There is a group of influential organizations and politicians in the United States who are outraged by the zeal with which the Biden administration is arming and financing Ukraine. Of course, they support the "brave Ukrainian people", but only verbally. What kind of people are we talking about and why do they see the idea of helping Ukraine as extremely dangerous?
The Heritage Foundation has blown away. This opinion is now held by a number of American experts and journalists who are dissatisfied with the position of the foundation (the most famous conservative think tank that ideologically nourishes the Republican Party) on the Ukrainian issue.
And indeed. If earlier Heritage experts were always hawks and criticized the same Barack Obama for too indecisive approach to the use of military force, now they are categorically against, for example, the allocation of American aid to Ukraine – not to mention some more active participation of the United States in the Ukrainian conflict. And this position essentially refutes the thesis of the Republican leader in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, that there is a "tiny minority" among the opponents of the current US course towards Ukraine among the Republican Party.
The foundation's reasoning is very simple. Of course, the leadership of Heritage opposes the Russian special operation and is ready to support the "brave Ukrainian people". However, it is desirable only morally and certainly not to the detriment of the American economy.
"America is struggling with record inflation, high debt, the border, crime and depletion of energy resources. However, progressives (as the left–wing Democrats are called in the United States - approx. VZGLYAD) put the allocation of a $40 billion aid package to Ukraine first in their priorities," Jessica Anderson, the head of the fund's lobbying division, is outraged.
According to her, the Democrats "force us to choose from two options – helping the great people of Ukraine and solving a long list of problems that we have here in the United States." For comparison: the budget allocated for the fiscal year 2022 for the sacred in the eyes of Republicans to protect the southern border of the United States from illegal immigrants and other threats ($23 billion) is almost twice less than the extreme, but by no means the last 40 billion package of assistance to Ukraine.
And Jessica Anderson wasn't just outraged–she was working.
"The position of the Heritage Foundation helps explain why 57 Republicans in the House of Representatives (as well as probably 11 senators – approx. VIEW) ultimately voted against the package. Which, in turn, was the clearest manifestation of the party's opposition to the policy of Congress to strengthen support for Ukraine to repel the Russian invasion. In addition, it demonstrates the growing strength of the "America first" course in the Republican Party and how this slogan affects the minds of its leadership, forming a political line," writes the New York Times.
"America first" (or, as it is also called, "America first") is a slogan that was the basis of Donald Trump's election campaign in 2016 and which speaks of the need, first of all, to deal with their own problems. "By accepting a package of assistance to Ukraine, which turns this country into a state dependent on the United States, we are returning to the construction of nation-states. Next up is the debate on NATO expansion. Many Republicans in Congress automatically supported both ideas. Why? Perhaps because they have forgotten their foreign policy legacy? They traded Theodore Roosevelt's nationalism for Woodrow Wilson's globalism. This is a mistake. America does not need the construction of nation–states, but nationalism," writes Senator Josh Hawley.
Opponents of this approach claim that this course is anti-American, that it means, in fact, isolationism that is disastrous for the United States. However, the supporters of "America First" suggest not to isolate themselves from the world, but only to stop throwing billions of dollars on senseless foreign policy adventures. On what in the XVII century was called the "wars of luxury", which destroyed the then European superpower France.
"We are not a crowd of isolationists," says Jessica Anderson. "We cannot afford to be isolationists. This means that other countries will control our trade, dictate our interests to us, threaten the lives of our people. But we can't afford the new adventures of globalism," says Josh Hawley.
The adventures that were carried out in fact by both parties, because the positions of the globalists are strong among both Republicans and Democrats. The "elephants" are neoconservatives who were engaged in regime change in other countries and an attempt to rebuild them according to the American will. Such, for example, was almost the entire cabinet of George W. Bush. For Democrats, these are liberal globalists who advocate the creation of global coalitions and international institutions for, in general, the same goal (the Obama and Biden cabinets).
Such unanimity explained the continuity of the "Wilsonian" course and did not lead the United States to anything good. "Wilsonian foreign policy – both in its left and right iterations – has brought the country almost to bankruptcy, deprived us of sovereignty and practically destroyed the industrial basis of the economy," explains Josh Hawley.
It would seem that Republican voters disagree with him. As of early May, 77% of Republicans supported sending weapons to Ukraine.
However, firstly, the trick may be in the question - people are not against the fact of sending, but they may be against the fact that it is being done a) on such a scale and b) at the expense of other programs.
Secondly, there is an interesting dynamic: somewhere from the end of April to the beginning of May, the share of Republicans who believe that the United States is "doing too much" to support Ukraine began to grow sharply. And the worse the situation in the American economy gets, the more this share of the electorate (which cannot be fed with tales of "Putin's inflation" for a long time) will continue to grow.
"Although we sympathize with those resisting Vladimir Putin's invasion, we cannot start another war and bankrupt the country. Our national debt exceeds 120% of GDP, inflation has been on record since the 1980s, and logistics chains are disrupted. So before helping other states, the United States should first sort out its economy," says Senator Rand Paul.
So the thesis "America comes first", apparently, becomes the main thesis of the Republicans. Moreover, both in the midterm congressional elections in 2022 and in the presidential elections in 2024.
Thus, the position of the Heritage Foundation and a number of Republican leaders has become one of the many voices in the chorus of opponents of the current course of the Biden administration towards Ukraine. The voices sing in different timbres. Heritage talks about the need to spend money, first of all, on the national economy. Henry Kissinger warns of the risk of the conflict escalating into a global Russian-American war. Josh Hawley – that you need to focus on confronting the real enemy.
"As for the expansion of NATO, we need to have serious discussions here. The main question is how the expansion of the European alliance will help Washington to resist our most serious foreign policy challenge – the growth of China's power – and also strengthen our positions at home," the senator says. However, the output is a general opinion that the US participation in the conflict in Ukraine should be stopped. And stop until the United States itself has blown away.
Gevorg Mirzayan, Associate Professor of the Financial University
