OPINION:
The loadstar of American foreign policy should be the security of our citizens and assets abroad, national prosperity and the promotion of human rights.
This requires accepting tradeoffs, domestic policies that minimize vulnerabilities and acknowledging we can’t antagonize every autocrat on the planet.
The West is celebrating a reinvigorated NATO and stiffened resolve among Pacific allies, but the American posture remains timid and defensive.
The conflict in Ukraine is morphing into a war of attrition that Kyiv is challenged to win.
Western sanctions are porous, and Russian President Vladimir Putin won’t yield. Renault is resuming production in Russia, Pepsi is supplying Lay’s potato chips, cheese and other “essentials.” Moscow’s central bank can work through the 20% of Russian banking still free to do business in the dollar.
Mr. Putin’s domestic approval rating has climbed to 83%. If Russian citizens can acquiesce to the execution of Ukrainian children, we are morally rudderless to enable their access to daily necessities.
By denying Ukrainians fighter jets and other air defense systems necessary to defend the sky and offensive weapons to take the war to the Russians, we invite a false peace. Mr. Putin slices off Donetsk and Luhansk, we de facto acknowledge Russia’s annexation of the Crimea, and Moscow plants operatives further east to subvert Ukrainian authority.
If confronting Mr. Putin provokes a Russian engagement with NATO forces, President Biden should make plain that the U.S. Navy would sink Russia’s fleet, seize its commercial ships at sea and blockade its ports.
Otherwise, Mr. Putin will learn from his mistakes, rebuild his military and improve its logistics and ultimately take aim at Sweden, Finland or the Balkans.
Diplomacy is always the first option, but when dealing with terrorists like Mr. Putin, a sharp sword lends authenticity to all the flowery prose.
The West isn’t disengaging from China — foreign investment and trade are booming, and its technological progress and modernization continue apace — and the American military in the Pacific needs restructuring to deter China from taking Taiwan.
Taiwan’s defense can be hardened with American anti-ship missiles, advanced sea mining technologies, anti-aircraft systems and improvements in its army’s readiness.
Former Under Secretary of Defense Michele Flournoy has written persuasively that U.S. naval and air readiness in the Pacific should create a credible threat to “sink all of China’s military vessels, submarines, and merchant ships in the South China Sea within 72 hours.”
Then Chinese President Xi Jinping might think twice about crossing the straits to win a place in the pantheon of Chinese heroes.
Unfortunately, the world is not conveniently divided between spheres of democratic states — NATO and Japan, Australia and a few other allies in the Pacific — and belligerent autocracies — Russia, China, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Iran and several others.
Too much of the world’s oil is locked up in belligerent states and in a nether space — Iraq, Kuwait, Nigeria, Indonesia and others — between democracy and its adversaries. We must cultivate the nonaligned, choose among lesser evils among the belligerents and get out of oil as fast as we can.
Mr. Biden’s greatest sin against facts and reason has been to work tirelessly to stifle the U.S. oil and gas industry.
Drilling here and supplying Europe doesn’t have to slow Mr. Biden’s goals for electrifying the American road and a low carbon economy. It does mean we won’t have to foolishly remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations to get a nuclear deal and oil from Iran.
We can’t escape the fact that we could drill full out in the United States, and the West would still need Middle Eastern oil and gas — especially with Russia handicapped from participation. But we can choose the devil with whom we deal.
The region is irrevocably divided between Sunni Muslims led by Saudi Arabia and Shiite Muslims led by Iran. And freed of sanctions, Iran would become a greatly enhanced terrorist state, an economic powerhouse beyond oil and with twice the population, a many times greater menace than Saudi Arabia.
China is buying 1.8 million barrels a day of Saudi oil but we supply the Patriot missiles the kingdom needs to defend against Iranian-supported Houthis attacks and have the technology it seeks to diversify its economy.
We can’t oppose the Saudi war with Iranian supported fractions in Yemen and vehemently criticize Mohammed bin Salam’s domestic policies, and then ask him to pump more oil, nudge him to treat dissenters and women better, and join with us in the Abraham Accords to build a more peaceable region and credible answer to Iranian aggression.
Adults recognize there are lots of bad actors in the world. Americans must get tougher with the worst of them and tolerate those least threatening to best serve our national interests.
• Peter Morici is an economist, emeritus business professor at the University of Maryland, and national columnist.
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