You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains.
–Matthew 24:6-8 (NIV)
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.
–I Timothy 2:1-2 (ESV)
February 24, 2023 marks the one year “anniversary” of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. No doubt, the primary responsibility for that invasion, that triggered the first major land war in Europe since the end of WWII in 1945, is with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. We recoil at the horrific loss of life and Putin’s targeting of civilian targets, clearly war crimes. Our hearts go out to the innocent people of Ukraine caught in this bloody, senseless tragedy. Two days after the invasion, The Roanoke Star posted this column where interested people could get prayer pointers and make financial contributions to help the sufferers.
Three days later, The Roanoke Star posted this interview with Hollins Professor Ed Lynch, PhD., the John P. Wheeler Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Global Politics and Society at Hollins University.
“I would say the following: It took the leadership in Moscow 4 and a half years to consider Lyndon Johnson weak enough to invade Czechoslovakia. It took 3 years to consider Jimmy Carter weak enough for them to invade Afghanistan. It took 8 years for Moscow to consider Bush weak enough to invade Georgia. It took 6 years for them to consider Obama weak enough to invade Crimea.
“With Biden, it took 13 months.
“Of course, under some presidents, like Reagan and Trump, Moscow didn’t dare invade anybody.”
As Americans, we should ask ourselves: what is President Biden’s role in the start of the Ukraine War?
In the early days of the 2020 presidential Democrat primaries, President Obama allegedly gave an uninspiring assessment of his Vice President Joe Biden’s abilities and his hopes that another Democrat would face Trump in November. “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to [expletive] things up.”
As Professor Lynch pointed out, in February-March 2014 Putin’s Russia invaded and then annexed the strategic Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine. Despite some harsh words from the Obama administration, Russia was able to seize and keep the Crimea without paying much of an international price.
President Trump, despite his drawbacks and detractors, presided over four years of relative peace on the international scene not to mention a booming economy and reasonable prices. Maybe you’ve seen the yard signs “I’d like a Mean Tweet and $2/gallon gas right now.”
Maybe next we’ll see yard signs proclaiming, “I’d like a Mean Tweet and peace in Ukraine right now.”
Remember the disastrous fall of Afghanistan in August 2021? Mind you, that was only seven months into the new Biden administration. Granted, Afghanistan is largely a medieval country with a complex past, a history of defeating great powers that dared invade, and most Americans didn’t want to leave US soldiers there propping up its government forever.
Still, the stunning speed of Afghanistan’s fall and the glaring incompetence of our leadership was shocking. (For more about that debacle and how the media has downplayed it, and the possible “coincidence” of the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago timed at the first anniversary of the fall is discussed in this column.)
Simply put, the sudden collapse of our allied government in Afghanistan and our disastrous, haphazard exit sent a message of weakness to the world.
Just five months later, in a rambling January 19 press conference, President Biden seemingly downplayed the seriousness of a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine. “It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and we end up having to fight about what to do and not do, et cetera.”
His “minor incursion” remark may go down in history as not only one of the most stupid but also most dangerous utterances of any US president.
The next day, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky posted a plea to Biden and the world on Twitter, “We want to remind the great powers that there are no minor incursions and small nations, just as there are no minor casualties and little grief from the loss of loved ones.”
Biden has long been known for gaffes, plagiarism and lies. However, instead of holding him to account, the Democrat Party and corporate media (two sides of one coin basically) just laughingly dismissed it as “Oh, that’s Joe Biden being Joe, haha!”)
When the loose-cannon and cognitively-impaired Biden is both president and commander-in-chief, however, it’s no longer a laughing matter. Just five weeks after Biden’s irresponsible “minor incursion” remark, Russian bombs started falling on Ukraine.
The Biden administration’s wrongheaded priorities have poisoned the Pentagon and its capabilities. During Covid, they forced the experimental shots on young, healthy servicemembers. Those who sought exemptions were largely denied. Many fine, dedicated people left the service because of the mandates, thus weakening our forces. Top brass claimed to attack “white rage” inside the military…despite no evidence of such and the fact that the majority of those in the service are white. Top Brass seemingly want to re-fight the 1860’s Civil War by focusing attention on renaming military bases while we left some $80 billion in hardware in Afghanistan thus arming our enemies for the next conflict.
The Pentagon predicted the Afghan government would survive months or years after our pullout, but that the Ukrainian capital of Kiev would fall within days of a Russian invasion. As it turned out, both predictions were wrong.
Virginia’s Senator Mark Warner (D) heads the Senate Intelligence Committee while Sen. Tim Kaine (D) is on the Armed Services Committee. That means, both have been in leadership during two military and diplomatic disasters but their voting records show they have mainly been focused on left-wing politically correct causes.
In 2020 many voters chose, for a variety of reasons, to place Joe Biden with his shady background in the White House. While crucial issues like national security got pushed to the backburner during that campaign, many were torqued up by issues including abortion, homosexuality, trans-genderism, etc. Of course, the corporate media and big tech played huge roles in misleading voters by whipping up Trump-hate while puffing up Biden as he hunkered in his basement. The Twitter files are revealing much of that collusion, like the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop which, after all, turned out to be real.
History teaches us that weakness invites war. The ancient Romans believed, “to have peace, prepare for war.” That sounds counter-intuitive, or even to woke ears, “offensive,” but it’s called “deterrence.” Anyone with a half-decent history education should know that. A strong, resolute country can enjoy peace because no one else is foolish enough to mess with them.
We need to pray for our leaders, of both parties, whether we like them or not, as well as pray for leaders of other countries in this perilous time.
As is often quoted in this column, “Elections have Consequences”…and often global, deadly ones.
–Scott Dreyer
