The Wall Street Journal Is Right: The Biden Admin Should Declassify Its Ukrainian Aid Strategy

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published a very critical editorial on Friday about how “Biden Reneges on His Ukraine Promise: He classifies a strategy document that Congress made the price of aid.”

They surprisingly wrote that “Republicans in Congress are right to insist that the Administration articulate a larger theory of how Ukraine can use the assistance to regain momentum and take more territory back from Mr. Putin.”

Their Editorial Board also threw a few jabs at Kamala too.

In their words, “Don’t count on the Administration following this order before Nov. 5, if it ever does. A public release might mean that Vice President Kamala Harris would have to explain her own thinking on the war before the election. As long as she doesn’t, and the Administration covers it up, Ms. Harris co-owns Mr. Biden’s record of muddled half measures.” There’s more to it than domestic electoral considerations though since the argument can be made that the US doesn’t even really have a strategy.

“All Sides Of The Ukrainian Conflict Underestimated Each Other” as was assessed as early as July 2022, with the US wrongly expecting that its unprecedented sanctions would force Russia to withdraw. When it proved too economically resilient yet it still continued to militarily restrain itself in furtherance of political goals as was explained here, the conflict then turned into an improvised “war of attrition”. That also hasn’t gone according to how the West planned.

Not only did last year’s counteroffensive disastrously fail after the West promised that it would be a game-changer, but Sky News reported in spring that Russia is producing three times as many shells as the West and at one-quarter of the price. The scale at which military resources are expended in this conflict is so large, however, that Russia still hasn’t been able to make much on-the-ground progress despite being so far ahead of the West in their “race of logistics”.   

In fact, Russia is finally bearing some fruits from this “war of attrition” as proven by the increased pace of its gains in Donbass, which is setting the stage for what might turn out to be the decisive Battle of Pokrovsk. Even before everything started moving in that direction, it was already clear that the military-strategic dynamics had shifted against the West after last year’s failed counteroffensive and the consequently growing awareness of Russia’s victory in the “race of logistics”.

It was around that time last spring that Republican holdouts finally stopped blocking Congressional aid to Ukraine in exchange for the Biden Administration submitting a strategy for this within 45 days. That predictably didn’t happen on time, and when it finally arrived, it was completely classified. The public therefore remains oblivious to the goals that they’re paying to pursue. More than likely, the Biden Administration doesn’t have any clear ones in mind, hence why it won’t declassify the document.  

The realization that no concrete goals exist, and the US just continues to improvise everything in spite of it being obvious that time isn’t on their side as proven by Russia’s victory in the “race of logistics”, could turn the public against this proxy war even more than they already are. As the WSJ wrote, “The Biden Team has hid behind platitudes such as supporting Ukraine ‘as long as it takes,’ which isn’t a strategy. It long ago became a rhetorical evasion”, one that’s become among the most open secrets in the world.

The military-industrial complex and those elite that invest in it, including public officials, profit handsomely from this state of affairs though. They’re the ones who don’t care about this becoming another “forever war”, as they imagine it to be at least, since they benefit from it. The public was told that this was an existential conflict for the West, however, which is why they’d be none too pleased to find out that their leaders never had a plan for winning in the first place other than sanctioning Russia.

Moreover, it might even be admitted or at least implied within this entirely classified document that new weapons systems have deliberately been sent to Ukraine at a snail’s pace for escalation management purposes vis-à-vis Russia, which would disappoint those who don’t understand the wisdom behind this. This pragmatic approach was elaborated here, but it’s sufficient for the average reader to know that more could have been sent to Ukraine and at a quicker pace too, yet the decision was made not to.

The Biden Administration should therefore declassify its Ukrainian aid strategy in full instead of continuing this charade. From the perspective of the US’ objective national interests, it’s better to prepare the public for the inevitable political solution to this conflict (whenever and whatever it may be) than to keep getting their hopes unrealistically high about a maximum victory that’s impossible to achieve. The sooner that the American elite levels with the people, the sooner that peace will arrive.