Putin’s Ukraine attack is the direct result of weak American leadership and a lack of American resolve
Michael R. Pompeo
Fox News
March 9, 2022
With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we have witnessed the invasion of a free and sovereign nation by a reckless dictator who cares little for peace or the sovereignty of his neighbors. This attack did not happen in a vacuum; it was the direct result of weak American leadership and a lack of American resolve.
For months, we knew that Russia was planning to invade Ukraine. We saw its troops massed on the Ukrainian border, knew they were conducting military exercises with the intent to invade, and knew that usurping Ukraine had been Vladimir Putin’s objective for decades. Yet, all the Biden administration could muster to deter this imminent attack was a weak, vague threat of sanctions and ambiguous statements that implied a “minor incursion” into Ukraine would be permissible.
American deterrence in Ukraine failed because the Biden administration placed too much emphasis on the threat of sanctions without establishing that it possessed the resolve to impose costs on its adversaries.
Read the full op-ed HERE.