There are three distinct views of Putin within the GOP. They are as follows:
- Putin is awesome! He’s the man! He was fighting wokeness throughout the world when it wasn’t cool! We need someone like him to take out the garbage in our country and start over again! PROPONENTS OF THIS VIEW: Trump; Carlson; Ramaswamy.
- Putin is a thug, to be sure, but his country just isn’t that dangerous. Russia is struggling to defeat Ukraine; it would be no match for NATO. Europe should take over this problem and let America use its limited resources to deal with the real existential threats–China and the border. PROPONENTS OF THIS VIEW: J.D. Vance.
- Letting Putin work his will in Ukraine will just encourage him to try the same thing with the Baltic states and Poland. Dictators are never satisfied. Didn’t we learn anything from Hitler? PROPONENTS OF THIS VIEW: Nikki Haley; Mitch McConnell.
My best guess is that the third group is still the largest within the GOP, but is not a majority. In any event, some prominent Republicans talk tough against Putin, but enable him in practice. Lindsey Graham, for example, sounds like a member of the third cohort, but votes with the second.