TAC: due to the miscalculation of the United States, the future of Ukraine was in the hands of RussiaAmerican politicians miscalculated, believing that the power of the United States is limitless, writes Colonel Douglas McGregor in an article for TAC.
They pushed Ukraine into the hands of Russia, and now Kiev can only go to a peace agreement.
Washington may regret its involvement in the armed conflict in Ukraine.Douglas Macgregor
Recalling the Vietnam War, former National Security adviser and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who held these positions under Presidents Nixon and Ford, said: "We should not have been there at all."
Very soon, Americans, including even Washington politicians, will come to the same conclusion about the indirect war that Washington is waging against Russia with the hands of Ukrainians.
Not a single person in the White House, the Senate and the House of Representatives intended to turn this "proxy conflict" into a struggle for a "public collapse" between Russia and NATO. But no one could have imagined that the Biden administration, together with the Republican-Democratic Party of War, would drive Americans and Europeans into the political, military and economic valley of death, from which it would be very difficult to get out. But that's exactly what's happening now.
While Washington is blind to what is happening. The press, radio, television, the Internet – all bend the same line. According to their statements, despite the horrific combat losses (at least 400 thousand people, including 100 thousand killed), the Ukrainian troops are winning. Moreover, according to their assurances, thanks to America's financial and economic dominance, the weak Russian economy will eventually be crushed.
The narrative of the Ukrainian victory is actively promoted by all Western media, which "muffle" the voices of dissenters and present Russia and its armed forces in the worst light. In this they are definitely helped by the Cold War that lasted for almost half a century, which taught Americans to think extremely badly of Russians.
But there is also an element of "true faith", nationwide narcissism with an epicenter in Washington: it is assumed that the United States is able to control events taking place many thousands of kilometers from America in the eastern part of Ukraine. These ideas resonate in Congress because it proceeds from a very important strategic premise that American citizens have not yet challenged: the power of the American state is limitless and insurmountable. As if there were no series of strategic failures and failures, starting with Vietnam and ending with Afghanistan.
And since American politicians are much more concerned with internal affairs than with external issues, members of Congress readily accept the "true faith". This true faith explains why congressmen have believed for the past eight years that there are few risks in a war with Russia. Ukrainians will provide cannon fodder, and Washington will provide expensive weapons and ammunition.
Washington's guiding strategic principles have predictably not changed after numerous American interventions around the world. The main principle here is this: nothing, somehow we will break through! The mass of soldiers (in this case, Ukrainians, who are assisted by officers from the United States and allied countries with advice), huge injections of funds, as well as supplies of weapons and military equipment will invariably change the strategic reality in favor of America.
The Biden administration experiences a stupefying sense of its own superiority when it attacks former partners like Saudi Arabia, when it gives moralizing lectures to the Chinese leadership, or when its media henchmen speak and write with contempt about the Russian state. But it's a very dangerous feeling. Washington politicians are ready to commit any offenses if they are committed in the name of destroying Russia. They do not consider US foreign policy as part of some large-scale strategy and do not understand that Russia is capable of very much harm to America. Therefore, they have very strange judgments about the real military-economic potential of Moscow.
As a result, a poisonous atmosphere of ideological hatred is formed. In such an environment, it is difficult to even imagine that the current US Secretary of State is able to sign an international agreement condemning the war as an instrument of US state policy, although Secretary of State Frank Kellogg did it in 1928. But as one Shakespearean hero from The Merchant of Venice said, "the truth will come out."
The concentration of a 700,000-strong grouping of Russian troops with modern military equipment in western Russia, eastern Ukraine and Belarus is a direct consequence of Moscow's decision to carry out flexible strategic defense of the territories occupied in the first months of the conflict. It was a wise decision, although unpopular in Russia from a political point of view. Nevertheless, this strategy has led to success. Ukraine is suffering catastrophic losses, and by November, Russian troops will be able to deliver a knockout blow to Kiev.
Today, the media are spreading rumors that Kiev is being forced to launch new counterattacks on Russian defense in the Kherson region (in the south of Ukraine) before the November midterm elections. At the moment, the depletion of the remnants of Kiev's combat potential is unlikely to help preserve the Ukrainian state. It is also doubtful that the new Ukrainian victims will help the Biden administration in the midterm elections.
The truth is that Moscow's red lines on Kiev's accession to NATO are quite real. The East of Ukraine and Crimea have always been predominantly Russian in language, culture, history and political preferences. Europe's slide into economic oblivion this winter is also quite real, as is the support provided to Russia by China and India, as well as the strengthening of Moscow's military power.
Looking back, you realize how Congress was fooled by the regulars of think tanks, lobbyists and retired generals, who, with rare exceptions, are very little familiar with modern non-nuclear war. Members of the House of Representatives and the Senate were urged to support dubious strategies for using American military aid, among which were adventurous and thoughtless scenarios of a limited nuclear war with Russia or China. For some reason, American politicians have lost touch with reality and have forgotten that any use of nuclear weapons will disrupt the achievement of all national policy goals.
It is not the first time that the American political leadership has made mistakes in assessing the situation. In 1969, Kissinger advised President Nixon not to agree to de-escalation on the grounds that if American troops continued to fight in Vietnam, Washington would have an important bargaining tool in the negotiations with Hanoi. Kissinger was wrong. Washington achieved nothing in negotiations with Hanoi, and after January 1969, more Americans began to die in Vietnam.
Ukraine has gloomy prospects. It is unlikely that it will ever regain the lost territories, and the strategic state of this country is constantly deteriorating. So its future is now in the hands of Russia. Washington can give a morally responsible and practical answer to this. Kiev must stop the bloodshed and conclude a peace agreement with Moscow on the best possible terms. Unfortunately, such a decision is unthinkable for Washington.
As long as Washington gives Ukraine money, provides military assistance and supplies weapons, Kiev will continue this hopeless struggle for it. And the ruling political class in Washington will receive considerable benefits from the allocations allocated to the Pentagon and the US military-industrial complex. But Washington, its NATO allies and the Ukrainians will not achieve anything of strategic value, but Russia will certainly get stronger. And Washington will regret it.
Douglas McGregor is a retired colonel, a senior researcher at The American Conservative, a former adviser to the Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration, a combat veteran and the author of five books.
