Old or New National Security Council?

Biden’s NSC is largely the same NSC that served Obama. Let’s see how that worked.

2009-2017 - Pakistan Drone strikes 337 deaths to include civilians

2010 - Bombed Somalia

2011 - Entered Libya

2013 - Entered Syria

2014 - The Rise of ISIS, it spread across three countries

2015 - Entered Yemeni conflict 

Let’s look at the history of Biden as VP facing Russia. In 2014 when Russia invaded Ukraine, the Crimean Peninsula, he said nothing. He watched quietly as the man he advocated entering the WTO and partner in the Biden-Putin Commission invaded a sovereign country without cause. 

Crimeans waited for the US to intervene according to the Budapest Memorandum. Signed on 5 December 1994 in Budapest, Hungary by the US, Russia, Ukraine, Hungary and then joined by other nations, it prohibited Russia from using military force or economic coercion against its signatories. Between 1993 and 1996 Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakstan dismantled their nuclear weapons. 

The agreement stood largely uncontested until 22 February 2014 when Russia invaded Crimea. There were anxious faces and people counting on other signatories to respond in order to protect Ukrainians on the Crimean Peninsula. All that came were “strongly worded condemnations.”

Now, it seems, that these condemnations are being repeated as Russia invaded the Ukrainian mainland. Biden’s NSC shows the strategy of containment by strengthening NATO forces surrounding Ukraine. But, what about the Ukraine? Is this nation going to be left to fall as the Crimean Peninsula was? What of the Baltic States? They are also at risk of Russian aggression, Putin has said as much. Will Biden lead NATO in abandoning Baltic allies because they are neither NATO nor EU presently?

A one sided containment is a short sighted plan, at best. It actually encourages and emboldens an already out of control Putin. These are some of the risks we run with Obama’s old NSC setting policy and strategy for this administration.