By Jim Geraghty
Wednesday, April 13, 2022
President Biden, speaking
to reporters at the Des Moines International Airport before departing on Air
Force One yesterday:
Q: Mr. President, have you seen
enough evidence to declare genocide in Ukraine, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I called it
genocide. It has become clearer and clearer that Putin is just trying to wipe
out the idea of even being — being able to be Ukrainian.
And the amount — the evidence is
mounting. It’s different than it was last week. The — more evidence is coming
out of the — literally, the horrible things that the Russians have done in
Ukraine. And we’re going to only learn more and more about the devastation.
This is one of those presidential statements that is so
significant, I waited for the White House staff to offer the now-traditional
“what the president meant to say was” correction. But as of this writing, the
White House is sticking with it.
A declaration that Russia is committing genocide in
Ukraine makes any remaining U.S. cooperation with Russia, or any hesitation in
assisting the Ukrainians lest we be too provocative or escalatory, morally
abominable. We keep saying “never again” on Holocaust Remembrance Day, and then
the “ethnic cleansing” of the Balkans occurs (40,000 civilians killed). And
then we see what happens in Rwanda (500,000 dead). And then Darfur, Sudan,
(between 178,258 and 461,520 dead, mostly from disease). And then Syria (500,000
to 600,000 dead).
Our elected leaders keep saying, “never again,” but the
evidence of history is “again and again and again and again, each time in
slightly different ways, as long as they’re relatively far away from each
other.” (President
Obama formed an “Atrocities Prevention Board” that did not have a website, a
Twitter account, or even email addresses for its main office or its members.)
As my reader James observes, if Russia is committing
genocide, “We should at least drop the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action talks
with Russia and Iran until the scoreboard for ‘last act of genocide discovered’
hits ‘ten days ago.’”
Here was White House press secretary and future MSNBC
host Jen Psaki, facing
tough questions from Dana Perino on Fox News Sunday this past
weekend:
PERINO: Speaking of Russia, they
are at the table as part of the negotiations with the Iran — Iranians, and
working as the Biden administration works on reviving that deal. But President
Biden has called Vladimir Putin a war criminal and Russia would stand to gain
billions if they were to hold this uranium. Can this continue? Can Russia
continue to be at the table for these Iran negotiations?
PSAKI: Well, Dana, here’s how we
look at it, and you know this from your many past experiences — diplomacy,
foreign affairs, it’s complicated. And this is an example of that.
We believe, and I think most of the
global community believes, that preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon
is in our national interest and our global interest.
The president is only going to
agree to a deal if it is a good deal. But we have [been] dealing with the
experiment of President Trump pulling out of the deal, and what we’ve seen is a
lack of visibility. Iran has made great progress in being able to move towards
acquiring a nuclear weapon. That’s not in our interest.
Russia has been a member of the
P5+1. They have been an implementing — played an implementation role. That’s
what we’re talking about and what’s been under discussion in these
negotiations.
We don’t know that we will come to
an agreement, though. It’s ongoing and we’re still considering it.
In other words, Russia will continue to be a U.S. partner
in the Iran negotiations, even though President Biden just said that
the Russians are committing genocide. It is an astounding, jaw-dropping,
mind-boggling contradiction that illuminates the wrongheaded thinking of an
administration whose primary goal in Iran policy is to never admit that the
Obama administration was wrong on Iran policy.
In other parts of the administration’s policy decisions
that influence Russia and Ukraine . . .
·
At this point, it doesn’t make any sense
for the U.S. not to assist in the transfer of those MiG-29s. What, stopping
genocide isn’t an important enough goal to justify the move? We’re afraid we’re
going to escalate the situation from an ongoing genocide?
·
As noted earlier, transferring
an “Iron Dome” missile-defense system to Ukraine has its own logistical
challenges, but clearly the menace of genocide makes it sufficiently
worthwhile for the U.S. to assist overcoming those challenges. The
good news is that the U.S. is looking at a much bigger package of military aid:
“Preliminary plans circulating among government officials and lawmakers in
Washington also included Mi-17 helicopters, howitzer cannons, coastal defense
drones and protective suits to safeguard personnel in the event of a chemical,
biological or nuclear attack, the officials said, though they cautioned that it
was not immediately clear if all of those items would end up in the final aid
package.” But no MiGs or Iron Dome systems like the Ukrainians wanted, at least
so far.
·
If there is ongoing genocide, does the idea of a
NATO-enforced no-fly zone over certain parts of Ukraine for humanitarian
corridors seem quite so reckless or escalatory? Would we hesitate to take that
kind of action against a Hitler or a Pol Pot or a Slobodan Milošević? (I would
compare Vladimir Putin to Stalin, but he would probably take that as a
compliment.)
·
If there is ongoing genocide, doesn’t keeping
the the U.S. embassy in Lviv instead of Kyiv look like an act of cowardice?
Shouldn’t the embassy, or at least a skeleton staff, move back to Kyiv? (Both
cities have come under Russian bombardment.)
·
If there is an ongoing genocide, shouldn’t
there be a permanent NATO naval presence in the Black Sea? A month before
the invasion started, the last NATO vessel, the French naval
frigate Auvergne, left the Black
Sea. If NATO had had a presence in the Black Sea in February, would the
Russians have hesitated at all? Would
they have filled up the Black Sea with mines?
·
We
still have tariffs on Ukrainian steel! (Not that the steel mills in Ukraine
are all that productive these days.)
·
Why is Russia still the third-largest supplier
of uranium to the U.S.? In 2021, the U.S. spent $1 billion on Russian
uranium. Wyoming
Republican senator John Barrasso notes that “Congress appropriated $75
million to the Energy Department to establish a strategic uranium reserve in
2020, yet the department hasn’t purchased a single ounce of U.S. uranium.”
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, “At the end of
2008, U.S. uranium
reserves totaled 1.2 billion pounds” — and then the U.S. stopped tracking
it because domestic U.S. uranium production supplies only about 10 percent, on
average, of U.S. requirements for nuclear fuel.
·
I can understand the argument that the U.S. and
Russia should always keep some line of communication open to avert any
potentially disastrous miscommunication or confusion between nuclear
powers. But
it seems a little odd for the U.S. to have a regular diplomatic relationship
with a government that we have declared is committing genocide.
·
As
I mentioned on The Editors podcast, seeing U.K. prime
minister Boris Johnson demonstrate real courage by walking the streets of Kyiv
alongside Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky made me wish we had a
non-geriatric president. But
over in The Atlantic, Eliot Cohen points out
there’s no reason Secretary of State Antony Blinken or Vice President Kamala
Harris couldn’t emulate Johnson’s move. Harris has had a particularly rough
start to her term as vice president; if she genuinely wants to reset public
perceptions of her, she and her team should head to Kyiv and demonstrate that
U.S. leaders aren’t afraid to at least briefly step into a city under siege and
dare the Russians to start a war by attacking during her visit.
Cohen
argues that what happens in Ukraine will have far-reaching consequences for
years to come:
For those of us born after World
War II, this is the most consequential war of our lifetime. Upon its outcome
rests the future of European stability and prosperity. If Ukraine succeeds in
preserving its freedom and territorial integrity, a diminished Russia will be
contained; if it fails, the chances of war between NATO and Russia go up, as
does the prospect of Russian intervention in other areas on its western and
southern peripheries. A Russian win would encourage a China coolly observing
and assessing Western mettle and military capacity; a Russian defeat would
induce a salutary caution in Beijing. Russia’s sheer brutality and utterly
unwarranted aggression, compounded by lies at once sinister and ludicrous, have
endangered what remains of the global order and the norms of interstate
conduct. If such behavior leads to humiliation on the battlefield and economic
chaos at home, those norms may be rebuilt to some degree; if Vladimir Putin’s
government gets away with it, restoring them will take a generation or longer.
Put Corn in Hungry Bellies, Not in Our Cars
Because the war is continuing into spring, Ukrainian
farmers in “the breadbasket of Europe” are not going out into the fields and
planting their crops. Even if they could, the odds of successfully exporting
their usually abundant wheat crop to their traditional markets is unlikely
because of all of those mines in the Black Sea and the Russian Navy parked off
shore. Right now, Ukrainian ports are closed, and nothing is going in or
out. The
end result is that a lot of people in places far from Ukraine are going to pay
way more to feed themselves, or starve:
“It’s a big issue,” Mercogliano
said. “We’ve been talking about the issue of potential food shortages because
Ukraine is responsible for 10 percent of the world’s grain exports, and that’s
a combination of wheat, corn, barley and everything else. Other countries are
going to have to either pick up that slack, but that’s going to be very
difficult to do. And then you’re going to have to get shipping to relocate to
do it.”
The large percentage of grain
exports is why Ukraine’s flag is half yellow, Mercogliano noted.
It provides the wheat to countries
in the Middle East, Africa, Europe and Asia. In 2020, Ukraine was the fifth
largest wheat exporter, with $4.16 billion in exports, according to the Observatory
of Economic Complexity.
Egypt, Indonesia, Pakistan,
Bangladesh and Lebanon were the top five importers of Ukrainian wheat in 2020,
according to OEC.
So what is President Biden doing?
The Biden administration said that increasing use of
gasoline with 15 percent ethanol, known as E15, over the summer months would
help lower consumers’ fuel costs, which
have climbed following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The decision is seen
as a win for corn growers and ethanol-producing companies, though some groups
said they fear it could further inflate food prices by making grain more
expensive:
Oil-industry officials have
questioned whether such moves would lower gasoline prices for consumers.
Increased demand for corn could
push up prices for the grain if the use of E-15 throughout the year continues,
analysts said. Corn prices have already jumped this year because of Russia’s
invasion of Ukraine.
Increased ethanol use could contribute
to cost inflation for food companies and meat processors, because producers
rely heavily on grains, such as corn, to feed livestock and poultry, according
to the National Chicken Council.
“Further and artificial demand for
corn created by this administration will likely increase the cost of corn and
all food products dependent on corn and corn oil inputs,” said Mike Brown,
president of the group, which represents poultry companies. Feed, made of corn
and soybean meal, is the top cost in raising chickens, the NCC said. “At the
end of the day — ethanol manufacturers win and consumers lose,” Mr. Brown said.
At a time when the world is facing a greater risk of
severe famine, President Biden wants to put more corn into our automobiles.
This is a stupid policy announced by a stupid man who is surrounded by stupid
advisers.
Meanwhile, under the sea at Coal Oil Point off the coast
of Santa Barbara, Calif., an
estimated 6,500-7,000 gallons of oil per day seep out naturally from the ground.
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