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We saw the kind of deplorable tactics Putin is using in Ukraine in Syria and Chechnya, too. The American public didn’t display the same level of interest or disgust during the earlier conflicts. Why the difference?

There are several reasons. First, the magnitude of the invasion of Ukraine is much larger. Second, the Russian military had a legal right to be in Chechnya and Syria, while Ukraine is an invasion and a violation of international law, pure and simple. Third, the victims of the previous acts of aggression had far less access to the Western mass media than the Ukrainians. Finally, and I suspect most importantly, Ukraine and its residents are closer to us than the residents of Syria and Chechnya. We can now imagine Russia attacking NATO countries, and we can relate culturally to the Ukrainian population.

You can argue, and some have, that the last item is racist. I think it is just natural for us to care more about our neighbors than the people on the other side the world. I don’t think we need to apologize for it.

Citing the examples of several international evildoers, Ross Douthat argues that keeping sanctions on Russia after a short period will only solidify Putin’s control of the populace. Is he right?

Yes. The situation is even worse than he suggests; the longer the sanctions stay on, the more ability the Russians have to counter them, and make them useless in the future. That’s why I’ve maintained that sanctions need to come off as part of any agreement; to leave them on purely for the emotional satisfaction of the American public will only damage our interests in the long run.

Given the spirit of the age, you might think that World War I was an imperialist war, but it wasn’t. The Austrians wanted war to fix an intractable political problem at home; the Tsar was afraid his government would fall if it backed down; the Germans were afraid of the “Russian steamroller;” the French were afraid of fighting at some future date without Russian help; and the British were afraid of a continent dominated by Germany. There are no territorial claims in that list.

Given the bloodshed that ensued over the next few years, and given that there were no real ideological stakes in the conflict, you would think that stalemate would lead to a reasonable negotiated peace. It didn’t happen, due to “Dateline” syndrome. All of the parties concluded that, in light of the magnitude of their losses, they needed a clear victory and territorial gains in order to justify the war. The bad guys had to be identified and punished, and the good guys had to be rewarded. And so the war went on, with catastrophic results for Europe and the entire world.

That is my fear for Ukraine. We need to avoid the temptation of “Dateline” syndrome. A deal may not look great (as with, for example, the Korean War), but the alternatives are impractical and dangerous.

Assume, for purposes of argument, that the war ends with some sort of negotiated agreement which trades a limited amount of Ukrainian territory and a pledge of military neutrality for guarantees of sovereignty. Large areas of Ukraine have been devastated. What happens now?

The US and the EU–not Russia, of course–provide huge sums of money for reconstruction. Ukraine consequently moves even further into the EU camp. The aftermath of the war is consequently another political disaster for Russian imperialists who had hoped (and not without reason) that Ukraine would ultimately fall into their lap through the use of carefully calibrated pressure tactics short of war. Putin’s lack of patience has cost them dearly.

A NOTE TO MY READERS: I will be out of town for a few days, starting tomorrow. Regular posting will resume on Sunday.

I read a column in the NYT about a week ago which suggested that Putin is a practitioner of identity politics. Is that correct?

Of course it is! He’s a fascist. Fascism is identity politics taken to an extreme.

It is sometimes alleged that Putin’s ongoing efforts to eliminate effective opposition are turning Russia back into a Stalinist state. Is that accurate?

It does smell that way, but not exactly. Putin is a fascist; Stalin was a dedicated communist trying to make it up on the fly. The distinction matters, because Putin is far more selective in what he attempts to control than Stalin ever was. He won’t liquidate tens of millions of supposed class enemies in an effort to build a twisted utopia in Russia, because it is the nation, not class, that matters to him; he just jails thousands of genuine political opponents, and has a few of them murdered. Not the same thing at all, if hardly inspiring.

As a result, if you insist on analogies to vicious 20th century dictators, the line actually runs to Hitler, not Stalin. Given that Putin constantly complains about nonexistent Nazis in Ukraine, he would undoubtedly be offended by the comparison. Poor little guy–in his defense, his victims only number in the thousands, to date, but we live in softer times.

Dreher wants you to know that his real hero, Viktor Orban, is nothing like Putin. Is he right?

Let’s look at the record. Orban maintains a stranglehold on power in Hungary by: ferociously gerrymandering legislative districts; buying or otherwise controlling the news media; using law enforcement and the judiciary against his opponents; doling out goodies from the EU to his supporters; and posing as the defender of traditional Christian values against LGBTQ people, secular humanists, Jews, and Muslim immigrants. Is this ringing any bells?

Admittedly, Orban hasn’t poisoned his most conspicuous opponents, shut down the internet, or invaded any of his neighbors yet. That’s because Hungary is a small, poor country which needs EU money and lacks a strong military. Whether it is due in any way to a lack of inclination is unknowable under the circumstances.

Our old friend Rod Dreher is shocked, shocked that Vladimir Putin is encouraging his Syrian allies to fight for him in Ukraine. To Dreher, this means that Putin is only posing cynically as the defender of Christian values against the barbarians of the left. Otherwise, how could he bring in dirty Muslims to fight the pious Orthodox Christians of Ukraine? He must only be interested in power, and empire!

Well, of course he bloody is! Dreher is the kind of guy who will buy anything you put in front of him as long as you wrap it up in a package of traditional Christian values. Anyone with any brains at all would have seen that Putin is about power, and nothing else.

People typically watch “Dateline” because it portrays a predictable and just universe in which evildoers get their just desserts in the end. Occasionally, that doesn’t happen; the story ends inconclusively, and the viewers feel cheated.

In a similar vein, I suspect most Americans anticipate Putin’s Ukraine adventure will end with an appropriate punishment for the criminal. Unfortunately, that is highly unlikely; the Russian military may not be covering itself in glory, but it has won Ukrainian territory and still enjoys advantages in men and weapons. If the result is a compromise, what happens next? Biden gets the blame, of course.

If he is wise, he will be preparing the American public for some sort of a deal. I don’t see any evidence of that to date.

Putin launched an unprovoked, imperialist war against an adjoining country he believes has no right to exist. When the US responded by arming Ukraine, what did he say? That he, and Russia, were being “cancelled” by America, of course!

It sounds ludicrous–deranged, even–but it has a clear purpose. He has chosen to identify himself completely with the extreme right in America in the hopes that it has enough political power to stop Biden from intervening in the war. It is cynical, not crazy.

Most of the members of the “New Right” deny being useful idiots, but what more evidence do you need?

And so Putin invaded Ukraine.

I don’t really see what he’s gained.

His campaign’s a dud.

He’s stuck in the mud

And the Russians are feeling the pain.

Donald Trump pulled his endorsement of Mo Brooks in the Alabama primary yesterday. His real reason for doing so, of course, was that Brooks was polling poorly, and thus making him look bad. His stated reason, however, was that Brooks had turned “woke” by refusing to argue that Trump could be reinstated as president prior to 2024.

If that’s what being “woke” means now, count me in.

In the midst of all of our cheerleading for Ukraine, Ross Douthat says we should leave plenty of room for dissent. Is he right?

Absolutely! There is always room for splashes of cold realism when public enthusiasm runs ahead of good sense, as long as the arguments are made in good faith. If you’re a “New Right” admirer of Putin who believes that the war is a contest between a properly masculine leader and the woke, feminized West, however, you’re not making the realism argument in good faith, and we have no reason to listen to you.

Fortunately, Douthat is not in that category, but some of his friends are. Here’s looking at you, Mr. Ahmari.

Ideally, of course, the Ukrainians would throw the Russians completely out of the country with NATO’s weapons, but no active assistance on the ground or in the air. It is highly unlikely, lacking NATO’s offensive capabilities, that they can do so. With that in mind, what should NATO be looking to accomplish here?

Two things: to minimize the loss of Ukrainian sovereignty in the event of a deal; and to degrade the Russian military to the point that it won’t try it again. Realistically, we can’t do anything more than that.

It isn’t a clash of civilizations between the swaggering, manly Orthodox Christian Russians and the secular, feminized West. There are no significant cultural differences between Russians and Ukrainians (after all, that was part of Putin’s rationale for the war), and the nearest NATO country, Poland, is as militant about LGBTQ issues as Russia.

It also isn’t a war between liberal democracy and autocracy, although that argument is closer to the mark than the clash of civilizations model. Ukraine has historically been dominated by oligarchs, and is hardly a perfect example of liberal democracy. Putin probably worries that the existence of personal freedoms and free elections in a neighboring state creates a bad example for his people, but it is unlikely that the Ukrainian system represents any sort of existential threat to his kleptocracy.

No, this is an imperialist war to recreate the Russian Empire over the objections of Russia’s neighbors and in violation of modern international norms. That is plenty of reason to oppose it.