Strategic failure: The Biden administration and Ukraine

For two and a half years the Biden Administration has had a policy of not letting Kyiv win lest Russia escalate. At the same time, it clearly does not want Russia to win as it has often stated. Not only does this policy rest on untenable foundation it virtually trumpets the absence of a strategy for victory, its fear of escalation, and thus allows Putin to continue in the clear belief that the West lacks the will to prevail. Moreover, this astrategic and intellectually bankrupt policy surrenders the vital process of escalation dominance to Moscow who continues making threats it cannot or will not carry out, but which clearly intimidate key allies like the U.S. and Germany.

Worse yet this policy is not only based on a non sequitur for if Ukraine does not win it loses and Russia wins. The arguments underlying the policy of procrastination, taken in their totality reveal an Administration more frightened of its partner and ally Ukraine winning than it is of the opportunity to advance long-standing U.S. interests in Europe or globally. There are numerous examples of this procrastination if not outright obstruction in the Administration’s policy even beyond the glaring lack of a strategy or desire for victory. Indeed, the first and possibly most devastating, failing is the Administration’s staunch refusal to entertain the possibility of any strategy whatsoever, a sure guarantee of a negative outcome. The second example of Administration failure is the unbroken record of the Administration’s consistent procrastination on virtually every weapons request from Ukraine since 2022, a policy that forced Ukraine to conceal the Kursk offensive from states who would otherwise be its partners. Worse, despite all the talk of support as long as it takes, many weapons deliveries continue to be held up due to obsolescence of parts, ongoing issues with supply chains, bureaucratic obstruction, and the overall unreadiness of our defense industrial sector.  These are pervasive problems throughout the Administration. For example, despite an agreement that took too many months to negotiate on promoting the integration of the U.S. and Ukrainian defense industrial sectors at the end of 2023, as of this writing nobody has been appointed to this position due to bureaucratic obstruction and this process continues to languish consigning this vital process to a bureaucratic limbo.

Third, Washington concurrently hesitatingly presides over a dithering alliance where Germany, for example,  appears to be so scared of its shadow that it cannot take any action against Russia, is cutting funding for Ukraine, and still cannot grasp that it too is under attack.  Indeed, the Administration’s equivocations suggest that many of its members cannot grasp that this is a war not only against Ukraine but against the whole idea of international order, possibly the greatest such challenge since the Cold War.

Despite the Kursk offensive as of this writing, the Biden Administration is still withholding its agreement to let Ukraine use long-range weapons like ATACMS to strike at Russian logistical and infrastructures, air bases, depots, rail lines, etc. that are significantly behind the front lines and from which Russia has hitherto attacked Ukraine with impunity.  But even if it relents it will take months for these weapons to be usable.  In fact, Washington insiders still maintain that giving Kyiv the green light it needs would trigger an escalation that might go nuclear even though all of Moscow’s supposed “red lines” till now have been exposed as a bluff.  So too is this unmerited fear of nuclear escalation. If anything, Russia’s reaction to the Kursk operation confirms that any such reaction is quite unlikely. Moscow is now sending forces from its nuclear and space forces’ bases to Kursk, indicating just how improbable any escalation is. The fact that Russia must make such deployments also underscores not just the hollowness of its nuclear threats, but also the fact that it too is unable to raise the necessary manpower to prevail. These prophecies of escalation also fail to explain how nuclear strikes offer Russia victory since Soviet simulations in the 1970s proved that troops could not exploit nuclear strikes or advance into a nuclear cloud.

Nonetheless this escalation excuse is regularly trotted out along with another new pretext for stalling Ukraine. This pretext is that ultimately, we will have to restore a dialogue with Russia therefore we cannot or should not support Ukrainian demands for striking targets at greater distance beyond the front inside Russia. However, this new pretext is, if anything, even more misconceived. Beyond ignoring the fact that Moscow too ultimately needs a working relationship with Washington (and when it wants to it can as the recent hostage exchange shows), this unfounded platitude assumes that we should fear Russia far more than is justified by the realities of power and that Ukraine should be sacrificed to placate or, to be frank, appease   Russia.  Both these excuses for inaction and others such as the third claim that the weapons would be useless since Russia has moved its bases out of range relate sharply to the second motive for the Kursk offensive are untenable.  In fact recent Western studies show conclusively just how many Russian air bases,  supply, energy, and other logistical infrastructures remain, in fact, within range of systems like ATACMS, HIMARS, etc. Thus, this excuse is just merely another evasion, and one not grounded in fact. It is nothing more than an alibi for inaction.

Alibis cannot constitute either a policy or a strategy. U.S. policy, as in so many other cases lead to a dead end. This is particularly disturbing when victory is attainable as the defeat of the Russian navy here shows. Therefore, campaign rhetoric aside this and the next administration not only can do better, they must do better.

Dr. Stephen J. Blank is a Senior Fellow at Foreign Policy Research Institute. He is an internationally renowned expert on Russian and Chinese defense policy. He is the author of “Light from the East: Russia’s Quest for Great Power Status in Asia” (Taylor & Francis, 2023). He was a Professor of National Security Studies at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College.

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by Real Clear Wire.]

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