As Ukrainian civilians take up arms to repel an invading army, as grandfathers and teen-agers and nursing mothers shoulder Kalashnikovs against tanks and attack helicopters, it’s worth remembering that this is Joe Biden’s fault.
America had a duty, Biden had the con, he dropped the ball.
And the Russian military rolled, as many as 15 divisions of combat troops streaming from three sides into a peaceful country, with warships off the coast and thundering jets overhead, videos of missiles into apartment buildings and elderly women with blood streaming down their faces.
That’s what happens when America breaks its promises.
Yesterday was Kabul, today is Kiev, tomorrow will be Kaohsiung.
When America is weak, the world suffers. When our president gets played, when he lacks the brains or the backbone to assert our interests and assure the peace, horrible things happen.
The slaughter of innocents at the airport, while we were there and since, with women beaten and raped and hundreds of thousands starving through the winter. Now the butchery of Russians marching in the name of lebensraum, a madman at their fore, the oldest and dirtiest chapter in human history.
And the United States did nothing.
More correctly, Joe Biden did nothing.
When the Soviet Union fell, when the Russian empire unraveled, Ukraine had a nuclear arsenal, weapons enough to keep any foe at bay for generations to come. And we took them away. The United States, protector of the world, took the Ukrainian nukes in exchange for a guarantee of protection. They didn’t need nukes to protect themselves, we said, because we would protect them.
But we didn’t.
First, under Obama, we let the jackal at the door carve off Crimea, without a consequence or objection.
And now, under Biden, we have let the slaughter of the entire nation begin.
Putin had armor and artillery and Biden had bluster and bluff. He held press conferences and thumped his chest.
But in the end it was a cold warrior versus a draft dodger and it turns out you shouldn’t take sanctions to a tank fight. After eight years under Obama, after the disaster at Kabul, Putin knew who he was facing, and he laughed with scorn.
And nothing Biden did or said deterred Putin in the least.
The biggest military in the world, the biggest economy in the world. The guarantor of global peace for the last 75 years. A guy who could turn off all the computers and electricity in Russia at the push of a button, who could collapse the Russian economy with the snap of his fingers. That guy, Biden, did absolutely nothing.
Just more press conferences.
It takes more than a big stick, it also takes a backbone.
And Joe Biden doesn’t have one of those.
And the tanks rolled and the jets flew and the Ukrainian blood flowed.
While civilians lined up for an AK and a satchel of ammunition and a pamphlet to explain how to fire a gun and fight a foe.
While a million and more refugees streamed with little more than the clothes on their back toward the nearest NATO border.
Norwegians and Britons and Poles knew what to do and think and say, and their leaders moved quickly to do what they could.
While the paper tiger on Pennsylvania Avenue kept talking about sanctions, piecemeal and halfway, some banks but not too many banks, and certainly not cutting off access to international banking. An underage TV actor is president of Ukraine and right now the moral leader of the world, and the American president is missing in action.
Joe Biden holds all the cards, and he doesn’t know how to play them.
If Joe’s got your back, your life insurance better be paid up.
Because the failure of Joe Biden to use the power of the United States to forestall a Russian invasion of Ukraine will result in generations and possibly centuries of the domination of a free and wonderful people by their thuggish neighbors. The might and leadership of the United States led to Ukrainian freedom in 1991, and the incompetence and hesitancy of the United States cost Ukraine that freedom in 2022.
Ronald Reagan and George Bush took Ukraine away from Russia, Barack Obama and Joe Biden gave it back.
But this isn’t about American politics, it’s about Ukrainian lives.
And hundreds of thousands of those will be lost.
Because of Joe Biden.
Because America with him at the wheel doesn’t keep its promises.