Putin’s savagery and false narratives make it difficult to contain moral outrage and the urge to be rid of him. But repeated emotional, off-the-cuff outbursts from President Biden about war crimes, genocide and that Putin “can’t remain in power” are a luxury a major power can’t afford. Such crimes, however apparent, have precise legal definitions to adjudicate. Pushing a rat into a corner, especially one with nuclear weapons, is dangerous.
The U.S. and its allies may get lucky, and Ukraine may totally defeat Putin or he may be deposed. But luck is not a policy. Apart from the threat of nuclear weapons used against Ukraine, depending on the results on the battlefield, Ukrainian President Zelensky and his U.S. and NATO allies may be obliged to negotiate with Putin. As former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin said of recognizing the Palestine Liberation Organization, “You don’t make peace with friends, you make it with very unsavory enemies.”
Even if Putin is eliminated, a defeated Russia would not disappear. It will still have 6,000 nuclear weapons and be a major energy, wheat and metal producer. And it will still have a 500-year political tradition of military expansion. And what of efforts to permanently cancel Russia if Putin falls and improbable, but not impossible political change follows? If a transformative opposition figure, such as Alexei Navalny, becomes president, how would the U.S. and NATO rewrite plans for Russia?
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