The conflict in Ukraine will end with Russia acquiring new territories, wrote American columnist Peter Van Buren in an article in The American Conservative. His realistic belief was published only one day after US President Joe Biden’s approval rating was revealed to have plummeted to a 40% low, much of it to do with the disastrous economic situation, partially spurred on by his reckless policy towards Ukraine.
“The terms for resolving the war will be dictated to Kiev as much by Washington as they will be by Moscow, as with Crimea a few years ago. The end will be quite sad; Russia will very likely solidify its hold on Donbas and the Crimea, and achieve new territory to the west approaching Kiev, roughly 20 percent of Ukraine. Ukraine will be forced to set aside its goal of joining NATO even as the U.S. takes a new stand on its western border with Poland,” Buren said.
According to Van Buren, the US framed Ukraine just as it did with other countries it promised it would “not abandon.”
“‘We have your back’ and ‘we will not abandon you’ join ‘the check’s in the mail’ and ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help’ among joking faux reassurances. Our proxies seem to end up abandoned and hung out to die,” he said.
It is recalled that NBC previously reported that American and European officials are already discussing with Kiev the possible consequences of peace discussions with Russia, including the broad outlines of what Ukraine may have to give up to reach an agreement. NBC said, “The discussions are an acknowledgment of the dynamics militarily on the ground in Ukraine and politically in the US and Europe.”
However, since that November 4 report, the same outlet released a poll on November 19 showing that Biden’s approval rating fell to the lowest level during his presidency and reached 40%. The survey added that 57% of respondents do not approve of Biden’s performance as US president.
Additionally, the poll showed that just 33% favour Biden’s foreign policy, an eight-point drop from September, while 62% of voters, including 30% of Democrats, say they are dissatisfied with how the president deals with foreign policy. According to the survey, voters’ opinion was largely influenced by the US president’s approach to resolving the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Biden’s weakened position is most visible among Democrats, most of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its fighting in the Gaza Strip.
Although the decline is only slight from September, when Biden’s approval rating was at 41%, a key difference is that the shift was among voters aged 18 to 34 in the new survey. Former US President Donald Trump holds a slight advantage over Biden among voters ages 18 to 34 at 46% — a reversal from past election results and past NBC News polls.
Biden trails the likely Republican candidate for next year’s presidential election for the first time in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup in the NBC News poll as Trump would have support from 46% of registered voters, while Biden gets 44%. In the last poll in September, Biden and Trump were tied at 46% each, while in June, the current president was narrowly ahead of the Republican by 4 points (49% to 45%).
The poll mentions Biden’s policies towards the Israel-Hamas War as a reason for Biden’s declining popularity but completely omits his botched handling of the Ukraine crisis as another reason why Americans are increasingly turning against him, especially after Trump made “guarantees” to help end the war “within 24 hours.”
All positive news reports in Ukraine’s favour have completely evaporated in the aftermath of the much-lauded and anticipation-building counteroffensive completely failed in its objectives, and at an enormous price in terms of manpower and resources, but especially since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas War on October 7.
Buren explained in his column that Americans are easily distracted “by the greatest propaganda tools ever imagined,” which he says is the media, and only “seem capable of focusing on only one bright shiny object at a time.” He explains that for Americans, wars “must include two clear sides, one good and one pure evil, with one preferably an underdog, daily combat footage which can be obtained without too much danger, and a football game-like progression across a map that is easy to follow. It should not be boring.”
“Ukraine was such a conflict and enjoyed almost a full two-year run. Nevertheless, the fickle attention of America shifted to the Middle East just as things started to look more and more like static WWI trench warfare in Ukraine. It was a hard act to follow, but something always follows nonetheless,” he added.
In effect, Biden gambled his presidential career on defeating Russia via the Ukrainian proxy. Not only did this, as expected, catastrophically fail, but average Americans are now poorer while Washington is geopolitically weaker. Biden’s failure in Ukraine, Trump’s search for a peaceful resolution, and public attention shifting to the Middle East have all contributed to the decline of the president’s approval rating.
American columnist Peter Van Buren
Written by Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher