The Opportunity in the Ukraine Crisis Biden can revive America’s standing after the Afghan debacle. The first step is to help the Kurds.

 

The Opportunity in the Ukraine Crisis

Biden can revive America’s standing after the Afghan debacle. The first step is to help the Kurds.

By Thomas S. Kaplan and Bernard-Henri Lévy

May 15, 2022 1:32 pm ET

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‘A statesman cannot create anything himself,” the “Iron Chancellor,” Otto von Bismarck, observed. “He must wait and listen until he hears the steps of God sounding through events; then leap up and grasp the hem of his garment.” A century and a half later, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has apparently heard those steps. By canceling a critical gas deal with Russia and overturning a longstanding policy of not sending lethal weapons into war zones, Mr. Scholz has seized the garment and transformed Germany’s role in the world.

Of even greater importance for the global order, Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine could be providential for President Biden too. Like it or not, the retreat of the U.S. has been the big story in the chancelleries and ministries of Europe, Asia and the Middle East for many years. Even before Barack Obama’s failure to follow through on his Syrian “red line” and Donald Trump’s betrayal of Iraqi and Syrian Kurds, the word on the street has been loud and clear: America is faithless to its friends and at serious risk of being challenged by a new axis of China, Russia and even second-tier adversaries like Iran.

This may seem like a bum rap on America, which has been a mostly benevolent hegemon for decades. But as the Ukrainians and the Kurds well know, life is unfair. Nobody likes a loser, especially an arrogant one. One can be arrogant yet magnificent in projecting power and values. One can be ineffectual yet respected if one is at least humble about one’s missteps. To be ineffectual and arrogant simultaneously elicits universal contempt.

The U.S. hit rock bottom with the tragic fiasco of its bungled exit from Afghanistan. America’s natural allies quite reasonably asked if they should hedge their bets with China and Iran.