What Will It Take To Declare War On Russia?
By
Leonard Zwelling
They may have hijacked our last presidential election and most surely interfered in it using “fake news” and the Internet. They continue to interfere.
They may be able to tap into and disrupt the power grid of the United States. They have purposefully participated in the undermining of any suggestion of a free country in Syria and are trying to do the same in the Ukraine.
Their leader believes that the break-up of the Soviet Union was one of the great tragedies of the 20th century. He is clearly on a path to disrupt freedom and democracy in the West and to enrich himself and his Mafioso brethren who run Russia. When is enough enough?
Am I advocating that the United States launch a nuclear attack on Russia? I am not.
Am I suggesting that a NATO force led by the ground troops of the United States invade Crimea and try to wrest it from Russian hands? No, I am not.
What I am suggesting is that the government of the United States led by the current President of the United States stop acting like Russia is our ally or friend or ever can be. It cannot.
Russia is a state that is currently hostile to the basic values that motivate the people of the United States. I am not sure why Hitler’s invasion of Poland was sufficient to launch a World War, but Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is not.
Mr. Putin is a latter day Hitler and Trump’s attitude toward Putin is akin to Chamberlain’s appeasement of the Fuhrer. Winston Churchill must be rolling in his grave when he sees Mr. Trump extend a paw to Putin as if there was anything they had in common. Maybe there is. Russian money.
It is remarkable to me that Trump and his supporters act like enemies to our long-trusted allies in Western Europe, but cozy up to Putin as if there is some good that can come of this. There isn’t.
Mr. Trump has it right about Iran although blowing up the Obama Era treaty with that country that might have kept it nuclear weapons-free might not have been a good move. Furthermore, the intensified sanctions on Iran have just steeled that county’s middle class against the United States. They are not going to overthrow the ayatollahs.
If Mr. Trump thinks anything good will come out of his relationship with North Korea, he is sadly mistaken. Russia, Iran and North Korea are not our friends. They will never join the family of nations trying to improve the world. All three are oligarchic dictatorships that will shun Western values and it is only the fact that they would be destroyed in a nuclear conflict that keeps then from invading even more than they do.
It is my proposal that we toughen the sanctions on Russia. We squeeze them until they wail. We supply the energy needs of Western Europe with our oil and gas and get Germany off Russian energy sources. We must redouble our pledges to the ex-Soviet states that have now joined NATO and assure them that Article 5 lives. If they are invaded, NATO will come to the rescue.
For a guy who likes to talk big, Mr. Trump acts small and cavorts with dictators and strongmen far too easily. But Putin is the worst. We should cut all ties with Russia and ratchet up the sanctions until Putin leaves Crimea and comes to the table about figuring out a way forward for Syria.
We may not be in a shooting war with Russia yet, but they have certainly declared war on us. The least we can do is do the same.
And if Trump won’t do it, Congress should (Article I, Section 8).
