WASHINGTON, D.C. – Overnight, Vladimir Putin ordered a Russian invasion into Ukraine. The extent of its consequences largely remain to be seen, both home and abroad.
Claudia Rosett, foreign policy fellow at Independent Women’s Voice, released the following statement:
“Vladimir Putin’s onslaught in Ukraine comes as a five-alarm warning of proliferating dangers that the Biden administration, focused on its radical domestic agenda, has been doing too little to deter. There are echoes here of the 1930s, in which the great democratic powers did too little, too late, to stop the cascading violations that finally turned into the conflagration of World War II.
“From the Soviet Union’s defeat in the Cold War, Russia has emerged as an aggressor against its neighbors and a disruptive foe of America and a free world order. Russia’s dictator, President Vladimir Putin, aspires to reassemble the Soviet empire, not as a communist system but as a globally powerful imperium under his rule.
“Russia is making common cause with what we might call a conglomerate of evil, expanding ties and coordination with other hostile tyrannies, especially the predatory communist regime in China. The West’s failure to deter Putin’s invasion of Ukraine will further embolden China’s dictator, President Xi Jinping, in his broad quest for global dominance, and, most immediately, his aggressive designs on democratic Taiwan.
“It is highly unlikely that sanctions and indignant posturing will stop these threats. But there are measures President Biden could take that would make a serious difference. Biden could free the U.S. energy industry he is now strangling, thus helping the U.S. economy, while downgrading Putin’s leverage as czar of the world’s biggest gas station. Biden could begin urgently building up a U.S. military focused on deterring and winning wars, rather than social issues and eco-fuels. And it is time for all Americans to revisit not-so-ancient history. America has experience in standing up to the Kremlin. President Reagan showed the way. As we head into a new Cold War — or not so cold — it is time to revisit how America won the last one.”
###