Really?
How about:
- Stop Russian aggression before it engulfs other parts of Europe, including NATO countries.
- Avoid getting the US dragged into a war with Russia when it, inevitably, attacks a NATO country (if it were to subdue Ukraine).
- Protect US-led international rules order where belligerents don't get to start wars of aggression and invade neighbors and US allies without recourse.
- Actively degrade Russian military to the point where they will not be a threat to anyone, within another 6-18 months of getting slaughtered in Ukraine. Disarming a rabidly anti-American foe is a very good thing for the US, indeed.
- If this whole Russian boondoggle leads to a collapse of the anti-American Putin regime, that would be pure gravy.
- Any that would be WAY more than anyone had realistically expected at the start of the war of Russian aggression.
- Remember we were talking of arming Ukrainians just enough to annoy the Russians at the start of the war? Now we are arming them to end the Russians as a threat!
- Send a super-strong signal to China, Iran, and North Korea, illustrating what will happen to them if they go for a land grab of their own.
Basically, we are keeping assholes in check.
If any of the above are important to you, this has been a hack of a good deal for the US.
If you don't care about any of the above, or are aligned with Russian interests (for whatever reason) then I guess it's a terrible thing. If you fall in the latter category, you will be expected to work to undermine the US. But what's the upside to that?
Big difference between 'Nam and 'Stan vs. Ukraine in that there are no US troops fighting nor taking casualties in Ukraine.
That, and we are winning.
I'm sorry, where exactly did you get that sanctions were going to "bring Russia to their knees in months"?
I've never heard of such an expectation. If you got it from some legitimate US government source, please do share.
For references,
sanctions against the old Soviet Union took about two (2) generations (~43 years) to degrade it into economic twilight and bankruptcy. But degrade it they did. And it not only went bankrupt, but ceased to exist. It wasn't cheap nor easy, but it was an undeniably positive outcome for the US.
Economic sanctions against North Korea, Iran, and Cuba have been on-again/off-again for decades. None of these have keeled over yet, but neither are they prospering nor seriously threatening the US, either.
Economic sanctions are a containment measure, not an active intervention that produced results in the near term.
Always have been. Always will be.
Mike, we have been wide awake on this thread for the last 8 months.
You are welcome to join us.
I trust that the above helped to constructively advance our dialog.
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