I thought the realpolitik answer was that the U.S. is an unreliable diplomatic partner, so treaty obligations can go by the wayside. A bit of
here, but also not.
When America attempts to use diplomacy with her enemies she tends to be very unreliable. With her allies, well that's a different story, but she did not too long ago throw the Kurds under the bus. Of course the Turks were one of her "official" NATO allies, the Kurds not so much.
There is something of a realpolitik answer in this, and I’m going to go back to 2014 when I was criticized for saying that Russia’s fait accompli in Crimea was a reality that we would need to negotiate. Similarly, I thought Russia’s interests in propping up Assad were more valuable to them than it was to us, so my position on Syria was to stay out of it.
Ok, I mean I also felt that the United States was mostly helping ISIS rather than actually being decisive in containing them by dumping random weapons crates via parachute to the "moderate" rebels. Cause you know, it's not like those rebels didn't also have more extremist ties because Obama dubbed them MoDeRaTe.
However, in the realpolitik dimension, there is a point at which the calculus must become one of assertive response rather than passive acceptance if we are to preserve the international order that we built after the defeat of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
Ukraine is not just an amalgam of Russian and Ukrainian speakers housed in random borders that were established after the communists’ capitulation, it is the principle, the real political principle, that we can not let aggressive powers challenge our interests in this way.
Hitler marched into Austria and Czechoslovakia because there was no deterrence, even though the national incomes and armies were greater than that of Germany in 1939. We and the British had the world’s largest fleets in 1941, but that did not stop the Japanese from bombing Pearl Harbor.
I just think we are at the point now where we have to say no.
I'm so sick of this whole Nazi appeasement drivel argument. We are not obligated to fight directly on the behalf of any non-NATO nation period.
I hate to break it to you but the Balkans and Eastern Europe is kinda like the s't basket of deplorable countries. These people, let's just say the Poles as a Western Slavic people have somehow managed to create a more stable system then those further East and South. Seen the
Serbian Film? Yeah that's what we're dealing with here.
It's not the same as the 1930s because Hitler was taking bites out of more stable Central European nations and when he attacked Poland there was a defense agreement in place between the French and British. The United States had no skin in the game at the time, we had no defense treaty with Poland so Japan brought us in instead. But before you get your panties in a twist remember it was the British and French as well as the USSR's fault for such appeasement, since it was strictly their domain to police at the time.
Also in the 1930s there were no nukes, geopolitical calculations have changed since then. And honestly if Hitler were informed on the principles of modern nuclear doctrine and knew that the French and British had ICBMs pointed toward him I doubt he would have invaded Poland. Despite what all the post WW2 gaffs would have you believe Adolf Hitler was quite an intelligent man, it's just he did certain things that make us wish on an emotional level that he wasn't.
