Invading Ukraine isn’t rational or sensible. But did that ever stop wars from happening?

And Biden did give Putin the green light... so

Okay. Spell it out for me. How did Biden give Putin a “green light”? Be specific. And remember that:

1. Ukraine is not in NATO. The U.S. has no treaty obligation to defend it, if attacked.
2. Biden has no declaration of war from Congress, not even an authorization for the use of military force against Russia or in Ukraine generally.

Waging war against Russia in Ukraine therefore would be illegal, full stop. Putin can order his own troops into Ukraine with the wave of a hand. But we in America are a constitutional republic/democracy and we’re constrained by our own laws in matters of war, or we ought to be. Sending handfuls of special forces and making drone strikes on terrorists with a plausible connection to Al-Qaeda in far-flung locales like Somalia is one thing — directly attacking a nuclear-armed superpower is another. Biden ain’t gonna do it without explicit authority.

Biden knows this, and Putin knows this. So, Biden is not going to make the rookie mistake of drawing red lines that he knows he can’t enforce, and that Putin can cross with impunity. That would damage American credibility in a major way, and Putin would gleefully cross any such red lines for that reason alone even if it served him no other strategic purpose.

Biden hasn’t blustered about sending troops to Ukraine, or killing Russians. But he has vowed to make a Russian invasion “costly” for Putin — very costly.

So, what’s actually on the table? Arming Ukraine. Leaking intelligence. Crippling economic sanctions that focus especially on the Russian oligarchs that effect Putin’s power around the country. Reinforcing our NATO allies. Diplomatic isolation. Pursuing other asymmetric capabilities against Russia, like cyberwarfare. Counter-propaganda that amplifies the exposure of Putin’s jailing of Navalny and other domestic repression.

If Putin wants another Cold War, then the U.S. can give it to him. And we can win it again, just like we did the first time.

I guarantee you Biden and his team are, right now, working around the clock to come up with exactly these sorts of options to respond to any contingent Russian scenario.

If Trump were still President, he’d be playing golf.

If Trump were still President, Putin wouldn't be threatening an invasion... You forget Biden was the VP when 0bama gifted Crimea to Putin... so what makes you think, Putin doesn't think he can do the same now Biden is President? He already did it once with no serious repercussions... And why did democrats use the filibuster to protect Putin's pipeline from sanctions? You lot whined about Trump starting wars... LOL

6/10 spin effort, good enough to confuse those unfamiliar with Russia’s post-Cold War trajectory or the facts of the past decade.

To understand this conflict you have to take a step back from domestic U.S. politics. As I stated above and you no doubt glossed over, the U.S. has *no authority* to defend Ukraine from Russia. Not under Obama, not under Trump, not under Biden. No amount of rage-tweeting from a Presidential potty is going to deter Putin. Putin only recognizes and respects hard power, period.

That said, Putin doesn’t threaten every non-NATO country on his border, either. He doesn’t menace Kazakhstan. He doesn’t hound North Korea. He’s quite chummy with China.

What makes Ukraine special, then? Why did Putin start aggressively harassing Ukraine beginning in about 2014? Is it because Obama was President at the time?

No. It was the pro-democracy, pro-E.U. Maidan Square protests — which resulted in the collapse of a pro-Putin puppet government in Ukraine, and ushered in real democracy in Ukraine — that’s what touched off Putin’s masterplan of dismembering Ukraine.

Putin has vivid memories of the Berlin Wall falling from when he was a young K.G.B. agent stationed in East Germany. He detests popular, pro-democracy uprisings. He sees them as directly responsible for the collapse of the USSR, which he has called “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.”

Putin has decided he can’t tolerate a successful, independent, European-oriented democracy full of Russian-speakers on his border. That model directly threatens his corrupt kleptocracy, as well as his megalomaniacal and imperialist claims to represent ethnic Russians everywhere they are found in Europe and around the globe.

So: Putin’s goal in Ukraine isn’t conquest or glory or territorial expansion or self-enrichment or even the security of ethnic Russians, many of whom would no doubt die on both sides of a Russia-Ukraine war. His goal in Ukraine now is quite simply, destruction.

Putin appears willing to pay a very high price simply to see Ukraine’s democratic experiment fail, both for its own sake and to set a bloody example for other “unruly” neighboring countries with thoughts of taking the democratic, E.U. and/or NATO path.

How high? We’ll see.

Ukraine's democratic experiment?

hahahahahahahahahahaha

Do you mean where every ruling party puts the other one behind bars??

I know this will come as a shock to you, but assisting separatist rebels against the government could be regarded as treason.

Perhaps if Russia kept its paws off Ukraine, there would be fewer opportunities to commit treason

Oh... and thanks for forgetting Bidens, Pelosis, Kerrys and Romneys family members enriching themselves in Ukraine...

Thanks for forgetting Giuliani :)

Yes... investigating crimes is a crime... got it...

Sending your personal attorney halfway across the world to talk to sketchy discredited Russian-sponsored assets in an effort to dig up dirt on a political rival isn’t “investigating a crime” in any sense of the words: at least not here in the free world, Boris. It’s an impeachable offense.

Get a real law enforcement agency interested in your conspiracy theories, or keep it in your pants

LOL... a real law enforcement agency... What like 0bama and Biden have used against their political rivals??

hahahahahahaha