Strategic Minute

Vol. 2. No. 8. Feb. 21, 2023

A Word First

This week, we stop our usual routine to examine President Biden's visit to Ukraine. We look at the open sources and come up with a very different conclusion on why he was there.

From on high

“Well, I’ve just come from a visit to Kiev, and I can report, Kiev stands strong."
President Biden returns from an unannounced visit to Ukraine.

Focus

A photo-op in Kiev. [Ukrainian Presidential Press Office]

The Third Man

We know the news: On Feb. 20, U.S. President Joe Biden made an unannounced visit to Kiev where lots of people took his picture with his Ukrainian counterpart. Biden relayed more promises of aid and then left for Poland, where he made a speech that attacked Russian President Putin.

Now, let's put on our thinking caps. Why would an 80-year-old man with serious physical and mental issues be allowed to make an arduous and dangerous trip to a war zone? No U.S. president, regardless of age and heath, was ever allowed to do that. No physician would ever approve it. No senior aide would ever advise it. Even the Secret Service would register its objection.

So, there must have been an urgent reason that Biden left his bed in the White House at 2 a.m. for what was reported to have been a 20-hour journey to Ukraine. It wasn't to hug President Zelensky. Biden had just done that weeks earlier. It wasn't for a photo-op to mark a year of the war in Ukraine. And it certainly wasn't to announce an additional $500 million in aid to Kiev, said to have received at least $100 billion from Washington. It wasn't even for domestic reasons: The next presidential election is in November 2024, and old Joe knows he won't be running.

On verge of collapse

Here's what we do know: the White House has been told by the intelligence community that Ukraine is on the verge of collapse. The Russian military has been systematically destroying Ukraine's military and critical civilian assets, leaving the country cold, starving and in chaos. NATO, most of whom want out, has been unable to stop the Russian winter offensive that has been whittling away at enemy defenses. Biden has also been told that Zelensky is so unpopular that he could be overthrown at any time.

What's worse is that the global power balance has dramatically shifted over the last year. In the rush to punish Putin, Washington has driven Moscow straight into the arms of a more sinister and richer U.S. rival -- China. This has achieved much more than merely foil Western sanctions on Russia: It has brought Beijing and Moscow together in a way unimaginable even a year ago.

How? China has become Russia's strategic reserve in both military and economy. The U.S. dollar has been replaced in Moscow by the Chinese yuan. Russia is now exporting huge amounts of coal for energy-hungry China. In all, the Chinese import of Russian goods is up more than 60 percent this year. Chinese exports to Russia have increased by 30 percent.

Militarily, China has played a major role in maintaining and even improving Russian platforms. Chinese subsystems, many of them knock-offs of American devices, are upgrading Russian military assets, including missiles, ships and unmanned aerial vehicles.

Russia-China vs. U.S.

And that is something that the United States cannot allow to continue. It has now become obvious that any future war between Washington and Beijing will involve Russia, with the biggest nuclear arsenal in the world. Both rivals will ensure that America is denied basing rights and other logistics that will make it extremely difficult to sustain a U.S. military presence in the South China Sea. Many of America's Arab and Asian allies are already deep in China's pockets. A disaster is in the making.

So why did Biden go to Ukraine? He did not make the trip to repeat the same war rhetoric or to promise more aid. The president went to see somebody he cannot and maybe will never admit to -- Vladimir Putin. The unexplained hours that Biden was in Ukraine were probably used to meet Putin or a senior aide to discuss a roadmap to stop the war and restore bilateral relations. Putin demanded and probably received a specific U.S. commitment that Kiev would not be part of NATO and that there would not be Western forces deployed even in neighboring Poland.

And yes, Putin wants compensation for the American destruction of Nord stream-1 and -2 gas pipelines. He probably told Biden that the money could come out of American aid to Kiev.

Why Biden? Because Putin would not agree to consider receiving such a commitment from anybody other than the president of the United States -- regardless of his physical and mental condition.

Biden changes his rhetoric

And that's the part that Biden revealed in Warsaw during his return from Ukraine: that he never intended for the United States to pose a threat to Russia. This is a far cry from Biden's promise last year to confront Moscow and kick Putin out.

"The West was not plotting to attack Russia, as Putin said today," Biden said. "President Putin chose this war. Every day the war continues is his choice. He could end the war with a word."

Zelensky has been waiting for Putin’s word. He had been pleading with the White House to stop the war and save Ukraine and him -- though not necessarily in that order. Zelensky is willing to accept an offer from Putin for a pullout from the Ukrainian mainland while allowing Crimea to remain in Russian hands. He knows that the great majority of Ukrainians will not object.

The Ukrainian president has already prepared an explanation for his turnabout -- expected to be seen over the next few weeks. As he told a German newspaper during Biden's visit, the war has taken on Armageddon-like proportions -- namely the alliance of Beijing and Moscow.

"If China aligns itself with Russia, there will be a world war," Zelensky said.