Biden Botches Ukraine

The President seems intent on snatching stalemate from the jaws of victory

Background music: an uncertain trumpet

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I’ve done my best to be supportive of President Joe Biden’s Ukraine policy, despite its many shortcomings. But now the war is well into its second year, and the signs of a debacle in the making are becoming hard to ignore.

Even since the war began in February 2022, the President and his people have voiced support for Ukraine against Russia, its predatory neighbor. And it’s true that America has done quite a lot to support the Ukrainians in their fight for national existence. Credit should be given when its due, and I extend it to the Biden Administration—though only to the extent that it’s merited.

For the truth of the matter is that America is not doing nearly enough to bring the Russo-Ukrainian War to a successful conclusion. Sad to say, the foot-dragging and timidity of the Biden Administration are prolonging the war. Ukraine is given enough aid and support to hold its own, but not enough to capitalize on the evident weaknesses of Russia.

Right from the beginning, the Administration has been fearful that military aid supplied to Ukraine would cause “escalation.” Time and again, weapons thought to be “provocative,” e.g. long-range missiles and artillery systems capable of hitting targets on Russian soil, were withheld, only to be supplied tardily after lengthy debates between the Administration and, seemingly, itself. When one recalls that the war opened with a massive invasion of Ukraine accompanied by indiscriminate air and ground bombardment, and that Russia has been attacking targets, military and civilian, throughout Ukraine ever since, this handwringing over escalation is little short of ludicrous.

One principle of the art of war is that in delay there lies no plenty. What can be done today with X amount of resources may require X x 2 resources the day after tomorrow, and X x 10 resources by the middle of next week. The Biden Administration seems blind to this principle. Rhetorically, it supports a Ukrainian victory: the expulsion of Russian forces from Ukrainian territory. Materially, however, it facilitates stalemate. And stalemate would be a disaster, institutionalizing the mutual animosities that this war has stoked, leading that most futile of diplomatic activities, a “peace process.”

That the shortest routes to peace are signposted VICTORY and DEFEAT is a reality that Biden & Co. can’t grasp. Indeed, the Administration seems just as frighted of a possible Ukrainian victory as it is of a possible Russian victory.

The Ukrainian counteroffensive in which so many hopes were vested has gone much more slowly that hoped or expected. To some extent, perhaps, this is due to the network of field fortifications that the Russian Army constructed over the winter. Also the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam in June, which caused major flooding on the southern sector of the fighting front, deprived the Ukrainians of a promising axis of attack.

But the primary limiting factor on the Ukrainian counteroffensive is an inability to gain and hold air superiority. And that’s thanks to the pusillanimity of the Biden Administration.

Missing force multiplier: the F-16 Fighting Falcon

For over a year, Biden & Co. denied that there was any need to supply Ukraine with the combat aircraft necessary to obtain air superiority—on which victory depends. It’s not as if the United States lacks the wherewithal to provide such aircraft. A large number of F-16s are held in storage and though the oldest of them are no longer airworthy, more recent models could be restored to operational status for transfer to Ukraine. The F-16 is also flown by other NATO air forces, who may hold some that are surplus to requirements. Though its design dates from the Seventies, the Fighting Falcon remains an effective fighter and fighter bomber that still files with the US Air Force in significant numbers.

The problem, as ever, is time. Pulling an F-16 out of the boneyard, bringing it up to operational status, and training Ukrainian pilots to fly it isn’t the work of two weeks or a month. So the Biden Administration’s belated decision to supply F-16s to Ukraine is rather less welcome now that it would have been six or eight months ago. Too little, too late: That refrain repeats itself over and over in the annals of military history.

The situation is the more regrettable since air superiority is not a rigidly defined, all-or-nothing concept. What Ukraine needs is the capability to gain and hold control of the air over a limited area for a limited period of time, both to provide ground forces with close air support and to protect them from Russian air attacks. The demonstrated inefficiency of the Russian Air Force thus far suggests that with a relatively small but efficient air arm, Ukraine could accomplish that much.

Time is passing, however, and it seems unlikely at this point that modern combat aircraft can reach Ukraine in time to affect the course of the battle before winter. The Ukrainians may still manage to score a significant victory, but if so that victory will be costlier and less decisive than it would have been with the help of airpower.

Joe Biden has signaled that he sees no need to prioritize the question of Ukrainian membership in NATO. That’s a worrisome sign that the Administration’s determination to thwart V. Putin’s aggression is dwindling away as the war drags on. And given what happened to Afghanistan, I can’t quite persuade myself that the president who committed such an act of betrayal would never repeat it.