Recall, Obama had said there was no strategic, national interest in Ukraine back in 2014.
...July 23, 2014 5:13 PM
Rich’s excellent column on Obama’s fecklessness in the face of Putin’s Ukraine aggression notes that the president has resisted not only causing real pain to Russia’s economy but providing the Ukrainian military with the weapons it needs to defend its sovereign territory and defeat Putin’s thugs. On the latter, Charles Krauthammer made similar observations here.
Meanwhile, the Daily Beast’s Eli Lake reports that among the defensive assets our government has denied Ukraine is “radar jamming and detection equipment necessary to evade and counter [Russian] anti-aircraft systems.” Last month, when it became clear that Moscow was providing the anti-aircraft systems to the Russia-backed rebels, Kiev asked this equipment. Last week, one of those systems was used to shoot down Malaysian Airlines Flight 17, killing 298 people.
I do not think the president’s opposition to arming Ukraine is explained by his intentional American decline, his stated desire that the conflict not escalate (as if Ukrainian weakness somehow discourages Putin’s aggression), or the risible suggestion—advanced by Obama’s former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton—that Russian operatives shooting planes out of the sky is Europe’s problem...
