During the Cold War American conservatives were ridiculed for the "Domino Theory" of the sequential advance of the USSR, which posited that if we didn't stop the commies in Vietnam we would be fighting them eventually at the Rio Grande. Now it is American liberals who preach the new domino theory, which warns that if we don't stop the Ru…
During the Cold War American conservatives were ridiculed for the "Domino Theory" of the sequential advance of the USSR, which posited that if we didn't stop the commies in Vietnam we would be fighting them eventually at the Rio Grande. Now it is American liberals who preach the new domino theory, which warns that if we don't stop the Russians in Ukraine next will fall Georgia, then the Baltics.....
Ukraine is beginning to face recruiting challenges for its military and fissures are appearing in Ukrainian society over issues of who should serve. Many are exempted from duty because they own/operate/work in businesses that, while not defense-related, are deemed economically-important to generate needed tax revenue. Some pay bribes to avoid conscription. Many Ukrainian service age men have fled the country to avoid service. The courageous Ukrainian volunteers that have been beating back the Russians are weary and their families growing disgruntled seeing young men in Kiev in the coffee shops instead of the trenches. What happens if this grows into popular ambivalence? It is merely an assumption that Ukrainians themselves will continue to support this war indefinitely.
When hundreds of billions in assistance pours into any nation corruption inevitably follows. It happened in Vietnam, in Iraq, in Afghanistan. Ukraine may be involved in a noble existential struggle; however, prewar Ukraine was also a notoriously corrupt country and it would be naive to imagine no diversion of aid enriching the corrupt and contributing to the expansion of criminal infrastructure. Such corruption will significantly handicap a post-war Ukraine and be difficult to prevent.
An unintended consequence of our military support of Ukraine has been the substantial improvement in Russia's military abilities. Deployment of advanced western weapons systems has given Russian (and vicariously the Chinese) military a laboratory to study the capability and function of these systems and improvise countermeasures to thwart them. The Russians are learning and adapting. Starlink is a recent example. The Russian army that bumbled toward Kiev two years ago is not the same army today. They are much more capable now because we have been schooling them. They have had opportunities to improve logistics. Their factories are churning out brand-new armaments at an alarming rate. They have recruited new supply chains and successfully incorporated foreign weapons systems from Iran and Korea. Counterintuitively, it may have been ultimately safer for NATO countries if the West had allowed Russian to remain complacent about its over-rated military capability instead of incentivizing its improvement. Arguably, today's Russia is a more formidable adversary than it was two years ago precisely because of our assistance to Ukraine.
During the Cold War American conservatives were ridiculed for the "Domino Theory" of the sequential advance of the USSR, which posited that if we didn't stop the commies in Vietnam we would be fighting them eventually at the Rio Grande. Now it is American liberals who preach the new domino theory, which warns that if we don't stop the Russians in Ukraine next will fall Georgia, then the Baltics.....
Ukraine is beginning to face recruiting challenges for its military and fissures are appearing in Ukrainian society over issues of who should serve. Many are exempted from duty because they own/operate/work in businesses that, while not defense-related, are deemed economically-important to generate needed tax revenue. Some pay bribes to avoid conscription. Many Ukrainian service age men have fled the country to avoid service. The courageous Ukrainian volunteers that have been beating back the Russians are weary and their families growing disgruntled seeing young men in Kiev in the coffee shops instead of the trenches. What happens if this grows into popular ambivalence? It is merely an assumption that Ukrainians themselves will continue to support this war indefinitely.
When hundreds of billions in assistance pours into any nation corruption inevitably follows. It happened in Vietnam, in Iraq, in Afghanistan. Ukraine may be involved in a noble existential struggle; however, prewar Ukraine was also a notoriously corrupt country and it would be naive to imagine no diversion of aid enriching the corrupt and contributing to the expansion of criminal infrastructure. Such corruption will significantly handicap a post-war Ukraine and be difficult to prevent.
An unintended consequence of our military support of Ukraine has been the substantial improvement in Russia's military abilities. Deployment of advanced western weapons systems has given Russian (and vicariously the Chinese) military a laboratory to study the capability and function of these systems and improvise countermeasures to thwart them. The Russians are learning and adapting. Starlink is a recent example. The Russian army that bumbled toward Kiev two years ago is not the same army today. They are much more capable now because we have been schooling them. They have had opportunities to improve logistics. Their factories are churning out brand-new armaments at an alarming rate. They have recruited new supply chains and successfully incorporated foreign weapons systems from Iran and Korea. Counterintuitively, it may have been ultimately safer for NATO countries if the West had allowed Russian to remain complacent about its over-rated military capability instead of incentivizing its improvement. Arguably, today's Russia is a more formidable adversary than it was two years ago precisely because of our assistance to Ukraine.