilities against Russia.
This is NOT OUR FIGHT!
Xiden is NOT MY PRESIDENT!"

Nonsense.
Orcs must die, Russians must go back to Russia.
The U.S. will suffer as much as any if Ukrainians failed to defeat orc invaders.

As for Brandon, sadly, the 2022 "Red Wave" showed that whatever Democrats figured out in 2020 is still working.

94 posted on 12/21/2022 8:19:34 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: packrat35
packrat35: "I don’t care to have us continue to be the world police force.
And I don’t care about Ukraine or Russia.
Let them fight it and out.
A pox on them both."

We're not "policing" anything in Ukraine.
We're helping Ukrainians kill orcs, that's not "police" work.
It's more like hunters shooting rabid dogs.
We're helping supply them with ways & means.

The reason you should care is because successful naked aggression in Ukraine will soon inspire more naked aggression, likely beginning in Taiwan, and continuing anywhere ruthless dictators see smaller neighbors as ripe for plucking.

We will not like that world and Ukraine is our chance to prevent it.

95 posted on 12/21/2022 8:52:11 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: BroJoeK

Sorry Joe. The USA has lost any moral authority to intervene in any conflict anywhere. We are Faux Demcracy and everyone can see Uke v Russia is about the $$$$$$$$. Just ask the Big Guy.


96 posted on 12/21/2022 8:55:12 AM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn...)
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To: BroJoeK
Pentagon study declares American empire is ‘collapsing’ Report demands massive expansion of military-industrial complex to maintain global ‘access to resources’
97 posted on 12/21/2022 9:20:30 AM PST by JonPreston
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To: central_va
"The USA has lost any moral authority to intervene in any conflict anywhere.
We are Faux Demcracy and everyone can see Uke v Russia is about the $$$$$$$$.
Just ask the Big Guy."

"Faux Democracy" depends on your definition of "our Democracy".
What Democrats mean by "Democracy" is pretty much the same thing communists mean by, for example, "Peoples Democratic Republic of Upper Slobistan."
"Democracy" is what the U.S. has had in nearly all our big cities for around 100 years -- single party, top down rule by elites who answer to nobody except even higher-up elites.

Indeed, why do you think our Democrats were first called "Democratics"?
It was a mocking reference by the old Federalists to Thomas Jefferson's support for the "Democratic" French Revolution, and it's use of Joseph Guillotin's latest invention for spilling "the blood of tyrants".
Jeffersonians liked the word, "Democratics", adopted it and even called themselves "The Democracy".

So, by those standards, we"re not a "faux democracy", we're the real thing.
What we're not so much any more is a constitutionally defined & constrained law-abiding republic, and that's a shame.

As for our moral authority, we have plenty of moral authority to help Ukrainians kill orcs -- the same moral authority as hunters shooting rabid dogs, so that's not an issue.
But if we stand by and let orcs win & rule over Ukraine, then that will be a moral issue similar to 1938-39 in Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland.

We will not like the results, general.

98 posted on 12/21/2022 10:51:23 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: JonPreston
JonPreston quoting: "Pentagon study declares American empire is ‘collapsing’
Report demands massive expansion of military-industrial complex to maintain global ‘access to resources’

But your article says this:

The headline writer plugged in the words "American empire" purely for dramatic effect.
It means nothing.
"U.S.-backed framework of international order" does NOT translate as "American Empire".

Is it threatened and in danger?
Oh, yeah, big time, and will be until Republicans find the will and the ways to defeat the current Democrat lock on political power in the U.S.A.

99 posted on 12/21/2022 11:08:29 AM PST by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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To: BroJoeK

And it costs ME money. Billions of dollars are flowing to the corrupt regime in Ukraine and it is being pissed away.

I will make it plain, so you know EXACTLY how I feel. F**K UKRAINE! F@@K RUSSIA! And F**K Joe Biden!


100 posted on 12/21/2022 11:16:37 AM PST by packrat35 (Pelosi is only on loan to the world from Satan. Hopefully he will soon want his baby killer back)
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