No. of Recommendations: 7
Sure. At what cost? How many civilians are you willing to get blown up along the way?
I'm willing to keep supply Ukraine with the guns and money they need for as long as they are willing to keep fighting. It's incredibly important that Russia's evil actions not be allowed to succeed, but it's the choice of the Ukranian's whether it's worth fighting to defend their country. But as long as they're still willing to do that, it's absolutely in the U.S.' best interest to help them do it.
And yet, upthread you noted that you're unwilling to put the kind of economic pain to Russia that would end the war and you're not willing to add western firepower directly into the conflict, both things that would deliver a knockout punch to Putin.
I'm not willing to take economic measures that won't end the war. A massive, "us or them" sanction on India (one of our allies) isn't going to end the war. It will prolong it, because it will probably lead India to choose "them" rather than "us" - and if we force them to go wholeheartedly into that camp, it will force India to integrate more with the Russian economy than they do today. Right now they have economic relations with both Russia/China and the West - if we cut them off from the West, they'll have to increase their economic relations with Russa above where they are now.
No one's saying "don't try to impose more economic harm on Russia." We're saying that the specific thing Trump has tried to do with India is a dumb proposal.
You're viewing this through too small of a lens.
A cease-fire now lets the Ukrainians rest, heal and more importantly, rearm.
And the same for Russia. It lets them heal and re-arm - and rebuild their terribly depleted foreign currency reserves. And then they can just invade some more.
That's worse for Ukraine, because the West will have demonstrated that they're not willing to help Ukraine continue to inflict punishment on Russia's military. Once Putin has that in hand, he'll know he can win. Not just hold the territory he has now; he'll know he can take it all. If the West isn't willing to keep up the fight now, they won't be willing to keep up the fight in the future. If DJT can't abide the current situation in Ukraine today, then a U.S. security guarantee is worthless - if we're not willing to stand up for the Ukrainian military when all we're doing is sending guns and money, there's zero chance we're ever sending our own soldiers there (or genuinely committing to even the guns and money) when Putin starts the invasion again.
