LESSONSPutin’s Catastrophic War of Choice: Lessons Learned (So Far)
Although the situation in Ukraine continues to evolve rapidly, there are already several vital lessons to glean from Russia’s incursion into the sovereign territory of its neighbor.
It has been only six days since Russia invaded Ukraine, but Moscow’s unprovoked and ill-considered war of aggression has already transformed world order, albeit in ways Russian President Vladimir Putin never anticipated or desired. In one fateful step, the Russian president has managed to revive Western solidarity, reenergize U.S. global leadership, catalyze European integration, expose Russia’s weaknesses, undermine Moscow’s alliance with Beijing, and make his authoritarian imitators look foolish. Quite an accomplishment in less than a week. Amidst the unceasing onslaught of breaking news, it is worth taking a moment to allow some of the lessons of Russia’s incursion to sink in.
Lesson One: The West Is Back
First and foremost, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has galvanized the community of advanced market democracies and reinvigorated a transatlantic alliance that was until recently adrift and divided, and even declared “brain dead.” In the three decades since the demise of the Soviet Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has repeatedly sought a new a raison d’être, leading it to go “out of area” (most notably to Afghanistan) and take on new security threats, including terrorism, cyberattacks, energy insecurity, maritime piracy, mass migration, humanitarian crises, and even climate change. The crisis of the West reached its nadir during the U.S. presidency of Donald Trump, who questioned longstanding U.S. alliance commitments and dismissed the concept of a rules-based international order itself—damage that U.S. President Joe Biden has only begun to correct. Putin’s brazen effort to subjugate an independent Ukraine has suddenly reminded the citizens of free societies of the foundational values at the heart of their security community—and how much they stand to lose if they allow Russian aggression to go unchecked and unpunished.
Lesson Two: U.S. Global Leadership Still Matters
Putin’s gamble has also given the United States the diplomatic restart it needed. The Biden administration’s crisis diplomacy on Ukraine, unlike its shambolic withdrawal from Afghanistan and fumbled rollout of the Australian submarine deal, has been adept.
