I was dismayed at the recent Oval Office meeting between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy that went wildly off the rails. Though I’ve previously defended Trump, that’s not going to happen here. On the issue of Ukraine, Trump is flat-out wrong.
Is Zelenskyy without blame in this? No, he is not. Both he and Trump could learn a little about diplomacy. But the excuses concerning Zelenskyy being improperly dressed, not expressing sufficient gratitude, and being a dictator are ridiculous. Trump has personalized this because he simply doesn’t like Zelenskyy or Ukraine and seems to have some weird fetish regarding Putin and Russia. Everything else is just noise.
Zelenskyy has, if anything restrained himself by not rubbing our nose in the fact that we are obligated to defend Ukraine. We, along with other countries some 30 years ago, gave Ukraine assurances that we would provide economic aid and security if they would surrender their stockpile of Soviet-era nuclear weapons.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the former Soviet republics were all trying to figure out what came next. Ukraine, one of the largest former Soviet states, held a new position as the world’s third-largest nuclear power, boasting approximately 2,000 nuclear warheads, 200 ICBMs, and 50 strategic bombers. What to do with it was the question.
At the end of the Cold War, two schools of thought developed concerning the so-called peace dividend and disarmament: the swords to plowshares school, and then as long as we have ‘em, everyone will leave us alone school. The swords-to-plowshares school gained momentum due to the promise of a more cooperative international order.
There were treaties enacted to further this goal, such as the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the START Treaty, and the idea was to get as many countries on board as possible. So the West set out to convince former Soviet nuclear states to sign on. Ukraine was by far the most significant disarmament prize and was pressured to return nuclear weapons to Russia, where we would assist the Russians in disassembling them and finding peaceful uses for the nuclear materials.
This was considered a win, win, win. Ukraine disarms, Russia has an easy way to meet their treaty obligations, and everyone else benefits because there are fewer nukes in the world—most of those under the control of stable regimes.
Outside of Ukraine, this was quite popular. But inside Ukraine, it was controversial, and for good reason. Inside Ukraine, school of thought #2 was in full swing: We have these nuclear weapons, and nobody’s going to mess with us while we do. It’s not a completely fallacious argument either. Other nations will think twice before confronting a nuclear-armed adversary. That’s exactly the argument that Trump is making right now about the U.S. and Russia.
But a nuclear arsenal isn’t free of cost. Nuclear weapons are expensive to develop and maintain. In this country, we have one entire national laboratory that exists to ensure that our nuclear arsenal will work should it ever be deployed. Soviet-era weapons relied on numbers and brute strength rather than sophistication to be effective. Ukraine was faced with the prospect of relying upon an arsenal that was potentially falling apart. How good, actually, were all of those bombers, ICBMs, and warheads? Nobody really knew. So we enticed Ukraine to walk away from its nuclear arsenal with promises of economic assistance and security assurances. Several accords along these lines were negotiated in the early 1990s.
Ukraine was distrustful of Russia throughout this process, and not, as subsequent events have shown, without reason. They wanted concrete assurances. So in January 1994, a trilateral agreement was brokered among Russia, Ukraine, and the United States. If Ukraine returned its weapons to Russia for disassembly, then the United States and Russia would agree to better security assurances for Ukraine along with significant financial assistance.
Ukraine tentatively agreed, but wanted a bit more in terms of security assurances. A few months later, Great Britain joined the negotiations and forged an accord known as the Budapest Agreement. This gave Ukraine enough confidence to surrender its nuclear weapons to Russia.
Let’s imagine an alternative timeline where Ukraine chooses not to surrender its nukes. Just after the fall of the Soviet Union, there existed a robust black market for weapons. A lot of the former Soviet arsenal was unaccounted for, and the Russians had no idea where it had all gone. The stockpiles of entire military bases vanished seemingly into thin air. Nuclear weapons were more closely watched, but some fissile material went missing.
Under these circumstances, what might have happened in a Ukraine that did not surrender its nukes? Ukraine was in the thrall of a corrupt oligarchy (as was Russia). Corruption, in fact, was one of the principal things that soured NATO on Ukraine back then. There is, I think, a good chance that some of that material would have found its way onto the black market, very likely making its way to someplace like North Korea, Iran, Iraq, or Afghanistan.
I have almost no doubt that had Ukraine not surrendered its weapons, this alternative timeline might include a dirty bomb made from stolen materials having been detonated in a city somewhere around the world during the past three decades. Perhaps the attacks of 9/11 would have, in this timeline, been carried out with dirty bombs instead of airplanes. Ukraine did the world a favor by surrendering its nukes. And all that cost us was some relatively meager financial assistance and security guarantees.
You may argue, if you wish, that we should have never given such assurances to a country halfway around the world, but the fact is that we did, and we did so not just willingly, but enthusiastically. You may also argue that accords and agreements are not the same thing as treaties. There’s even a valid argument about what exactly our obligation was in terms of assuring Ukraine’s security. But those aren’t the arguments that I’m hearing.
I don’t blame all of this exclusively on Trump. Presidents Obama and Biden also failed to honor our obligation to defend Ukraine. And guess what the reason was each time? You need to think twice about confronting a nuclear-armed adversary. Oh, the irony.
I’m sympathetic to Trump’s argument that most of the people around the world living on the dole of the American taxpayer ought to go pound sand. He’s right that the situation in Ukraine is primarily a European problem, and that the Europeans (particularly the Germans) have not stepped up as they should. But none of that gets us off the hook.
I’m for supporting Ukraine for moral reasons beyond simply honoring our commitments to them. America is one of the countries that benefits most from a free, stable, and prosperous world, which is why we’ve traditionally defended all of these values. Besides, we are enabling Ukraine to weaken what is purportedly the world’s second most powerful military, which is under the control of a geopolitical adversary, at a significantly lower cost than a direct conflict, without sacrificing any American lives in the process. We help ourselves in this regard at a relatively low cost.
Based on this abdication of leadership, how do you think it’s going to go over the next time we tell a country, “Stick with us, kid, and you’ll be okay?
I can construct a better argument for abandoning Ukraine than anything I’ve heard from Trump. Corruption in Ukraine played a role in the events that led them to where they are now. The unspoken idea at the end of the Cold War was that Ukraine would enter NATO at some point and would then no longer need security assurances from just us. The corruption in Ukraine was an impediment to joining NATO early on when the Russians were in no position to stop it. That ship sailed with the arrival of Vladimir Putin.
But that’s the best case that I can make, and it simply does not stack up against the fact that a robust Ukraine is a far better ally than Russia. Russia’s economy is not anywhere near the top worldwide (they are around the 20th). They are a bad trading partner. The Russian military has been exposed as not only not the second-best military on the planet but not even the second-best military in Ukraine when the Wagner Group is engaged. Name another country that has won not one, but two major naval engagements against a very well-armed foe without possessing a navy. Ukraine turned the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet into a submarine. Their use of drones and asymmetric warfare has just been incredible. I think that Ukraine makes a far better battlefield ally than anyone else in the region.
Finally, some support for Zelenskyy. I think that Zelenskyy is a tremendous leader. He’s not perfect, but he’s pretty darned good. In many ways, he’s Ukraine’s Trump. The Ukrainian people were as sick of business as usual (including corruption), as were we both times Trump got elected. Zelenskyy wasn’t a politician; he was a TV comedian. He was elected specifically to usurp the status quo. Sound familiar?
Perhaps that’s why Trump displays such personal animus towards the guy. He hates the competition.
(1) comment
With no credit to Eric Clapton's tune "Cocaine," Hackworth is the king of flipflop. talking out of both sides of his mouth and generally pontificating about little to know knowledge of whatever, he continues to get press. To think he gets paid for this nonsensical rhetoric. The urinal should be ashamed of continuing to print his garbage.
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