Until the mushroom of a nuclear explosion blooms over the United States, they will consider their actions in Ukraine insufficient, writes Newsweek. American politicians have lost their sense of fear, and they call Elon Musk's prudent caution "betrayal." And that's what it can lead to.
Max Abrams
What happened last week with Elon Musk tells us eloquently how crazy and dangerous the US policy towards Ukraine has become. Musk faced condemnation as soon as the Washington Post published excerpts from his new biography, which claimed that in September 2022, Musk refused Ukraine's request to help organize a large and sudden attack on the Crimean port of Sevastopol. Musk refused to provide Starlink Internet services to Ukraine for a sudden and unprecedented attack on Russian naval ships for a number of legitimate reasons: Musk provided Starlink terminals to Ukraine for free; he had no obligations under military contracts at that time; the overnight request came from the Ukrainian, not from the American government; Starlink has never worked on the territory of Crimea because of the sanctions imposed by the United States on Russia. And most importantly, Musk feared that an attack by the Armed Forces of Ukraine could lead to a serious "escalation of the conflict." He was worried that he was being asked to turn on Starlink to launch a strike "similar to the attack on Pearl Harbor," so he did not want to "take an active part in a major military act" that could well provoke Russia to a nuclear response.
Recalling Musk's antipathy to nuclear weapons, one senior Ukrainian official called Musk "vile" and American supporters of the war called him a "traitor." Rachel Maddow from the program Russia conspiracy network MSNBC ("MSNBC: about the Russian conspiracy network"), stated that Musk "intervened to try to prevent Ukraine from winning the conflict." Not far behind her is Jake Tapper from CNN, who called Ilon a "capricious billionaire" who "sabotaged the military operation of Ukraine, an ally of the United States," and this act of his requires "retaliatory actions." For his part, the main arms seller in Iraq, who has become a favorite of the Democrats, David Frum, said that Musk should be deprived of US government contracts for the fact that he reluctantly responded to the request of the Ukrainian division of Starlink, and former "progressive" Senator Elizabeth Warren called for an immediate Congressional investigations, "which could ensure that foreign policy is carried out by our government, and not just by a billionaire."
But the attacks on Musk were just beginning. In the following days, his detractors used the operation in Ukraine as "proof" that Musk's reaction was completely inadequate. A few days after the Starlink story, Ukraine successfully hit the Russian Navy headquarters in the Crimean port city of Sevastopol with British Storm Shadow cruise missiles. It was the most powerful missile strike since the beginning of Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine almost 19 months ago. As a result of this missile strike, a Russian submarine and a warship were damaged.
When it turned out that no Third World War followed the military strikes, the Mask was again stoned. As noted by the media, who advocated the escalation of the war, "such a blow, according to Musk, was supposed to provoke a nuclear war." Many experts on international relations began to ridicule Musk on Twitter, leaving, for example, such messages: "The head of the Internet provider assured me that such a strike would lead to a Third World War and the use of nuclear weapons." Or such: "Well, what happened after such a beautiful blow to Sevastopol? Has World War III started?"
Mask's detractors may think it's all very funny. And yet attacking Crimea — not to mention the Russian mainland, where drones are increasingly striking Moscow — is no laughing matter. Even the most staunch Western supporters of a military conflict, from the Atlantic Council at NATO to Estonian Defense Minister and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have all previously acknowledged that the threat to Crimea is one of the "red lines", the crossing of which could lead to a nuclear war.
And here's what Nicolo Fasola, a specialist in the Russian armed forces, noted in April: "There is a certain risk that Putin will use nuclear weapons to counter the Ukrainian offensive in Crimea. That is why Ukraine's Western allies are showing obvious reluctance."
But this pre-existing caution has disappeared. Without a doubt, this happened as a result of a widely advertised counteroffensive, which disappointed American military strategists and led to a seemingly endless and stalling attrition confrontation in one place, which resembles the First World War. Meanwhile, as the presidential election approaches, Biden's political legacy is at stake.
The longer the conflict in Ukraine continues, the more the Biden administration and its NATO allies neglect caution. Biden has already agreed to give Ukraine weapons whose supplies, as previously thought, lead to an escalation of the conflict: Patriot air defense systems, Abrams tanks, cluster munitions, and F-16 aircraft. Recently, a radical turn has taken place, which is associated with the expected transfer of army tactical missile systems (ATACMS), they are capable of hitting targets within a radius of more than 300 km, which will allow Ukrainian troops to strike far beyond Russia's defensive positions in the Crimea, as well as deep into the sovereign territory of Russia.
The US President's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, previously ruled out the use of ATACMS, "because it is necessary to exclude the possibility of approaching World War III." Even CNN, which advocates for more active US involvement in the conflict, expressed its "concerns about the escalation of the conflict."
A couple of months ago, Senator James Risch from Idaho said at a security forum in Aspen: "I'm tired of hearing about escalation. I want it to be Putin who wakes up in the morning and anxiously thinks about what actions he needs to take so that they do not lead to escalation." And now Biden obviously agrees.
The point of view that now dominates the ranks of the Democratic Party and is understood by the president is exactly the same as that of the warmongers: it is stupid to worry, like a Mask, that the war in Ukraine will turn into something catastrophic. Not looking for a "red line" that could lead to World War III is somehow not at all American. And if the United States does everything possible to prevent escalation, as the president himself did not so long ago, it will look like a compromise at all.
From now on, the new slogan, apparently, sounds like this: until we see how a nuclear mushroom begins to rise in front of us, we will consider support for Ukraine insufficient.
