2 articles on Ukraine and my tentative thoughts

From Instapundit, and quoted from a New York Post editorial:

Vladimir Putin’s attempted rape of Ukraine isn’t going as easily as he expected, and the determination of the Ukrainian people is why.

This is a nation that elected a comedian its president, not as a stunt but as the biggest possible middle finger to defeatism, cynicism[,] and fear. And that president refuses to flee, like countless other electeds.

How many members of Congress would take up arms, as much of Ukraine’s Parliament is doing?

The fierce resistance matters, and not just in holding off Putin’s army of conscripts. It is inspiring the world.

The West may have hesitated in advance of the assault, but it’s rallying. Nation after nation is sending materiel to Ukraine, with even Germany side-stepping constitutional restrictions to help the freedom-fighters.

Not all of Europe is yet on board with fully kicking Russia out of SWIFT, but it took a big step in that direction Saturday, blacklisting much of Putin’s banking sector.

Fear is losing. Sweden and Finland are talking of joining NATO — even knowing it was that prospect that most enraged Putin in Ukraine’s case.

Kyiv and the rest of the country remain in grave peril. But the resistance so far is also a warning that, at the worst, Ukraine won’t stay conquered. The nation’s already forced one Russian puppet prez to flee — any new one will face the same staunch opposition.

As much we can, let us all show solidarity with this nation of heroes. Fly the blue and gold flag if you can get one; wear the colors — send your kid to school in a yellow shirt and blue jeans.

Tell bloody Vlad: You are f–ked.

Also from Instapundit, quoted from Jim Bennett:

Putin’s failed coup in Ukraine reminds me a bit of the failed German coup in Norway in April 1940. Of course[,] the Germans ended up taking control of Norway, just as Putin can end up in physical control of Ukraine if he is willing to take the necessary steps and pay the price. But Hitler had wanted the same kind of clean coup in Norway that he had achieved in Denmark — the [king] and royal family held hostage and a formal surrender from the legitimate government, with no exile government or forces. He didn’t get that because the Norwegian resistance was unexpectedly strong, and one cranky old officer on the verge of retirement and a bunch of raw 18-year-old conscripts managed to sink one [battle cruiser] and put another out of action, incidentally drowning the 1000-man [special-forces] team that had been assigned to capture the [king], Parliament, and treasury. By throwing the German schedule off by six hours and losing the element of surprise, all of those targets got away and eventually made their way to London[,] where they set up an effective government in exile. The Nazis had to do with a makeshift puppet regime [headed] by the nutjob* Quisling, who had very little credibility with the Norwegians or anybody else.

Whatever else happens now, the Ukrainian forces and government have similarly frustrated Putin’s hope for a swift, nearly bloodless coup and installation of a pliant puppet regime. He can prevail militarily, of course, by the application of much more destructive military force, basically making Kiev a second Grozny. Unlike Grozny, every bloody act will be tweeted, videoed, and shared worldwide with fluent English-language narration. And he would have to maintain a [sizable] occupation force, with ongoing casualties, for the foreseeable future.

Alternatively, he could probably accept a ceasefire and maybe a recognized partition of Ukraine, keeping Crimea and some of the Donbas, but not much more — in other words, little to show for his losses, [except] something he might use to save face domestically.

I expect he will continue on the former course for a while, waiting to see how bad the international fallout is, and whether the Ukrainians can hold together. But the further he goes down that road, the harder the climbdown will be.

The parts of the American right that are still trying to sell an isolationist line are looking worse and worse. Biden’s handlers are smart enough to loudly insist they will not send troops. The Ukrainians are presenting themselves well and sympathetically. (We should not forget there is a substantial Ukrainian-American and Ukrainian-Canadian population, and that the Pole and Baltic ethnic communities are pretty well engaged, too.) Lots of Second Amendment types are enjoying the sight of a government handing out AKs to everybody. But I have always felt that Anglosphere populations just don’t have the stomach for a genuinely realist foreign policy. We are seeing that right now.

Getting tagged as pro-Putin is the one thing that is most likely to derail the GOP train in November. The left is starting to see that and put out the Journolist instructions. I hope we don’t have too many idiots on our side falling into their trap.

*Quisling really was a nutjob. As Defense Minister in the 1930s, he threatened to go to war against Denmark over some claims to part of Greenland.

Trying to ascertain facts on the ground during the fog of war is a fool's errand, but it seems clear that Vladimir Putin's push into Ukraine is not going nearly as smoothly as planned: Ukrainians are resisting, and Ukrainian bravado is visible everywhere online these days, from the tweeted video of the tow-truck driver taunting Russian troops near a broken-down tank to reports of the "ghost of Kyiv" downing Russian fighters left and right to the perhaps-apocryphal story of the Ukrainian woman handing out flower seeds to Russian soldiers so that flowers will grow over their graves. Much of this is probably nonsense, but it buoys the spirit of the people. Even Ukraine's former president, Petro Poroshenko, armed and in uniform, currently holds the line two kilometers from a Russian position. Some righties have snidely contrasted this with Justin Trudeau's craven, hide-in-a-hole response to a bunch of harmless horn-honking by unarmed truckers. Poroshenko: a real man.

I honestly don't know what to think. Instapundit seems to have done a pretty clear 180 on the issue, creeping closer to Democrats who, in the spirit of anti-Putinism, are vociferously pro-Ukraine. But wasn't Ukraine the corrupt cesspit where Joe and Hunter Biden had their shenanigans? While the Ukrainian bravado we're now seeing is uplifting, I recall hearing, only a few days ago from the right, that Ukraine isn't a country where we have any real interests. How on earth did the message flip-flop so quickly?

So color me suspicious of this whole mess. I'm feeling manipulated, and I'm going to act like a typically fearful Korean politician and wait to see how this plays out before I draw any firm conclusions. I know next to nothing about the history of the region and only just learned the significance of the term "Holodomor," which sounds like something North Korea has been through repeatedly. I think it's safe to say that Putin's invasion is bad insofar as (1) it's a violation of Ukraine's sovereignty, and (2) it may embolden a hungry China to make a move on Taiwan (although I expect Taiwanese resistance to be fiercer, and China's naval forces to be pretty weak and incompetent). 

Does this place me alongside the Ukrainian people? I don't know. I read up a bit on the current president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He promised democratic referenda for the citizens on various matters of policy, but he hasn't delivered. He has been targeting oligarchs who may be trying to run Ukraine via a shadow government, but some see Zelenskyy's move as an attempt at consolidating power for himself. He has only recently begun arming his citizens, but not long before that, he was staunchly anti-gun. Zelenskyy presents a mixed picture, and the most charitable thing one can say about him is that his country is currently being invaded, and he has to defend it while keeping away from Russia's grasping talons. Should Ukraine be part of NATO? To his credit, I think Zelenskyy said that that should be a matter for the people to decide, and the people of Ukraine are about 78% Ukrainian, 17% ethnic Russian, and 5% other. Most of these folks are apparently pro-NATO and pro-EU membership (another thing Ukraine seeks, although God knows why).

The topic of Ukraine is complex, and to my mind, this is not the time for "hot takes" on the matter. The US and certain EU nations have already sent armaments to the Ukrainian government; tepid sanctions are either in place or about to be put in place, and there's little else the US can do. Trump apparently told Putin that, if he made a move for Ukraine, Trump would "hit Moscow." Whether Trump actually said that or not, we enjoyed four years, under Trump, of Putin not making a move against his neighbor. Then the American people stupidly installed a senile Democrat, and as expected, world powers noticed the change and decided it was now safe to get frisky again.

Europe's decision to help Ukraine is remarkable given Putin's gas-pipeline stranglehold over Western Europe—a weapon I expect him to use as the situation worsens. I hope Europe knows what it's doing, but I suspect a lot of us are acting more on gut instinct than on anything rational. So for now, I remain neutral. In a media-saturated world, we're sure to be bombarded with propaganda from both sides—anything to garner our sympathy. I'll keep reading commentary and learning about the situation (in which the West apparently has a measure of culpability) and will play it by ear from there.

ADDENDUM: seen in the Instapundit comments:

Trump keeps saying that Putin outsmarted Biden, so the Lamestream Press reports it as "Trump praises Putin." I mean, my dog can outsmart Biden, and he is not a smart dog.

ADDENDUM 2: Dr. Pepple on the folly of blaming Trump for the Ukraine mess.