The Tribune

With CHARLIE HARPER

AS REPORTS from the Russo-Ukraine War get pushed further off America’s front pages in favour of higher gas and other prices, mass shootings, COVID and miscellaneous political outrage from all sides, President Joe Biden and his most significant European and Asian allies are quietly preparing for what may be a smack down of the less than awesome Russian army before European unity starts to crumble later this year under the threat of no Russian fossil fuel imports as winter approaches.

At the same time, the American President is preparing to include a controversial visit to Saudi Arabia on his itinerary for an upcoming trip. He will have one thing most on his mind – persuading the Saudis and other Persian Gulf oil producers to get with the programme and significantly ramp up production. The US also continues to quietly make nicer with Venezuela’s oil-rich Nicolas Maduro, despite its diplomatic slap in his regime’s face by omitting Venezuela (and Cuba and Nicaragua, who also politically defy the US) from the list of nations invited to the Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles.

Biden, a long-time veteran of the US Senate’s powerful Foreign Relations Committee, has never made a secret of his disagreement with a couple of Barack Obama’s more notable foreign policy mistakes. First, Biden stoutly opposed the various surges in American troop strength in Afghanistan intended to finally tip the balance in that misbegotten war in favour of the West. Obama, only peripherally interested in world affairs, usually acquiesced to his military advisors and green-lighted these costly and useless surges.

Biden’s decision to pull the plug on the pointless Afghan War was just what it looked like. It was both impulsive and long-envisioned. It was an unmistakably clear declaration of his intent not to repeat - and in fact to undo - Obama’s mistakes.

Biden was also appalled at the tepid, even timid response by Obama to the blatant Russian seizure of Crimea by Russia in 2014. He reportedly said so, repeatedly and ineffectually, within the White House. Now, Russia has doubled down on its earlier successful Crimean gambit by launching its full-scale assault on Ukraine. It’s evident Russian President Vladimir Putin, doubtless emboldened by the thoughtless, casual and corrupt conduct of American foreign policy for at least a dozen years prior to Biden, is counting on continuing complacency and incompetence in the White House.

That’s proving to be his biggest mistake. Biden won’t be as disinterested in the world as were his immediate predecessors.

But at the same time, it’s unlikely European unity behind Russian sanctions and against Russian gas and oil imports will withstand the popular outcry that might well attend the advent of cold weather coming in autumn. Putin is no doubt also counting on this, and he’s likely correct. No democratically elected leader is ready to continue standing on principle while his voters are freezing in their homes.

All of which brings us to a couple of military measures undertaken by the US and its allies within the past several days.

First, on Sunday, NATO launched a two-week naval exercise in the Baltic Sea that includes more than 7,000 marines, airmen and sailors from 16 countries, including Finland and Sweden, who officially applied for NATO membership in May. Over 45 ships and more than 75 aircraft are also taking part in these war games. The NATO muscle-flexing is supposedly not in response to any specific threat.

But the Western message will be missed by no one paying attention, particularly the prime resident of the Kremlin. Just in case, though, the American admiral in charge of the current exercise said the following:

“In past iterations of BALTOPS (as the current exercise is code-named), we’ve talked about meeting the challenges of tomorrow. Those challenges are upon us — in the here and now.”

The American admiral added that “this exercise highlights our past investments and shows our collective partnership and capabilities as we recognize the importance of freedom of the seas and the vital role the Baltic plays in European prosperity.”

Meantime, the UK announced its intention to donate to Ukraine several M270 multiple launch rocket systems, which can strike targets up to 50 miles away. Putin responded with dire-sounding threats to attack new, “uncomfortable” targets. Despite Putin’s warning, the UK’s Defense Secretary, Ben Wallace, argued the assistance is justified. “As Russia’s tactics change, so must our support to Ukraine,” he said. “If the international community continues its support, I believe Ukraine can win.”

In the Far East, North Korea is again flexing its putative nuclear muscles, and China reportedly mounted an unusually large-scale air “exercise” in and around Taiwanese air space. There are new reports that Beijing is constructing a giant, secret naval base in Cambodia on the Gulf of Thailand.

In response, South Korea and the US staged their own airborne show of force in a “training exercise” as a senior US official warned of a forceful response if North Korea proceeds with reported plans to set off its first nuclear test explosion in nearly five years.

According to wire service news reports, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the air demonstration involved 16 South Korean planes — including F-35A stealth fighters — and four US F-16 fighter jets and was aimed at demonstrating their ability to swiftly respond to North Korean provocations. It’s Top Gun: Maverick in real life.

In Seoul to review military preparedness with South Korean and Japanese allies, US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman warned of a “swift and forceful” response if the North carries out the nuclear test. American rhetoric opposing Chinese bellicosity escalated in Washington.

Thus, the global standoff intensifies. Putin is stuck with a plan that isn’t working but continues to attract popular support at home in Russia and, apparently in his mind, continues to burnish his and his nation’s virility. Biden is determined to restore the US to the front of the world stage politically, economically, ideologically and militarily.

Putin can’t and won’t back down. Neither will Biden. Nor for the next several months will America’s European allies. If the West concludes that it will be best to intervene more directly to expel the Russian invaders from Ukraine, we will inch ever closer to a shooting war with Russia. This summer could be momentous.