Posted on 02/25/2022 6:14:50 AM PST by conservative98
Donald J. Trump was the only U.S. president in the past two decades to stop Russian President Vladimir Putin. The others — George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and now Joe Biden — all saw Putin seize foreign territory by force during their terms.
The reason is simple: Trump was polite but tough, and unpredictable; while Bush, Obama, and Biden all attempted to appease the Russian leader, on the theory that past American assertiveness was the real problem, and Putin’s reaction was understandable.
In 2008, while a weakened and unpopular Bush was in Beijing, China, to watch the Olympics, Putin invaded Georgia. In 2014, after Obama had promised Putin that he would have more “flexibility”in his second term, Russia infiltrated Crimea and later annexed it.
And now, in 2022, after Biden botched the withdrawal from Afghanistan and removed sanctions from the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, Putin has invaded Ukraine.
In every case, Putin responded to American weakness with aggression.
Trump was accused, falsely, of “collusion” with Russia, and was frequently criticized for being too polite to Putin in public. A press conference in Helsinki, Finland, in 2018, where Trump accepted Putin’s public word that Russia had not interfered in the 2016 American presidential election, was said to be a disaster.
Yet during the four Trump years, Russia did not attempt to expand its earlier territorial gains in Ukraine, nor did it seriously threaten to invade any other country on its lengthy borders.
The reason: Trump was tougher on Russia than any of his predecessors, or his successor.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Plain simple logic. Peace through strength.
Facts don’t matter to the left. I just saw some jackwagon trying to say that keystone doesn’t matter because we’re importing a record amount of oil from Canada, therefore, retard in the WH isn’t responsible for oil prices rising. Dems are entrenched like ticks, and they don’t listen to facts that go against what they wish to believe.
I hate them.
2009 Biden gives Russia access to the WTO
2009 Biden supported killing the Magnitsky Act, which listed corrupt Russian officials and barred them from American financial market
2012 Obama was caught on a hot mic telling Putin’s puppet Medvedev that he would have more “flexibility” on missile defense after the 2012 presidential election
2013 Obama canceled long-promised missile-defense systems to our allies in Poland and the Czech Republic
2017 Trump approved missiles to Poland and Czech
2017 Trump approved Javelin missiles to Ukraine after Biden refused to allow it
2012 Obama/Biden mock Romney for calling Russia our greatest geopolitical threat....the 80’s wants its foreign policy back
2014 Obama/Biden allowed Russia to operate with impunity in Syria and trusted Russia to control Syria’s chemical weapons
2018 Trump conducted strikes on Syria for using chemical weapons against civilians
2020 Biden said: “Putin knows that when I am president of the United States, his days of tyranny and trying to intimidate the United States and those in Eastern Europe are over,”
Is that the real puppet master walking behind Resident Biden?
Trump wasn't weak, or single minded. He understood what the real underpinnings of Putin's power is and made it ineffective.
Once we changed to the weakling we have now, and ended our net exporting of natural gas and oil, Putin now had the ability to extort Europe into inaction while he steals the Ukrainian piggy bank.
” Trump was polite but tough, and unpredictable”
I think there’s more to Putin’s strategy than the behavior of an individual president.
Bttt.
5.56mm
Biden’s sanctions are actually a reward to Russia through higher oil prices. We are so screwed.
Absolutely right! See Tagline.
It’s just an amazing coincidence he did Bush, Obama, Biden and skipped Trump.
It's like telling a car salesman you'll be able to pay more after payday.
“I think there’s more to Putin’s strategy than the behavior of an individual president.”
Totally agreed. This is a shallow article.
Trump had an actual policy and he’s, quite frankly, bold and brilliant. Everyone says peace through strength but I don’t think any of them understand strength the way Trump does. They, all too often, think strength comes from calling Putin a thug, a murderer, madman, former KGB etc. That’s just silly. Trump made it very clear he wanted good relations with Russia (1), he showed his wiliness to use the military and to ignore the cries of those who would see peace at all cost. (2). He was willing to arm adversaries of Russia (3). He didn’t try to isolate Russia economically but he weakened them by owning the float when it comes to oil production. By greatly increasing America’s status as an oil producing nation he took some of the leverage that Russia may have already had(4). The pipeline with Germany was a way for Trump to further decrease Russian leverage. He called NATO out on their defense spending and he tied the economy with national security (Anyone want to bet that Trump was going to tell NATO members he would give them credit towards defense spending if they purchased American energy resources (5). He sought to give Russia sources to other methods of economic development (6). Russia was not to become a pariah state under Trump, notably he wanted them to join the G-7 again. He publicly made it clear that he wasn’t all in on NATO and certainly wanted no part in expanding (7). Trump is a master at what he does and rather than trying to destroy him the government should have done their job and worked to forward HIS policies (he was the one elected). The world would be lucky if Trump got another 4 year.
I suspect that Trump ‘stopped’ Putin by simply telling him that nothing in the way of Ukraine joining NATO was going to happen on his watch.
Then dementia and the kids took over, and reversing that policy was a MAJOR objective, just to prod Putin for helping Trump win in 2016
But there was mean tweets!
We didn't provoke Russia, that's the key difference.
We accepted that Ukraine belongs to them, at least when it comes to EU and NATO membership. We didn't push in that direction, which was the case under the Obama years and then now under the Biden era again.
The Russians simply ***WILL NOT ACCEPT UKRAINE AS A MEMBER OF THE EU AND NATO.***
What is so hard to understand here? What communication break down do we have to where our policy makers don't get that?
Oh, wait, ***they don't care,*** because just like with the economic consequences people are feeling today, the consequences are not felt by the elite themselves living in their ivory palace. Likewise, the consequences will not be borne by our policy makers for Ukraine. It's Ukranians that will pay for this, not Biden, Merkel, Von der Leyen... None of these people are threatened in any way, not even politically or their image (it's the evil Russians after all). So it was easy for them to ratchet up the ante higher and higher, since after all, they aren't going to pay for this.
The best analogy: Imagine going to a casino in Vegas, and you're betting on games but someone else is flipping the bill although you get to keep some of the winnings. You're just a big mouth, showing off, posturing, and you stand to gain if you win since some winnings go to you, but if you lose, you don't pay, some guy/gal named Ukraine does. Some would become very risk taking. Some jerks would be willing to blow another persons entire life's savings since it's after all not theirs and they only stand to gain. Is the risk taker that gambles really high the moral person here? Is this the smart guy? No, he's actually a disrespectful asshole willing to squander another mans fortune for his own benefit.
Trump respected boundaries the Biden administration has crossed. That doesn't make Trump weak or pandering, it makes him far more “decent” and “aware” than any of the MSM gave him credit for.
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