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Russia Invades Ukraine: 5 Ways The U.S. Could Respond
On Friday, Russian military forces occupied the Crimean peninsula in southern Ukraine, and since then, U.S. officials have pledged that the occupation wouldn’t come without a price. President Obama said on the day of the occupation — or invasion, depending on who you ask — that there would be “costs” to any military action in Ukraine, and Secretary of State John Kerry doubled down on that on Sunday, boasting that there would be a “huge price” to Vladimir Putin's actions. Meanwhile, a number of Senators have demanded a strong U.S. response to Russia’s actions, and
But what might this response look like? While U.S.-led military intervention seems unlikely, the West nevertheless has a number of options at its disposal. Here are a couple of them. Note that these aren’t mutually exclusive; they could, and in fact may, be used in conjunction with one another.
Kick Russia Out Of G-8
The Group of Eight, or G-8, is an economic forum ostensibly comprised of the world’s largest industrialized democracies. Russia joined in 1998, and the group’s next conference is set to be held in Sochi in June. The U.S. is almost certainly going to either boycott that meeting or force it to be rescheduled elsewhere, but the West could also respond by kicking Russia out of G-8 altogether. On Sunday, Kerry said that this option is on the table: “[Putin] is not going to have a Sochi G-8. He may not even remain in the G-8 if this continues,” Kerry said.
Freeze Assets, Block Visas
When the Ukrainian government cracked down on protesters in Kiev, the U.S. responded by freezing the assets and blocking the visas of Ukrainian officials involved, which effectively banned them from traveling to the U.S. and cut them off from some of their money. The same could be done to Putin and his underlings now; specifically, this could be done by expanding the scope Magnitsky Act, a law passed in 2012 that allows the U.S. to target assets and visas of certain lower-level Russian officials. On Sunday, Senator John McCain advocated expanding the Magnitsky Act so that it would also apply to Russians complicit in the Crimean occupation.
Support The Rest Of Eastern Europe
Putin has always feared the growth of Western alliances in Europe, and has attempted to form various counterbalances with other Eastern European dictators; in this sense, the invasion of Crimea can be seen largely as an attempt to prevent another country from allying itself with the European Union. The best long-term response, then, might simply be for the West to strengthen and reaffirm its ties with other Eastern European countries that Putin may have his eyes on. This could mean bringing Georgia — or even Ukraine — into NATO and mobilizing NATO forces to defend Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
Deploy The Missiles
Alternatively, there are always missiles. In 2007, the U.S. planned to install a missile defense system in Eastern Europe but canceled it two years later after Putin objected. Perhaps it’s time to revisit that? This isn’t the most elegant solution: It would dramatically escalate U.S.—Russian tensions to levels not seen since the Cold War, and what’s more, it might not spook Putin at all. The counterargument, advanced by McCain and other GOP Senators, is that failing to take some kind of aggressive action communicates to Putin that he can freely seize territory from Russia’s neighbors without any international consequence.
Send U.S. Troops To Ukraine
This is, by far, the least likely option. The last thing Obama wants is to start another war — it was hard enough pulling troops out of Iraq and laying the groundwork to end the war in Afghanistan. In addition, the U.S. doesn’t even have much of a strategic or economic influence in Ukraine, unless “screw Russia” counts as an interest. The fact that no one, not even the most hawkish Republicans, is really calling for the U.S. to go to war in Ukraine suggests that it probably won’t happen. However, it’s also important to note that, in their Sunday interviews, neither Kerry nor Hagel ruled out a military response. “We have plans for everything, all the time,” Hagel said.
