America embracing its role as the arsenal of democracy

When Russia invaded Ukraine, the idea that it might lose seemed farfetched. Vladimir Putin appeared to have a powerful, modernized army, supported by a defense budget a dozen times larger than Ukraine’s.

And even after Ukraine’s miraculous defeat of Russia’s initial attack, one had to wonder about the longer-term prospects. Before the war, Russia’s economy was about eight times bigger than Ukraine’s; so you might have expected Russia to eventually win a battle of attrition.

But that isn’t what seems to be happening. U.S. officials are beginning to talk optimistically, not just about holding Russia off, but about outright Ukrainian victory.

How is this possible? The answer is that America, while not directly engaged in combat, is doing what it did in the year before Pearl Harbor: We, with help from our allies, are serving as the “arsenal of democracy,” giving the defenders of freedom the means to keep fighting.

For those who aren’t familiar: Britain in 1940, like Ukraine in 2022, had unexpected success against a seemingly unstoppable enemy, as the Royal Air Force defeated the Luftwaffe’s attempt to achieve air superiority, a necessary precondition for invasion. Nonetheless, by late 1940 the British were in dire straits: Their war effort required huge imports, military hardware and essentials like food and oil, and they were running out of money.

Franklin D. Roosevelt responded with the LendLease Act, which made it possible to transfer large quantities of arms and food to the British. This aid wasn’t enough to turn the tide, but it gave Winston Churchill the resources he needed to hang on, which would set the stage for Allied victory.

Now Lend-Lease has been revived, and largescale military aid is flowing to Ukraine. Thanks to this aid, the arithmetic of attrition is actually working strongly against Putin. Russia’s economy may be bigger than Ukraine’s, but it’s small compared with the U.S. economy, let alone the combined economies of the West. And with its limited economic base, Russia doesn’t appear to have the capacity to replace its battlefield losses.

Ukraine’s army, by contrast, is getting better equipped, with ever more heavy weapons, by the day. Assuming Congress agrees to President Joe Biden’s request for an additional $33 billion in aid cumulative Western support for Ukraine will soon come close to Russia’s annual military spending.

In other words, as I said, time appears to be on Ukraine’s side.

If Ukraine does win, it will be a triumph for the forces of freedom everywhere. Would-be aggressors and war criminals will be given pause. Western enemies of democracy will have been given an object lesson in the difference between macho posturing and true strength.

While credit for this victory, if it materializes, will, of course, go to the Ukrainians themselves, this wouldn’t have been possible without brave, effective leadership in some (if, alas, not all) Western nations.

Whatever else you may say about Boris Johnson, Britain has been a rock in this crisis. Poland and other Eastern European nations have risen to the occasion too. And Biden has done an incredible job, holding the Western alliance together.

Previous U.S. presidents have given stirring speeches about freedom. And it’s good that they have. But Biden has arguably done more to defend freedom, in substantive ways that go beyond mere words, than any president since Harry Truman.

I wonder whether and when he’ll get the credit he deserves.