Niall Ferguson: Putin and Biden Misunderstand History in Ukraine War – Bloomberg
I would put it like this: Cold War II is like a strange mirror-image of Cold War I. In the First Cold War, the senior partner was Russia, the junior partner was China now the roles are reversed. In Cold War I, the first hot war was in Asia (Korea) now it s in Europe (Ukraine). In Cold War I, Korea was just the first of many confrontations with aggressive Soviet-backed proxies today the crisis in Ukraine will likely be followed by crises in the Middle East (Iran) and Far East (Taiwan).
But there s one very striking contrast. In Cold War I, President Harry Truman s administration was able to lead an international coalition with a United Nations mandate to defend South Korea; now Ukraine has to make do with just arms supplies. And the reason for that, as we have seen, is the Biden administration s intense fear that Putin may escalate to nuclear war if U.S. support for Ukraine goes too far.
That wasn t a concern in 1950. Although the Soviets conducted their first atomic test on August 29, 1949, less than a year before the outbreak of the Korean War, they were in no way ready to retaliate if (as General Douglas MacArthur recommended) the U.S. had used atomic bombs to win the Korean War.
History talks in the corridors of power. But it speaks in different voices, according to where the corridors are located. In my view and I really would love to be wrong about this the Biden administration is making a colossal mistake in thinking that it can protract the war in Ukraine, bleed Russia dry, topple Putin and signal to China to keep its hands off Taiwan.
This could have been half as long, but Niall makes a good point. What we need is some way to signal that “every inch” of NATO really is sacrosanct. That doesn’t do much for Taiwan, however. Or Ukraine. Send them lots of arms and jets as well.