Ukraine / Russian War: The Ethics of Western / NATO Military Parsimony

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At its inception President Zelenskyy pleaded with the West for enough military power, weaponry to make Russia's war on Ukraine brief, and less destructive.

But NATO has allowed this tragically destructive war to drag on into a second year. Why?

Ukraine has been pleading for U.S. F-16 fighter jets. Biden says no, so far.

The result?
The profile of the war more closely approximates a stalemate than a decisive outcome.

Why?
Some believe it's to avoid providing Putin with an excuse to escalate to use of nuclear weapons. If so, then isn't NATO in some form succumbing to nuclear blackmail?

What are the ethics of this? In this status quo, Russia is free to wreak havoc on Ukraine, while Ukraine has not conducted reciprocal retaliatory intrusions on Russia. Is that a plausible recipe for defeating Russia, and expelling Russia from Ukraine, & perhaps Crimea as well?

If Ukrainian victory is what the West is hoping for, what is the ethical justification for pacing the supply of weapons to Ukraine for a years long war of attrition, carnage, destruction, and misery?
The geo-strategic implications of a defeated Ukraine are obvious, justification for Western incentive to expedite an end to the carnage. BUT :

That's not necessarily as anti-Russian as it may seem. Russia reportedly has a very high casualty rate because it's not applying Western medevac techniques for its own troops, instead reportedly leaving wounded Russian troops on the battlefield to die.
So a rapid, decisive victory for Ukraine may be more humane for Russia, as well as a score of 1:0 for democracy over autocracy.

Yet NATO looks on pretending to magnanimity for parceling out weapons in meager doses.

What?

Why?
 
Although the headline quotes from Wang’s meeting with President Vladimir Putin played up promises to “deepen political mutual trust” and “strengthen strategic co-ordination”, Beijing’s real objectives are much more complex, according to Chinese official sources and commentators. One of its main aims is to repair China’s badly damaged image in the west — particularly with leading trade partners in Europe — by showing its efforts to urge Moscow towards a political settlement of the war. It is also intent on letting western powers know that China stands firmly against the use of nuclear weapons by Russia.

Subscribe to read | Financial Times

News, analysis and comment from the Financial Times, the worldʼs leading global business publication
www.ft.com www.ft.com

Context:
military experts have suggested the U.S. Korean War would have been more likely to succeed had China not intervened, to bring to pass the 2023 status quo.

That is a history lesson that should not be ignored in context of Russia / Ukraine in 2023.
 
Dave Davies / NPR - Fresh Air reports that Russian prisoners were not merely released from Russian prison, but promised a pardon if they survived 6 months on the Ukraine War's front line.

Putin is bottom of the barrel.
 
After the Cold War some advocated NATO expansion, to protect former Soviet satellites. I vehemently resolutely opposed such expansion at that time, knowing it would be used by Kremlin war hawks to justify future Russian military adventures, along with other risks, such as a refreshed, accelerated post Cold War arms race.

It's decades later, a new millennium. Russia's conquest of Crimea, and current war in Ukraine (now in its 2nd year) demonstrate that the Kremlin doesn't need NATO expansion to justify full-scale Russian military invasion.

Sweden and Finland pending NATO membership aside, in light of the obvious high priority military conquest continues to be for aggressive expansionist Russia, would it advance the interests of peaceful prosperity for NATO membership to rapidly expand, perhaps before Ukraine's victory?

The Baltic States have already joined NATO.
Finland and Sweden may soon join.

But what of Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia? Kazakhstan, and Mongolia?

Would peaceful prosperity proliferate with a NATO noose around Russia's neck? Or might it only promote Russia's ultimatum, nuclear blackmail?

It's not a binary, all or nothing. Perhaps the more Westernized nations are the more appealing targets for Russian expansion. Are those prospective targets suitable for consideration in expedited NATO membership?

It might seem like that could cost the United States of America $more $money. Yes. It could. BUT !!
Let's not overlook what the alternative has cost $US. The U.S. has already earmarked almost $200 billion in aid to Ukraine.

Spending $one $dollar more than necessary on U.S. national defense may be $one $dollar wasted.
Spending $one $dollar less than necessary on U.S. national defense may mean forfeiture of U.S. national sovereignty & Liberty.

If you want the insurance, you have to make the $payments.
 
By late March last year, barely a month after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the war was already at a stalemate. And this is where we are now, at the end of the war’s first year. Russia can’t win because NATO has its global standing on the line and will support Ukraine to the end, but Ukraine and NATO cannot win for fear of a Russian nuclear escalation.

www.opendemocracy.net

Senior US military figures say Ukraine stalemate to continue

OPINION: Some US army officials think the stalemate in Ukraine can be broken only through negotiations. Will they say so?
www.opendemocracy.net www.opendemocracy.net

More grim perspective: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/ukraine-war-russia-nato-stalemate-us-military-peacemakers/
 
The Emperor Has No Clothes !

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has held "productive" talks with US President Joe Biden about Ukraine – but he did not signal any decision on allowing Kyiv to fire long-range missiles into Russia.
No new pledge on Ukraine missiles after Starmer-Biden talks

Ukraine has repeatedly urged the UK and US to let it fire long-range missiles against targets inside Russia.
www.bbc.com

No new pledge on Ukraine missiles after Starmer-Biden talks in Washington

Ukraine has repeatedly urged the UK and US to let it fire long-range missiles against targets inside Russia.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com

The reason to expedite Ukraine counter-attack into Russia is to shorten the War, reduce the attrition of Ukrainians.
The reason to delay / restrict it is to prevent Putin from starting a nuclear war.

Not clear to me Starmer / Biden have split the baby all that well.

The problem?

Putin has already gotten the message. Western timidity is unmistakable. Putin is perfectly capable of interpreting it correctly.

It's the wrong message to send this madman.
It's time to give Putin a bloody nose. President Zelenskyy knows this.
 
Ukraine: Putin is bad, Zelenskyy is good

Gaza: Hamas is bad, Netanyahu isn't much better. And Netanyahu's War in Palestine is alarmingly close to genocide. And Biden is party to it.
"The center of gravity is the civilian population. And if you drive them into the arms of the enemy you replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat."

United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin commenting the first week of December, 2023 From Simi Valley, CA on Israel's War on Hamas
Click to expand...
 

UN publishes a paper on Rethinking Unconstrained Military Spending​

In April 2020, the United Nations Office of Disarmament Affairs released a publication Rethinking Unconstrained Military Spending ... global military budget (now at $1.9 trillion per year) ... https://www.unfoldzero.org/un-publication-on-rethinking-unconstrained-military-spending/

$1.9 $Trillion in global military spending, among a total planetary population of 8.2 Billion means we are spending $hundreds of $dollars per year per person.

We straddle an unknowable fence here. We may not know exactly how much must be $spent to preserve our sovereignty. But simple logic indicates any amount above that minimum necessary amount is extraneous, wasted. BUT !

There's no more extravagant waste than a 2nd rate military. Gen. Horner
Click to expand...

It might be difficult to obtain such cooperation from our allies, to scale their own military spending to what the U.S. deems preferable.
We can virtually rule out such cooperation from our potential military adversaries.
​
Why does it matter?
It's a standard "guns vs butter" calculation. The larger the %GDP spent on military, the less of that GDP remains for other expenditures including educating our children, healthcare, infrastructure improvements, etc.

"global military budget (now at $1.9 trillion per year)" :eek:
 
Moscow has devoted considerable resources, manpower, and political will to its invasion of the country next door. In purely military terms, it has managed not to lose and may even be eking its way toward some sort of attritional victory in the Donbas. But even if it consolidates its territorial gains and keeps Ukraine out of NATO, Russia will have won only a pyrrhic victory, mortgaging its future for the sake of a few bombed-out square kilometers. In other words, Russia is effectively losing the war in Ukraine—not to Ukraine, but to everyone else.

In virtually any likely end-of-war scenario, Ukraine will remain a hostile, Western-armed neighbor—a permanent sucking wound on Russia’s western flank. Europe will continue to embargo Russian goods and build its energy future without Russia’s Gazprom. The Russian army, having shown itself moderately adaptable to modern warfare, will nonetheless be gutted of equipment, bereft of its best cadres, and reliant on foreign suppliers. To reconstitute it will take years and many billions of dollars. By then, Russia’s supposed mastery of modern drone warfare will probably be obsolete.
news.yahoo.com

Russia Is Losing the War—Just Not to Ukraine

A war meant to catalyze national revival has instead become a case study in national self-harm.
news.yahoo.com news.yahoo.com

Exclusive: Germany's army needs to more than double in size, commander says​

By Sabine Siebold / September 11, 20259:53 AM GMT-5
BERLIN, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Germany's army needs to add 100,000 active troops to its existing 62,000 to meet new NATO targets intended to boost preparedness for the growing threat of Russian aggression, its commander says in a confidential paper seen by Reuters on Thursday.
"It is imperative for the army to become sufficiently ready for war by 2029 and provide the capabilities Germany pledged (to NATO) by 2035," Army Chief Alfons Mais wrote in a letter dated September 2, addressed to the chief of the defence staff, Carsten Breuer.
 
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