If you only follow the newspaper and TV news about Ukraine, you can imagine that the war has sunk into a long, grueling and somewhat boring routine. You would be mistaken. In fact, things are getting more dangerous with each passing day.
For starters, the longer this war goes on, the more opportunities arise for catastrophic miscalculations — and the raw material for that is accumulating fast and furiously.
Consider the two leaks from US officials a few days ago about the country’s involvement in the Russian-Ukrainian war: First, the New York Times revealed that “the US provided intelligence on Russian units that allowed the Ukrainians to attack and kill many of Moscow who have died in action in the conflict so far, according to US officials.”
Later, the New York Times, after reporting on NBC News and citing US government officials, reported that America “provided intelligence that helped Ukrainian forces locate and attack” the Moskva, the main battleship of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea. . This help with location “contributed to the subsequent sinking” of the vessel by two Ukrainian cruise missiles.
As a journalist, I love a good story based on a leak, and the reporters who gave those scoops did powerful investigative work. At the same time, according to everything I could glean from US officials, who spoke to me on condition of anonymity, the leaks were not part of a deliberate strategy, and President Joe Biden was furious.
He would have called the director of national intelligence, the director of the CIA and the secretary of defense to make it clear, in the strongest and most incisive language possible, that this kind of uncontrolled talk is senseless and needs to stop now — before we end up in a non-stop war. intended with Russia.
The startling conclusion to draw from these leaks is that they suggest that we are no longer waging an indirect war with Russia, but slowly approaching direct war — and no one has prepared the American people or Congress for this.
Vladimir Putin is certainly under no illusions about how much the US and NATO, the western military alliance, are arming Ukraine with equipment and intelligence, but when US officials start bragging in public about the role they played in killing generals and the sinking of the main Russian warship, which killed many sailors, we may be creating an opening for Putin to respond in ways that could dangerously escalate this conflict.
And thus, dragging the US into deeper involvement than the country wants.
It is doubly dangerous, say US officials, because it is increasingly clear to them that Putin’s behavior is not as predictable as it was in the past. And the Russian president’s options are running out to win some kind of victory on the field that could save him from humiliation — or even some indirect way out of it.
It’s hard to overstate the extent to which the war has been a catastrophe for Putin. In fact, Biden pointed out to his team that the Russian wanted to fight NATO expansion, but encouraged its expansion. Finland and Sweden are taking steps to join the alliance they have been left out of for seven decades.
Unfortunately, we have to be aware that it is not just the Russians who would like to get us more involved. Make no mistake: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been trying to do the same from the start — getting Ukraine to join NATO immediately or convincing Washington to strike a bilateral security deal with Kiev. I deeply respect and admire Zelensky’s heroism and leadership. If I were him, I would be trying, as much as he is now, to get the US to get involved on my side.
But I’m an American citizen and I want us to be careful.
Ukraine was – and still is – a country full of corruption. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help you. I’m glad we’re helping. I insist that we must help. But my impression is that Biden’s team is walking a tightrope with Zelensky, far more than is apparent at first glance.
The White House wants to do everything possible to ensure that Ukraine wins this war, but in a way that still maintains a distance between us and the Ukrainian leadership. This is so that Kiev is not the one to determine the way forward and so that we are not embarrassed by political issues in the country in the post-war period.
The view of Biden and his team, from what I’ve gathered, is that the US needs to help Ukraine restore its sovereignty and repel the Russians — without letting Ukraine become an American protectorate on the Russian border. We need to be aware of what is in our national interest and not let ourselves be led astray in directions that lead to exposures and risks that we do not want.
One thing I know about Biden — with whom I traveled to Afghanistan in 2002, when he was a senator and chaired the Committee on Foreign Relations — is that he is not easily seduced by world leaders. The American president has dealt with too many leaders in his political life. Biden has a very clear vision of where US interests stop and begin. Ask the Afghans.
So where are we now? Putin’s Plan A — to take Kiev and install its own leader — has failed. And his plan B — just trying to take full control of Ukraine’s old industrial center known as the Donbass, a largely Russian-speaking region — is still in doubt.
Your newly reinforced ground forces have made advances, but they are limited. It is spring in eastern Ukraine, and the surfaces are still sometimes muddy and wet, so Russian armored vehicles in many areas are forced to stay only on roads and highways, which makes them vulnerable.
My conclusion echoes my initial argument: we need to stick as closely as possible to our original, limited and defined objective of helping Ukraine expel Russian forces as much as possible or, whenever and wherever Ukrainian leaders feel the time is right, negotiate your withdrawal.
But we are dealing with incredibly unstable elements, especially a politically wounded Putin. To brag about killing its generals and sinking its ships, or falling in love with Ukraine in ways that entangle us with that country forever, is the height of folly.
