Don’t Just Sit There: Undo Something
I’ve been trying to think about what the days after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine remind me of. And I have. They remind me of the days after 9/11. Like over 90 percent of Americans, I was angry at the terrorists who murdered almost 3,000 people in one day. And like some similarly high percent of Americans, I’m upset at an evil man, Putin, who attacked another country.
In the days after 9/11, though, I didn’t agree with what so many people were advocating: the USA PATRIOT Act, which took away a lot of our financial privacy and some of our liberties, and the invasion of Afghanistan, to name two. I wanted to keep our civil liberties and our already diminished financial privacy intact and I thought that U.S. Special Forces could get Osama bin Laden without the U.S. government overthrowing the Afghan government. And, of course, it turned out that it was U.S. Special Forces who got Osama bin Laden, not in Afghanistan but in Pakistan.
While I’ve been loving watching brave Ukrainians take to the streets with guns and make fun of Russian tank drivers, I’m against hurting millions of innocent Russians by taking down Russian banks’ ability to use SWIFT and I’m against the U.S. government getting in another war. The foreign policy analyst I’ve paid most attention to for the last few decades, one reason being that he never gets stampeded or bullied into favoring wars that the U.S. can easily stay out of, is Doug Bandow. He has a great article at antiwar.com today laying out why the U.S. government should stay out of this one.
Now, if I could contribute $1,000 to someone in Ukraine to help fight the Russians, I would. Of course, I would want to make sure it gets to the right cause. But my understanding is that long-standing U.S. law has made this illegal. No way do I want the U.S. government to get into another war in Europe.
There are three things I would like the U.S. government to do: lay off Iran, as co-blogger Scott Sumner has argued well and succinctly, so that the Iranians could increase oil output, bringing down the price; sell some oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, bringing down the price and doing a little to reduce the huge federal budget deficit; and deregulate oil exploration and production. The first two would have an immediate impact on the output and price of oil, and the last would have a long-term impact.
These previous 3 are instances of an approach I’ve taken for a long time. Given how much governments in the United States meddle in people’s lives, I’ve had a saying since about 1990: Don’t Just Sit There: Undo Something. In other words, look for the regulations, taxes, and spending programs that the government can eliminate or reduce where doing so would help the situation at hand.
Postscript: Even the Swiss are getting into the act. And check out this statement from the same NY Times news story:
Switzerland said it was departing from its usual policy of neutrality because of “the unprecedented military attack by Russia on a sovereign European state,”
Unprecedented? Has this government official heard of Stalin and his 1939 invasion of Poland?
READER COMMENTS
Philo
Feb 28 2022 at 11:45pm
I think the Swiss are counting only modern precedents–post WWII. The end of WWII marks the transition to our era.
Alan Goldhammer
Mar 1 2022 at 8:42am
+1 to this comment. In addition, David’s reference suffers as the invasion was made possible by the pact negotiated between von Ribbentrop and Molotov. Had this German/Russian agreement not been carved out Poland’s fate might have been different. Germany did not invade Poland until after the agreement was signed and Russia did not invade Poliand two and a half weeks after the German invasion.
zeke5123
Mar 1 2022 at 10:10am
But even that isn’t true. Crimea happened what about ten years ago? Military forces were sent by Russia to a sovereign state that Russia annexed. Just because there wasn’t really fighting doesn’t change the substance of the action.
Thomas Strenge
Mar 2 2022 at 4:37pm
Apples and oranges. Crimea was Russian territory under Ukrainian administration (a gift made in 1954). Putin now invaded Ukraine proper. This time there is little local support.
Sean
Mar 1 2022 at 12:45am
David, you can donate $1,000 to someone in Ukraine to help fight the Russians! https://bank.gov.ua/en/news/all/natsionalniy-bank-vidkriv-spetsrahunok-dlya-zboru-koshtiv-na-potrebi-armiyi
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 10:41am
Thanks, Sean. I’m not sure this is legal, though, for Americans.
Vivian Darkbloom
Mar 1 2022 at 11:46am
Isn’t money fungible? Why the need to make your donation expressly to fight? You can earmark those funds for food, for example. This frees up funds to do other things…
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 6:54pm
Good point.
Henri Hein
Mar 2 2022 at 12:16pm
Sean,
Thanks for posting the link. How confident are you it’s legitimate? The reason I ask is that the malware industry in Eastern Europe is big and sophisticated. I would expect there to be plenty of spoof-sites taking advantage of the outpouring of sympathy towards Ukraine. Which I share, for the record.
Sean
Mar 3 2022 at 9:18pm
Henri, I would say I’m pretty confident it is legitimate (of course can’t be 100%). If you google the national bank of ukraine, you find https://bank.gov.ua/en/ as the first result, which is the same domain as the one I posted originally. If this were a brand new domain I would be a lot more suspicious, but given this I think the probability of fraud is pretty low.
steve
Mar 1 2022 at 10:06am
What you are advocating for here is that larger more powerful countries can do whatever they want to smaller less powerful countries. No country ever has unanimous opinions about anything. While the large majority of Russians support Putin I am sure there are those who oppose him. You appear to be arguing that we should never retaliate as it might hurt those people. If that is the case then Putin has carte Blanche and can do anything he wants.
Steve
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 10:39am
You wrote:
I don’t see how you get that out of what I said. When I say that I enjoy watching Ukrainians fight back and that if I find a good legal way to donate money to the fight, I will do so, it should be hard for you to conclude that I want larger powerful countries to do whatever they want to smaller less powerful countries.
Ditto with your comment that I’m arguing that “we should never retaliate as it might hurt those people.” There are ways to retaliate that don’t hurt those people: like killing Russian soldiers who invade Ukraine.
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 10:41am
The post explicitly says otherwise. The point is to take actions that actually address the problem at hand, affect the people actually responsible, and have minimal collateral damage.
steve
Mar 1 2022 at 11:17am
“There are ways to retaliate that don’t hurt those people: like killing Russian soldiers who invade Ukraine.”
Again, Russia is much larger with a much bigger military and a lot more money. You are conceding the fight to the Russians. We are not going to send troops and neither is anyone else. The only people who can really stop Putin are the Russians themselves. If he loses support he will stop. (Doesnt public choice teach that political figures respond to incentives too?)
Steve
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 11:26am
Indeed that is Economics 101. But you are forgetting another lesson of Economics 101: resources are scarce. You want to allocate your scarce resources to where the marginal value is highest and there is as little waste as possible. Not every possible combination is a valuable combination.
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 11:30am
Historically, it is not always the case that the largest military wins. Heck, just look at US history: Vietnam and Afghanistan are two very recent examples. Look broader at the Soviets adventures in Afghanistan, or the British. The Roman experiences in Germany. The Huns in Europe.
Size can matter, yes. But strategy matters much more.
steve
Mar 1 2022 at 12:56pm
Sure, this could end up as another Viet Nam or Afghanistan. What that means for the people of Ukraine would be 10-20 years of extended guerrilla war, thousands dying and living in worse poverty than they do now. You can call that winning if you want.
Mind you after 12 years in the military I am not averse to the idea that sometimes we need to kill people but I dont really understand talking about it so glibly. I’m probably biased since I am medical and have spent too much time putting bodies and minds back together. Anyway, there is no way that all of the Russian people, even those who oppose the war, end up paying more anyway. They will help pay for the replacement tanks and airplanes. They will pay for the medical care of their soldiers. Having served I can guarantee you that a bunch of those fighting dont believe in the war. Are they then innocents?
Russia has already determined that there will be war and costs. Deciding not to do anything that will harm Russian innocents financially just means that more people will (likely) die and that the Ukrainian people will bear more of the costs.
Steve
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 1:15pm
I agree we shouldn’t be glib. That’s part of the reason David (and I) object to the glibness by which you treat civilian repercussions.
For the last time, no one is advocating inactivity. Rather, what is being discussed is making sanctions more effective by actually targeting the individuals making the war decisions.
To put it in military terms, David is saying to attack military targets and not civilian. You’re objecting by saying that focusing on military targets is akin to doing nothing.
steve
Mar 2 2022 at 5:25pm
But now you have drifted into fantasy. There is no way to target like you claim you want to do. Go ahead and name some.
Jon Murphy
Mar 2 2022 at 6:10pm
Why do you think the actions proposed in the post are fantasy?
TMC
Mar 1 2022 at 10:10am
Past releases from the Strategic reserve have done little to move prices. Biden just tried it recently and prices went up, not saying that it’s causal. It’s just too small, and the reserve is not intended to be used to manipulate prices. It’s there for more serious disruptions.
Scott’s suggestion “Here’s a second proposal—restart the German nuclear power industry. Then sharply reduce German imports of Russian gas.” would be more useful, though longer in the making. I’d add to that 1. Approve the Keystone pipeline, 2. Become an oil exporter again, and 3. more effort into modern small nuclear reactors.
Russia may be as bad as Iran in actions right now, but that’s with Iran somewhat contained and without as much resources as it could have. Iranian leadership makes Putin look sane and boring. It’s worth the higher oil price to keep them as contained as they are now or better.
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 11:59am
Sure, but that was a different situation. Price rose there because demand was rapidly increasing (also, he only released about 3 days worth of supply). Here, we do have a serious supply disruption: Russia is a major producer of oil. Supply is falling. Opening the Reserve could reduce prices in the short run here by preventing the supply from falling.
Besides, the Reserve was just one of three proposals. The other two are well in-line with your points 1 and 2.
Joseph
Mar 2 2022 at 1:45pm
+1 om Iran. I said the same thing to Scott and of course nobody cares. Why people want to provide more resources to a clearly unhinged government is beyond me.
David Henderson
Mar 2 2022 at 2:49pm
You wrote:
I care, which is not the same thing as agreeing with you.
You wrote:
I’m not sure what you’re referring to. If you have in mind the Iranian government, I’m not advocating that they be provided more resources. If I have stopped you forcibly from getting something, and then I quit stopping you, I’m not providing you resources. Moreover the SWIFT restriction for Iran hurts many people besides the Iranian government.
Joseph
Mar 3 2022 at 10:15am
David, I must be missing something.
Right now Iranian government has somewhat limited resources while still trying to build nukes and openly hating both Israel and the US. Are you saying that letting them sell more oil will not give them more resources than they have now which they will undoubtedly use among other things to advance their weapon programs, finance Hamas etc.?
Iran is quite similar to the Russian regime in terms of danger to the neighbours and beyond, once they get their hands on nukes the world is going to become even less safe. Aren’t NK and Russian examples sufficient?
Jon Murphy
Mar 1 2022 at 10:39am
I like this approach a lot for two reasons:
First: reducing or eliminating regulations will indeed help the situation at hand
Second: reducing or eliminating regulations can have long-run benefits unrelated to the problem at hand. One of the big ones would be increasing prosperity, increasing wealth, and putting people into a better situation to handle future problems.
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 11:16am
Nicely said.
When I have advocated such things in the past, a charge people have made is that “You aren’t advocating anything different from what you previously advocated.” This is said as if it’s a slam dunk, but it’s not.
If there are things we should have been doing anyway–and everything I’m suggesting is in that category–then it makes sense to advocate them when they would also address the problem at hand.
And, as you say, they make us more prosperous and that makes us more able to handle anything that comes down the pike.
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 11:05am
Further response to Steve above:
Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell advocates putting the deportation of every Russian student from the United States “on the table.”
If someone opposes that, does that mean that the person is advocating “that larger more powerful countries can do whatever they want to smaller less powerful countries?”
Alan Goldhammer
Mar 1 2022 at 4:33pm
Not that it makes any difference but President Trump did the same thing to Chinese students during his tenure. Wars of any type have casualties.
Mark Z
Mar 1 2022 at 8:13pm
That’s an impressively bad idea. Aside from being grossly collectivist, we’d be sending military aged Russians back to Russia. If anything it would make more sense to offer military-age Russians eligible for conscription automatic visas; maybe offer a green card to any Russian soldier who deserts.
David Henderson
Mar 1 2022 at 6:57pm
steve writes above:
You think it’s “glib” to talk about killing people who are trying to kill you with tanks, heavy guns, and bombers? I’m wondering what military you spent 12 years in.
steve
Mar 4 2022 at 9:51am
What you said was…
“Ditto with your comment that I’m arguing that “we should never retaliate as it might hurt those people.” There are ways to retaliate that don’t hurt those people: like killing Russian soldiers who invade Ukraine.”
Remember that Russia is the aggressor here. Rather than have some Russians who might be innocent suffer some financial penalties, likely small, that alternative, the only one you offer, is to kill Russian soldiers. There are so many things wrong with this.
Who will kill them? Not you or me, it will be Ukrainians who have fewer soldiers and not as many weapons. Who else will die while the Ukrainian soldiers fight them? Thousands of civilians. You are consigning many more Ukrainians to death rather than inflict a financial loss. You cant get those lives back. You can get money back.
You do know how the Russian military works right? Of course you do since you are willing to comment upon it and want them to die. A large portion are conscripts, meaning they come from the poor parts of the country and are generally uninformed about what goes on in Russia. (Remember who controls communications in Russia.) I can guarantee you that a large percentage of those conscripts dont want to be there. So your plan is to kill those, mostly young, soldiers who dont want to be there anyway and in the process have lots of Ukrainians die.
All of that just so that people who might be innocent (Note that Putin’s popularity is climbing) can continue to live comfortably while their aggressor country can bomb civilians. With your plan Putin can tell his people not to worry. They will be warm, well fed and face no inconveniences. And no one gets angry at Putin.
So when you are so willing to throw away the lives of soldiers on both sides and the lives of Ukrainian civilians, that’s a pretty casual approach to the value of life.
“I’m wondering what military you spent 12 years in.”
4 years as a corpsman, enlisted. 8 years Air Force, officer.
Steve
Hanoch
Mar 1 2022 at 7:27pm
I agree that the U.S. should not engage militarily here, but I am not persuaded re: banking or other effective economic sanctions. Innocent people are being brutalized daily in Ukraine. If economic sanctions cause Putin to lose public support and this horror is ended sooner rather than later, isn’t it worth it?
Michael Rulle
Mar 2 2022 at 9:55am
Few remember that Stalin invaded Poland. He was tricked by Hitler. Amazing.
Re:Iran—-I can agree on oil——but I do think we need to prevent Iran from Nuclear capability——and I do not know how the 2 relate.
Bandow, who seems very lucid and intelligent to me, still has a bit of ideologue in him. As a “hardcore” libertarian they seem to be against all wars ——while few are “for wars” —-libertarians are isolationists, generally.
I was against the Patriot Act in real time. It had nothing to do with what was required. I admit to have been for both wars—-Afghanistan and Iraq. Afghanistan was obvious. Not taking over the government but punishing them for assisting Bin Laden. I was for Iraq as well. We do forget that Hussein was constantly resisting all UN sanctioned efforts to live up to their agreements. I think it was clear that everyone believed they had weapons of mass destruction—-even though they did not.
I also believed, and still do, that if you are going to take over a country, you must be fully committed to changing their nature. The 3 most obvious examples to me are the Civil War, the war in Japan, and of course the war in Germany. If you are not willing to do this—-then do not engage. We forgot just how hard this is and what was required. I am not saying we should have done either—-only that if we did—-we needed to be fully committed. By the way, it is not yet clear to me that Iraq was not a success.
Putin wanted to take over Ukraine. I have no idea if he is a tactical idiot or extremely clever. I might really be way off——but they can win anytime they want. However, winning might be losing. How far will the West go to prevent him from taking over? I don’t know. One part of me says “why should we care” —-not in the moral sense but the “realpolitik” sense. We have no obligation. But the other side says, if he takes over, why aren’t the Baltics next?
Suddenly we find out that Russia’s army is useless? That seems implausible. I also sometimes think this entire affair is just some kind of make believe game.
But, like in all things, in time all will be revealed.
Joe munson
Mar 2 2022 at 4:35pm
It’s a tricky situation but assuming sanctions actually work I lean on pro sanction to try to avoid Russia wanting to take more land later. I mean in theory they could little by little eventually invade and take over a bunch of none NATO countries that don’t have nuclear weapons and have a small population.
I, too am traveled by all the pro Ukrainian fake news that is not called fake news, the obvious irrationality of valuing Ukraine lives over lives in the third world where this stuff is “supposed” to happen, and the obvious double standard between putin and many other dictators and even the Ukraine war and the Iraq war, I think its a really hard call.
Also, nobody will say the blindingly obvious, barring some kind of mass civil resistance in Russia and or a palace coup, which is possible but unlikely, Ukraine will eventually lose with six months, meaning it seems kind of pointless to me, except maybe to get the population trained at being better insurgents.
saving the patriotism for civil resistance after Russia wins seems to be the more pragmatic strategy and the even more heroic strategy since none violent revolutions win more often than violent ones.
Also what happens when the insurgency starts and innocents get killed by the insurgents AND the Russians?
Uncomfortable times we live in.
andy
Mar 3 2022 at 2:47am
I’d normally have the same point of view here, but it seems to me that Putin has just stepped too far. When you look at Munich treaty, 1938, Putin’s invasion looks about the same. The Poland case. The 1968. The Putin’s explanation. Lavrov’s requests. It’s all a copy of Hitler/USSR era.
Suppose a bully at school was just picking fights. Bad, we should do something about it… and then he brutally rapes a girl. The girl was from the ‘bottom’ half of the class, but wasn’t like ‘the worst girl’ (as if that mattered). And this is the European feeling about what happened. He just didn’t ‘overstep’ the line a little; this is a completely different territory.
And the view seems to be: Ukrainians didn’t choose this and are dying there. It’s done in your name with your tax money. You do something to stop it. Will it be dangerous? Sure. But the Ukrainians didn’t choose it either.
On a funny note, a producer of security systems turned off his security systems for companies in russia. They sent them letters and called, explained their position and told them they will turn it on if they produce a photo from an anti-war demonstration with an international reporter.
bb
Mar 3 2022 at 10:42am
David,
No serious people are talking about getting directly involved in this conflict so kind of a straw man argument. I do agree with backing off of Iran, but not because of oil prices. I just think our obsession with this little country is harmful to us and them. And ramping up our oil and gas production makes less sense than ramping up our ability to liquify gas and europe’s ability to receive it.
Patriot act was terrible.
David Henderson
Mar 3 2022 at 5:17pm
You write:
I think of my Hoover colleague John Cochrane as being a serious person. Don’t you?
You write:
On your first sentence, my view is that there are sometimes multiple reasons. I think there are things people should do and then something comes along that gives another reason for doing those things. This Iran case is one of those.
You write:
I think both are important. On the USA PATRIOT Act, I agree with you.
bb
Mar 4 2022 at 3:34pm
David,
I don’t think that John Cochrane is qualified to make that argument. I don’t think many people are looking to him for guidance on this subject. And publicly advocating war with Russia, which could very easily result in nuclear war, is not something a serious person would do, unless that person is qualified to make that judgement. So no, I don’t think he is a serious person.
I’m happy to listen to what he has to say about financial markets though.
I agree with everything else you wrote.
Thanks for replying.
David Henderson
Mar 4 2022 at 4:20pm
You’re welcome.
I would just note that you’re coming awfully close (though, admittedly, not all the way) to saying that by definition a person who advocates war with Russia can’t be serious.
Jon Murphy
Mar 5 2022 at 6:57am
bb-
A lot of your point rests on the “qualified to make a judgement” standard. But who is qualified?
Several members of Congress have called for various acts of war against Putin (from no-fly zones to air raids on convoys in Ukraine). Given Congress participates in foreign policy decisions, saying they’re not qualified would seem incorrect.
National news foreign policy commentators have called for action. If they are not qualified, then the news media needs new commentators.
So, who is qualified?
bb
Mar 7 2022 at 8:51am
Jon,
I do think there are MOCs who are not serious, although I’m not inclined to dismiss Adam Kinzinger as unserious. Not sure who the others are. But MOCs routinely take unserious positions for political gain when they know their statements won’t be acted on. Not sure about the news commentators. I don’t watch much cable news, but what I have watched and read has been universally opposed to direct engagement. And I definitely think there are plenty of unserious new commentators.
That said, “No serious people” was probably an overstatement.
And I think people who spent their careers studying or working Russia, Eastern European Diplomacy, the Cold War, NATO… are qualified. So former NATO generals, diplomats, national security experts. Anne Applebaum, Fiona Hill for example. Who are the serious people calling for NFZ in your opinion?
bb
Mar 7 2022 at 8:14am
David,
What I’m trying to say is that war between the US and Russia comes with an existential risk that is not remote. Advocating for such dangerous action without the background and experience to make a highly informed judgement strikes me as reckless. Particularly when so many experts are lining up on the other side. But I see your point.
Pierre Lemieux
Mar 3 2022 at 11:49am
Great line!
David Henderson
Mar 3 2022 at 5:13pm
Thanks, Pierre.
I think I gave a talk at Latrobe College in Pennsylvania with that title, back in the 1990s.
Comments are closed.