Russia acts with the same aggression towards its neighbors regardless of what regime or ideology happens to be in power in Moscow at any given time. This goes back hundreds of years to the Tsarist Empire predating the Romanovs. It continued without alteration throughout the 70+ year Bolshevik era, and is present again today in Vladimir Putin’s fascist kleptocracy. Unopposed, Russia will attempt to conquer Ukraine followed by all of the border states—Georgia, Moldova, the Baltic states, Poland et al.—that it has always viewed as a minimum within its sphere of influence if not an integral part of Mother Russia.
The only deterrent Russia respects is a show of strength. We realized this at the end of World War II, when our Soviet ally quickly crushed any democratic aspirations of Eastern European lands, imposed its own puppet regimes, and abruptly morphed into our global arch-rival and enemy. It took George Kennan’s 1946 “Long Telegram” to alert the President and State Department to this historical reality and to persuade them to craft a policy to counter it. The consequence was the Truman Doctrine, the NATO military alliance and the positioning of several hundred thousand American troops, missiles and nuclear weapons in Western Europe. These measures kept Western Europe free and kept the Soviet Union and its Russian successor state “contained” for eight decades. It, along with the Marshall Plan (1947), were arguably the best investments this country ever made.
It has taken only weeks for Donald Trump and his MAGA-addled national security minions to destroy this critical construct that has kept the peace between superpowers for 80 years. In the blink of an eye, they have abandoned our closest allies and embraced our enemy. Putin, the latest in a long line of Russian autocrats, realizes very well that this is his license to behave even worse than he has thus far. His naked aggressiveness will only accelerate. He must have to pinch himself to believe that his long-time U.S. adversary is dumb and inept enough to abandon what has worked so well.
Whether Trump and his band of national security numbskulls are so ignorant of what has guaranteed both our security and prosperity for the past 80 years, or they simply don’t care, sublimating our national interests to their obsessive lust for power, is irrelevant. What is most important is what this complete reversal of bedrock U.S. policy means for America and the free world going forward:
All of this puts U.S. national and economic security at enormous risk. We have ceded the 21st century to our two most dangerous adversaries, China and Russia.
I don’t think the American public fully understands what is happening, and how momentous and disastrous Trump’s upending of 80 years of institutions and policies that brought us relative peace and prosperity will be.
Dick Hermann
May 2, 2025
The only deterrent Russia respects is a show of strength. We realized this at the end of World War II, when our Soviet ally quickly crushed any democratic aspirations of Eastern European lands, imposed its own puppet regimes, and abruptly morphed into our global arch-rival and enemy. It took George Kennan’s 1946 “Long Telegram” to alert the President and State Department to this historical reality and to persuade them to craft a policy to counter it. The consequence was the Truman Doctrine, the NATO military alliance and the positioning of several hundred thousand American troops, missiles and nuclear weapons in Western Europe. These measures kept Western Europe free and kept the Soviet Union and its Russian successor state “contained” for eight decades. It, along with the Marshall Plan (1947), were arguably the best investments this country ever made.
It has taken only weeks for Donald Trump and his MAGA-addled national security minions to destroy this critical construct that has kept the peace between superpowers for 80 years. In the blink of an eye, they have abandoned our closest allies and embraced our enemy. Putin, the latest in a long line of Russian autocrats, realizes very well that this is his license to behave even worse than he has thus far. His naked aggressiveness will only accelerate. He must have to pinch himself to believe that his long-time U.S. adversary is dumb and inept enough to abandon what has worked so well.
Whether Trump and his band of national security numbskulls are so ignorant of what has guaranteed both our security and prosperity for the past 80 years, or they simply don’t care, sublimating our national interests to their obsessive lust for power, is irrelevant. What is most important is what this complete reversal of bedrock U.S. policy means for America and the free world going forward:
- It is destabilizing the entire world. By abandoning both hard and soft power, the U.S. is no longer viewed as the best defense and deterrent against aggression by Russia or China. Don’t think for a moment that nothing but U.S. posture has changed. Our about-face is encouraging countries throughout the world to seek accommodations with both of our former adversaries, at the same time distancing themselves from the suddenly unreliable U.S. Government. Key strategic allies like Japan, South Korea, India and Australia are rethinking their defense ties and strategic alliances, as well as their trade relations, with the U.S. and also with China and Russia. Europe, too, is rethinking its relations with Washington, Moscow and Beijing.
- Trump’s Ukraine War peace proposal looks as if it was dictated by the Kremlin. It speaks to a Putin wish-list and implies that Trump may abandon Ukraine to Russia.
- NATO absent U.S. participation is not likely to be much of a deterrent to a Trump-energized Russia.
- Extreme right-wing European political parties partial to Russia have been emboldened by U.S. hostility to our traditional allies and warming relations with Putin. Trump manipulator Elon Musk and Toady-in-Chief JD Vance are strong and vocal supporters of Germany’s far right, neo-Nazi party, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) and huge admirers of Hungary’s despot, Viktor Orban.
- Trump’s irrational and self-defeating trade policies, fomenting needless disputes where there were none before, have nations fleeing American investments, treasury securities that subsidize our out-of-control national debt, as well as the U.S. dollar, the world’s reserve currency for decades and an immense advantage now being frittered away by Trump and his hack-economists. Another downside for the U.S. is that American taxpayers will also be saddled with paying higher interest rates on treasuries necessary to get our foreign underwriters to buy them.
- Isolating the U.S. will make it more difficult if not impossible to cobble together future alliances and international agreements.
- The most difficult and valuable intangible commodity for any nation to attain and keep is trust. That is all gone now, and foreign nations will be wary of trusting the U.S. for a long time to come, if ever, even after Trump is no longer on the scene.
- Trump has put China in a stronger position vis-à-vis the U.S. than vice versa. What happens when China decides that it will no longer buy our treasuries and underwrite our profligate spending? When cheap Chinese goods are no longer on our retail store shelves? When China, emboldened by our abandonment of Ukraine, views that as encouragement to invade Taiwan? When the world leaves the dollar and moves toward the renminbi as the reserve currency?
All of this puts U.S. national and economic security at enormous risk. We have ceded the 21st century to our two most dangerous adversaries, China and Russia.
I don’t think the American public fully understands what is happening, and how momentous and disastrous Trump’s upending of 80 years of institutions and policies that brought us relative peace and prosperity will be.
Dick Hermann
May 2, 2025
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