Will the U.S. Abandon Ukraine? It Could Happen.Putin is counting on Trump 2.0.
Charlie Sykes
21 hr ago
Supporters of Ukraine march in front of the White House on August 27, 2022 (Photo by Nathan Posner/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
“In a little over a week, Ukrainian forces retook Izyum and dozens more occupied towns in a lightning offensive that shocked Western and Ukrainian officials with its speed, carrying almost all the way to the border, and sending Russian troops and pro-Russian separatist forces fleeing for their lives.” —Jack Detsch, Foreign Policy
A Ukrainian victory would, arguably, be the most significant U.S. foreign policy triumph in decades. Despite some initial hesitations, the Biden administration has forged and led a remarkable international coalition, and has supplied many of the arms that now appear to be turning the tide.
So this may seem like an odd time to raise the question: How reliable an ally are we, really? Is is possible that the United States could bail on Ukraine if the war drags on?
Vladimir Putin certainly thinks so. He may be counting on it.
Of course, this may be another one of his epic miscalculations, but his hope is not baseless.
Consider this report from Defense One:
Conservative groups are lobbying members of Congress to vote against the White House’s request for additional money for Ukraine, arguing that the administration is asking for a blank check with no long-term plan to end the war.
The White House announced Friday that it would request an additional $13.7 billion to help Ukraine between October and December, including $11.7 for security and economic assistance and $2 billion to reduce energy costs that have increased during the war. Congress has already approved two supplemental funding packages, for $13.6 billion in March and $40 billion in May.
Conservative groups, including Heritage Action and Concerned Veterans for America, quickly urged lawmakers to reject the plea for additional aid.
This is a decidedly new look for the venerable Heritage Foundation, which this week seemed to formalize its break with the last vestiges of Reagan-era foreign policy, as its new president embraced neo-isolationist “National Conservativism.”
 National Conservatism @NatConTalk
I come here not to invite National Conservatism to join OUR conservative movement. But to say that @Heritage's values are already yours. -@KevinRobertsTX, president of the Heritage Foundation, at #NatCon3.
September 12th 2022
18 Retweets33 Likes
Back in May, David French wrote about Heritage’s shift on Ukraine:
Resistance against Ukraine aid is growing on the right, and the center of right-wing resistance is no longer Tucker Carlson but one of the most powerful think tanks in Washington, the Heritage Foundation
Heritage’s opposition would be troubling enough on the merits, but compounding the problem, Heritage (a think tank, remember) has abandoned careful analysis in support of cheap, easily rebutted MAGA talking points. It’s sad to see.
Heritage, however, is hardly alone.
Defense One also noted that Russ Vought, president of the Center for Renewing America and Trump’s former director of the Office of Management and Budget, also ripped the Biden administration’s request for more aid for Ukraine. As Dana Milbank noted back in December 2020, Vought is a key player in the MAGAverse. While Vought’s tenure at OMB was notably shambolic, Milbank wrote, “what Russ Vought is very good at is sabotage. He’s sabotaging national security, the pandemic response and the economic recovery — all to make things more difficult for the incoming Biden administration.”
And then, of course, there is the right-wing media.
An article in The Federalist on Thursday slammed “McConnell and his fellow swamp creatures” for refusing to “put America’s security interests ahead of Ukraine’s.” Fox News’ Tucker Carlson has not yet weighed in on the latest ask, but said in May that “leaders believe protecting Ukraine is more important than protecting you.”
Here’s Tucker from… last Friday (!):
 Matthew Gertz @MattGertz
Tucker Carlson's top Russia-Ukraine war expert Douglas MacGregor, on Friday night: "This entire war may be over" soon, "right now things are going very, very badly" for the Ukrainians and they're "desperate," "they're losing once again just south of Kharkiv."
September 12th 2022
995 Retweets5,552 Likes
The right’s anti-Ukraine rhetoric is hardly new. Where the commentary has not been overtly pro-Putin, it has been aggressively anti-anti-Putin.
On February 22, right-wing commentator/influencer Candace Owens urged her millions of followers to read Putin’s speech from earlier in the week.
“I suggest every American who wants to know what’s *actually* going on in Russia and Ukraine, read this transcript of Putin’s address. As I’ve said for month — NATO (under direction from the United States) is violating previous agreements and expanding eastward. WE are at fault.”
On his podcast, Steve Bannon praised Putin for being “anti-woke,” and for denying LGBTQ rights. Longtime Trumpist consigliere and trickster Roger Stone also repeated Russian talking points, and insisted that “Biden wants war more than the Ukrainians want war.”
 The Republican Accountability Project @AccountableGOP
Longtime Trump ally Roger Stone recites the Kremlin talking point that Russia is invading Ukraine because it feels threatened by the West. He also says “Biden wants war more than the Ukrainians want war.” Evil.
February 24th 2022
152 Retweets567 Likes
Trumpist rock star Charlie Kirk told his millions of followers that “it feels as if Putin is going into places that want him.” (Like many of his other takes, this one has aged poorly.)
Ohio’s shape-shifting J.D. Vance also picked up the clear signals from MAGA World, when he declared, “I got to be honest with you, I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or the other.”
 Ron Filipkowski ???? @RonFilipkowski
OH Senate candidate JD Vance: “I think it’s ridiculous that we are focused on this border in Ukraine. I got to be honest with you, I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or the other.”
February 19th 2022
2,256 Retweets5,853 Likes
But no one has been as aggressive as Fox News’s top-rated host.
“It might be worth asking ourselves, since it is getting serious, what is this really about? Why do I hate Putin so much?” Carlson famously asked earlier this year. “Has Putin ever called me a racist? Has he threatened to get me fired for disagreeing with him? Has he shipped every middle-class job in my town to Russia?” he continued. “Is he teaching my children to embrace racial discrimination? Is he making fentanyl? Is he trying to snuff out Christianity? Does he eat dogs?”
For months, Carlson has been a fixture on Russian state television, so Putin has some reason to think that his rhetoric represents the sentiments of MAGA America. And, perhaps of its next ruling party.
**
So far, however, MAGA’s hostility to Ukraine has had only a limited impact on GOP congressional support. Only 57 House Republicans and 11 GOP senators voted against a $40 billion supplemental bill in May.
But, as Defense One notes, “stories in conservative media coupled with right-leaning groups lobbying lawmakers to vote against the additional funds are likely to increase the number of Republicans who oppose this request compared to previous supplementals.…”
The directional arrow of the GOP should be obvious by now. This is what I wrote in Politico back in February:
Conservative politics today is dominated not by elected leaders, but by the entertainers. Tucker Carlson is exponentially more influential than Mitch McConnell…
And the influence of that entertainment wing is magnified by the ascendency of the America First isolationism championed by Donald Trump, whose dominance in the GOP has meant the virtual eclipse of the party’s once robust internationalist wing.
The reality is that, despite Tom Cotton’s saber-rattling, there is really no longer any appetite among Republicans for a Reagan-esque tear-down-that wall approach to foreign policy. For the most part, the old Cold Warriors have been purged from the party. In their place have risen Trump-inspired acolytes like J.D. Vance, the Ukraine-indifferent Ohio Senate candidate…
The animus of the right has been turned inward.
So, the Putin-is-a-savvy-genius wing of the party may be small at the moment, but as we have seen over and over, the MAGA voices are the Republican id these days.
Exit question: Since Putin launched his genocidal invasion, has a single prominent Republican broken with Trump over his bromance with the Russian thug? Or his hostility to NATO? Remember:
There are few things that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia desires more than the weakening of NATO, the military alliance among the United States, Europe and Canada that has deterred Soviet and Russian aggression for 70 years.
Last year, President Trump suggested a move tantamount to destroying NATO: the withdrawal of the United States.
Putin has gotten a lot wrong lately, but he undoubtedly thinks that if he can wait out the Biden presidency, he could do business with Trump 2.0… with all that means for the fate of Ukraine.
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