Rather, it is essential to reckoning with his domestically and strategically calamitous presidency. That observation barely scratches the surface of Republican hypocrisy on this front, but recounting the Trump administration’s corrosive relationship with Ukraine is not the vindictive resurrection of old talking points. Republicans have criticized President Joe Biden for not doing more to arm the Ukrainians, yet fail to recognize that crucial US support was withheld years ago: they voted not to convict Trump in his first impeachment trial in the Senate, proceedings that the House of Representatives had precipitated over Trump’s making US assistance to Ukraine conditional on political favors. But in fact, Washington’s most consequential involvement in Kyiv’s affairs to date has been Donald Trump’s intervention in them, and it was pro-Russian.
To the extent that he had a credible pretext for invading and occupying Ukraine, it was that NATO has encroached on Russia’s traditional sphere of influence. Russian President Vladimir Putin, now a rogue leader and a singular menace to international security, sees Ukraine as having fallen under malign sway of the West and the CIA.
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