Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
Fable One: Donald Trump Is Appeasing Russia?
Who wiped out the Wagner group in Syria? Who sold offensive weapons to Ukraine first? Who warned Germany not to become dependent on the Russian Nord Stream II deal?
Who withdrew from an unfair missile deal with the Russians? Who cajoled and berated NATO members to meet their military investment promises made following the 2014 invasion of Ukraine?
In contrast, who originally conceived a Russian “reset” in 2009? Who publicly virtue-signaled pushing the red “reset” button in Geneva with the current Russian Minister Sergey Lavrov?
Which ex-European leader got a million euros a year working for Russian energy companies?
Of the last four presidents, under whose watch did Putin not invade another country?
Which American president, in hot-mic style, offered to (and did) dismantle US-Eastern Europe missile defense plans in exchange for temporary Putin quietude (“space”) to aid his 2012 reelection?
Fable Two: A Trade War?
Donald Trump is not wildly slapping tariffs on Europeans.
He is simply saying that 1945 is now 80 years past and that the asymmetrical tariffs that Europe imposes on U.S. imports should be corrected. The massive trade surpluses Europe accumulates each year should give way to fairer, more balanced trade.
If Europe does not want tariffs, then simply calibrate its own tariffs on what America places on European imported goods, and work down jointly to zero tariffs on both sides.
Fable Three: America Is Bullying Europe?
The U.S. does not actively interfere in European elections and politics.
In 2024, Europeans, especially the British Laborites, bragged about sending over campaign “volunteers” to work against Trump and, earlier, his conservative predecessors.
British subject Christopher Steele sought to sabotage an entire American 2016 election with a falsified “dossier.”
The Ukrainian ambassador in 2016 wrote an op-ed all but endorsing Hillary Clinton and trashing her opponent.
In September 2024, Mr. Zelenskyy was flown in on a Biden-provided US military jet to Scranton, Pennsylvania—at a pivotal time in the most pivotal swing state—to surround himself with Democrat politicos.
His media-frenzied presence signaled a partisan campaign theme that a Harris win and the continuance of massive Democrat aid to Ukraine would ensure manufacturing jobs, such as the artillery shell factory he selected to visit.
As to NATO, Trump’s pressure from 2017 to 2021 finally pushed more NATO nations to rearm. But even eleven years after promising to invest a mere 2 percent of GDP in defense, nine of the 32 members still have not complied.
Fable Four: Negotiating With Putin Is Selling Out?
In the long history of Western diplomacy with mass-murdering tyrants, Putin doesn’t even rank among the worst. Just ask his former reset partners Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
FDR fueled mass-murdering “Uncle Joe” Stalin’s Red Army as a way to defeat Nazi Germany.
Richard Nixon flattered and cajoled the greatest mass murderer in history, Mao Zedong, to triangulate China against the Soviet Union.
Ronald Reagan offered to share missile defense expertise with Soviet Russia.
Europeans have hosted almost every Palestinian murderous terrorist leader, as a way either of deflecting terrorism from their own shores or emphasizing their general loathing of Israel.
Fable Five: Europe Is Going To Save Ukraine?
Europe rushed to congratulate and celebrate with Zelensky after his preplanned White House blow-up. They are loudly announcing that a supposedly isolationist and appeasing U.S.—which has sent more aid to Ukraine than all nearby European nations combined—will now be supplanted by a “new” muscular and rearmed Europe.
We sincerely hope so.
But on every recent international moral question—ganging up on a lone Israel to appease terrorist forces in the Middle East, standing up to China’s mercantilism, neo-imperialism, and domestic oppression of minorities, or Russia’s prior 2008 and 2014 invasions—European outrage has been muted, real consequences nonexistent.
We are now witnessing European heads of state sending the same old, same old virtue signaling support for the brave Zelenskyy, who supposedly spoke truth to power to the mean U.S. Orange Man.
But where does such performance art lead after the cult hero Zelenskyy had gnawed the hand that gorged him?
To multitudes of European tanks, skies full of European jets, and division after division of crack European infantry now heading east to “back up” Ukraine—led on horseback by its new Joan of Arc, Ursula von der Leyen?
Aside from all the present posturing and mock-heroics, the only way to save Ukraine is for the U.S. president, Donald Trump, to reflect joint Ukrainian, American, and European interests in stopping the war, forcing Putin as far back eastward as possible where he started in 2022, and creating a credible deterrent along with a DMZ/industrial corridor tripwire to stop another 2008, 2014, and 2022 invasion.
Anything else is empty carnival barking.
It is amazing how a theology (progressivism) can be so wrong so often, so consistently and still enjoy such unwavering support of so many among the multitudes of hypocrites in this country and in Europe, who sincerely and narcissistically believe in their moral and intellectual superiority. Gd help us!
Yes, Jonathan, well said!
Trump alluded to a difference between US and European Aid during his meeting with Macron but there’s been no follow-up – at least not to my knowledge, on this.
That was that the European Aid, certainly that from France, came primarily in non-military aid and that most were loans that were provided on a senior secured basis. By contrast, the suggestion was that the US Aid, whether military or humanitarian, had no strings.
Macron tried to doge this and the media move the questions along instead of pursuing this.
Lending senior secured to a country is not really the same as pure aid.
Dr. Hanson:
Would there be ANY Ukrainian war or invasions if they were still the third largest nuclear weapons country in the world? Putin would have still invaded, chancing becoming part of a new Moscow nuclear glass parking lot?
A previous Republican American president convinced the Ukrainians to disarm by turning over their nukes to the new Russian Federation. And now those Ukrainian nukes that were pointed at Russia Putin now has pointed at us in America and our European allies.
Did we pay billions of dollars to Ukraine in order for them to surrender those nukes? Or did we promise in exchange for surrendering those nukes to provide our mighty military to serve as Ukraine’s replacement deterrent and defense?
Seems a fair question to ask as I was a young NCO attached to command staff in Europe after the USSR crumbled and watching deals being made by us.
That is a promise that world leaders of adversarial and friendly nations both have watched us treacherously renege on for the last four presidential administrations. A treacherous abandonment of Ukraine as they were voluntarily fighting beside us in OUR WARS in Afghanistan and Iraq, from the first day to the last.
There is no good way out of the war in Ukraine by now. But we have successfully avoided having our military blood spilled by purchasing indulgences while Ukraine fought alone.
We have become the world’s used car salesman of military treaties, and there will be second and third order consequences.
I’m just astonished at the support, braggadocio, media aggrandizing, flag waving on Social Media etc. to keep the war machine running…to what end? Praying the public presentations are not indicative of behind closed doors discussions, and an end is in sight. Ending it is a win for Ukrainian and Russian soldiers and civilians. A continuance is a win for everyone but them, quite a dark tack.
“…astonished at the support…?” One has to follow the US $s ‘spent’, where and to whom…answer, mostly western (US) corps, our military industrial complex, makers and consultants. Most of those $s were and are intended for here, to those who occupy the many bldgs along the Potomac and the 66 corridor to Dulles International in the DMV. They really don’t give a schiff about Ukraine, or Putin.
There would be no war in Ukraine to postulate and beat our chests over if the Ukrainian leaders of the day had decided that Americans were liars who were not to be trusted, and had kept the 3,000+ tactical and strategic nukes that made it the third largest nuclear power in the world at the time.
Those nukes would still be pointed at Russia – rather than surrendered to the new Russian Federation as President Bush convinced them to do. Where Putin now has those former nukes from Ukraine now pointed at us and our NATO allies like the UK and Poland.
How is it a win for Ukraine that we treacherously reneged on our promise that our military would serve as the replacement for those nukes, being their deterrent and defense? How is it a win that we reneged on that promise, allowed Putin to invade, the next presidential administration did nothing to roll back that invasion and stop the fighting, the next administration allowed another invasion… but now cashing in with a minerals deal is a win?
Ukraine voluntarily fought beside us for 20 years, from the first day to the last in OUR WARS in Afghanistan and Iraq, BTW. Despite the fact they weren’t attacked and have no Muslim presence in their nation to worry about – they voluntarily came to our military aid instead of saying “Meh… not our war”.
We purchased indulgences to justify our treachery. While national morality has little value, future second and third order consequences of decisions like this are real.
“Empty carnival barking,” indeed. The former Soviet bloc nations who gained their independence (Latvia, Poland, etc.) are very clear-eyed about the expanding threat posed by Putin’s hegemonic Great Russian Empire plans. They were not heard from at the giant thumbsucking cryfest recently, wherein VP Vance offered some very plain-spoken views on the part of the US regarding the EU’s failures to provide for their defense in any meaningful way. Their responses are pathetic mewling at best. History shows what can easily come next if we are not wise.
“History shows what can easily come next if we are not wise.”
Yes, I remember we thought we could successfully stay out of WWI and WWII. Showing up with boots on the battlefield for the last 37 weeks of WWI, and two and a half years fashionably late and Pearl Harbor for WWII.
European leaders can be criticized for many things including NATO commitments. However VP Vance claiming that they’re the ones who should be defending Ukraine – instead of we in the USA who disarmed Ukraine of their nukes with our promises to provide our military to serve as their replacement deterrent and defense – is Democrat level deflecting while wearing Populist Political Beer Goggles to view Ukraine.
Four successive American administrations have treacherously reneged on our military commitments that disarmed Ukraine while they were an ally fighting beside us. We purchased indulgences by sending money and some weapons that Ukrainians could fight alone with.
I saw Ukrainian troops beside us in Afghanistan and Iraq from my first deployment at the beginning to my last. They were voluntarily there beside us fighting in OUR WARS in Afghanistan and Iraq from the first day to the last – without any military agreement that committed them to do so.
VP Vance could not have done his tours in those wars and failed to notice Ukrainians among the multinational troops there. For him to tell watching world leaders well aware of this that “Ukraine has done nothing for us”, is far beyond embarrassing.
Thanks Victor! European leaders would be well advised to consider new careers in vaudeville. They are naturals for this type of venue!