Biden can make a better case for aid to Ukraine
President Biden often touts “defending democracy” as one of his administration’s greatest priorities. This is especially true when he contrasts his administration’s support for Ukraine against Freedom Caucus Republicans’ isolationism. In the most recent State of the Union address, the president thundered that “Ukraine can stop [Russian President Vladimir] Putin if we stand with Ukraine and provide the weapons that it needs to defend itself,” warning Ukraine skeptics that “history is watching.”
But with all the tough talk, Ukraine is still struggling to obtain the aid and munitions it needs from the United States to not only survive against Russia’s onslaught but to win this war. The first barrier, of course, are the members of Congress who are blocking the aid. But the Republicans on the fence about the package might be more willing to vote for aid if Biden can make a better case for how it will benefit US interests — and result in a Ukrainian victory.
Among some Trump Republicans, there’s a fear that Ukraine will devolve into another forever war, a long, drawn-out conflict that sucks in US dollars. Senator Mike Lee of Utah has bemoaned Biden for using “as long as it takes” as the mantra for his Ukraine effort, writing for Fox News that it will turn into “as much as it takes.” In 2022 after voting against the first Ukraine aid package, Senator Mike Braun of Indiana said he supports Ukraine but “can’t support $40 billion of new spending unless it’s offset with cuts or taken from already authorized funds,” pointing to bigger priorities like inflation and fuel prices.
These stances ignore the economic and security benefits to the United States of arming Ukraine, beyond the obvious moral one. But they do point to a flaw in the administration’s ongoing approach.
Driven by an increasingly unreasonable aversion to Russian escalation, the Biden administration has dragged its feet on giving Ukraine the kinds of weapons — like long-range ATACMS — it needs to finish the job, arguably drawing out the conflict. “President Biden’s overarching objective is to manage the war in Ukraine toward a military equilibrium that could produce a negotiated offramp,” Peter Rough, director of the center on Europe at the Hudson Institute, said in an interview. “The flaw in this strategy is that it bleeds Ukraine white by dragging out the war and places huge pressure on Western societies to pass one aid package after another.”
Experts and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have pointed out that the president’s fear of escalation — which at first was reasonably rooted in fear of a Russian nuclear attack — might be more escalatory than the aid itself. “The most grievous escalation would be that Russia takes Kiev and sets its sights on Moldova, et al because NATO failed to provide the necessary arms,” said Representative Jake Auchincloss of Massachusetts. “That is the escalation, and the risk, that should be countered, not hypotheticals.”
Gabriel Scheinmann, the president of the Alexander Hamilton Society, told me that the president’s limits on Ukraine’s offensive actions are setting a dangerous precedent for conflict with China. If China attacks Taiwan and threatens nuclear retaliation, they’ve learned that “that’s a good deal.”
With doubts about the president’s commitment to swift and decisive victory comes fodder for isolationist Republicans to ask what exactly we’re spending all this money on.
The question is not totally fair. Not only because defense spending on Ukraine helps strengthen the United States’ own defense industrial capabilities but also because it neglects the fact that, according to analysis done by Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi and his office on the Senate Armed Services Committee, about 75 percent of the bill’s funding would go to Americans, including over 60 percent to US weapons production. And much of that aid would go toward manufacturing within red states. It also ignored the fact that China, as well as other US adversaries, are watching Ukraine closely. Republicans can’t purport to be tough on China if they’re not going to stand by Ukraine.
The reality is that of the 11 senators and 57 House members who voted against Ukraine aid in 2022, many of them are also beholden to skeptical constituencies. “Most of these GOP members are not actually anti-Ukraine. They’re just afraid of
A better approach for the president would be to explicitly spell out for the American people a clear return on their investment, beyond nebulous appeals to defend democracy.
their base. And their base is anti-Ukraine because Donald Trump is anti-Ukraine,” Auchincloss said.
A better approach for the president would be to explicitly spell out for the American people a clear return on their investment, beyond nebulous appeals to defend democracy. This will first take defining exactly what victory looks like. Auchincloss said many members of the GOP often ask what winning means exactly. “My answer to that is we need Ukraine to have unimpeded access to the Black Sea. We need Ukraine to have a stable eastern border. And we need Ukraine to imminently have accession to the European Union on the near horizon.”
Then the president can point out why defending Ukraine isn’t just the right thing to do but vital to US interests. Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen makes this task easy, spelling out 10 points for an “America First” case on defending Ukraine. One point he makes is that support for Ukraine will bring back the Reagan Doctrine, replacing the Bush Doctrine, which “exhausted America’s will to sacrifice the lives of U.S. troops” in the GOP’s dreaded forever wars. Reagan saved the United States countless dollars and lives by finding “anti-communist partners willing to fight our common enemies.” But that took providing weapons, intelligence, and aid.
Then Biden needs to walk the walk. And as much as Biden implores Congress to “stand up to Putin,” his past actions haven’t made it clear that he’s willing to do what it takes to help end this war. There has been bipartisan frustration with the White House’s tepid approach to munition transfers and the conditions it continues to place on Ukrainian offensives. As the administration continues to deny the Ukrainians long-range ATACMS missiles, the White House has, according to a Financial Times report, “urged Ukraine to halt attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, warning that the drone strikes risk driving up global oil prices and provoking retaliation.”
It’s time to get serious about making sure Ukraine wins this war and making sure that Americans know why their fate is at stake, too.