Among the sorry outcomes of Trump's September phone call to Ukraine president Zelensky is the latters meeting with Russian Diktator Vladimir Putin in Paris on Monday at what are reputed to be peace talks.
Trump's phone call and Giuliani's (et al) machinations drumming up misinformation about the Bidens and Ukraine interference in the 2016 election (fake news) leaves Zelensky in a weakened position. He will be trying to end the conflict in the Russian-occupied Donbas region of Ukraine. He would be in a far better position if the U.S. was four square behind Ukraine in its efforts to reclaim its territory and to remove Russian meddling (to say nothing of its seizure of Crimea). Trump and his free-lancing gangsters have steadily undermined Ukraine's claims to independence from Russian interference.
Here is a relatively short Brookings run down on how and why the U.S. became a guarantor of Ukraine independence. They gave up the nuclear weapons place there by the Soviets (remember 1990!).
And here is a CFR assessment of the prospects for the Paris talks.
So the Budapest Memorandum made the world, and specifically the United States, a safer place. Now the machinations of Trump and Giuliani for political gain against a rival who may or may not be Trump's opponent in 2020, have weakened an ally (Ukraine) against the Russians. Who surely interfered in the 2016 election, and just as surely are working to interfere in 2020. Apparently Trump neither knows nor cares what America's place in world affairs should be; only about his personal place and personal gain. That used to be called treason, back when we cared about such things. Impeachment subito!
ReplyDeleteRussia has always dominated, or wanted to dominate, Ukraine. That is not news. Ukrainians thought they had found the key to their cell door when they began to snuggle up to the West. Trump who never notices cell doors of friendly tyrants just changed the lock. Zelinsky is going to play chess with Putin with his own queen off the board. That game is not likely to go well.
ReplyDeleteWhen Putin moves in on Kyiv, one could -- and all the Republicans will -- say Ukraine always was an Orthodox, Slavic country and no part of Western civilization. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia will get very cold even as the rest of the globe warms. Poland's autocracy will look around for the best deal and won't find in in a NATO in which the U.S. is half in today and half out tomorrow. Putin will have a lot of low-hanging fruit to choose from, and we will just have to content ourselves with new record highs for the Dow Jones.
Anyway, the Ukrainians tried to mess up our 2016 election, as Rudy will prove if it takes him all winter.
And, btw, North Korea has announced officially that the president of the united states is about to go back on "dotard" status. It's sad when a great love affair breaks up. That Kim-Trump affair always was too hot not to cool down.
I may be over-fixated on this--but WW1--a war no one wanted or expected, broke out because Russia and its Slavic connections were looking for a fight. With its ally, France it got one with the help of this great German military plan and a crazy Kaiser salivating to implement it.
DeleteOkay a hundred years ago, not exactly the same,but a family resemblance that the U.S. forgets/ignores to its shame and peril. We are the goofy uncle who is the guarantor of order in "old Europe" while everyone in new and forgetful Europe carryies on diddling with their goofy histories, economies and boundaries. The other week the Economist reported that Viktor Orban has taken to issuing Hungarian passports to Hungarians left outside its reduced borders by the Treaty of Trianon (centenary coming up 1920!). Long live the Hungarian Empire! ETC.....
And Germans can't forget the Weimar inflation when they had to cart their reichmarks around in wheel barrows.
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