America’s Fleeting Chance to Resume Leadership
The United States can't be the “indispensable nation” if it doesn't lead in Ukraine.
SENATORS, BOTH REPUBLICANS AND DEMOCRATS, made an important start yesterday when they voted 67 to 32 to advance legislation that would free up $95 billion in military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. It was, to be sure, just a preliminary, procedural vote. The Senate still needs to pass the bill, and even then it faces long odds in the House of Representatives. But the Senate vote was an overdue step to stop the disastrous downhill slide in American power and influence in the world. The United States faces a choice: to resume its role as what Secretary of State Madeleine Albright called the “indispensable nation,” or to sit by and watch the world become more dangerous for us and our allies.
Opinions vary on when American global leadership began to wane. Some will point to the Vietnam era; others to the post-9/11 wars; still others to the Obama administration’s effort to “lead from behind.” Then there was Donald Trump’s “America first” approach, which actually meant “America alone.”
President Joe Biden got off on the wrong foot on foreign policy in 2021. Even those who felt it made sense to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan can now agree it was done too abruptly, leaving our Afghan allies at the mercy of a Taliban takeover. But then in 2022, the president changed course. Through 2022 and into 2023, the United States took the lead, inspiring and encouraging the world to support Ukraine as it fought off Vladimir Putin’s brutal, unprovoked invasion. Washington got the ball rolling with military aid and intelligence sharing, and soon our allies in Europe and elsewhere were following suit.
Former Soviet-bloc countries in Central and Eastern European were among the first and most enthusiastic, but France and Germany quickly joined in. Emboldened by American rhetoric and determination, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was the first Group of Seven leader to travel to wartime Kyiv. Countries across Europe volunteered to send weapons to Ukraine. Germany announced a historic Zeitenwende, or turning point, promising to oppose Putin with sharply increased military spending. Two long-neutral Scandinavian nations, Finland and Sweden, applied to join NATO. Even pacifist Japan found ways to contribute to the war effort.
This international outpouring provided a critical lifeline for Ukraine, but also marked an important resurgence of American global leadership. This wasn’t militant unilateralism or mealy-mouthed multilateralism. Without putting a single American soldier in danger, the United States rallied the free world to the defense of a sovereign democracy beset by a murderous dictator.
But having mustered its friends and allies to a noble cause, the United States began to flag. Military aid slowed. Polls showed waning voter interest. A growing number of Republicans denounced American support for Kyiv. Several proposed packages of aid stalled or died on Capitol Hill, forcing Ukrainian troops to ration ammunition. The world took notice: Washington was committed to providing just enough aid to stop Russia from winning, but not enough to enable Ukraine to win.
By midsummer 2023, our European allies began to outstrip us, providing more aid than we had committed to support the Ukrainian war effort.
According to the Germany-based Kiel Institute for the World Economy, by October 2023 the European Union had spent more than $90 billion on military, humanitarian, and financial aid for wartime Ukraine. Individual EU member states had spent an additional $55 billion, and the United Kingdom had contributed $14 billion. That’s a total of nearly $160 billion from Europe, more than double the $77 billion from the United States.
Viewed as a percentage of GDP, America’s contribution to the war effort lagged behind that of Norway, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Denmark, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Finland, Sweden, Germany, Croatia, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands. When the Kiel Institute releases updated numbers next week, the United States, which has sent nothing since the end of 2023, will likely fall even farther behind. We are no longer carrying our fair share of the burden.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz reflected this shift in an article in the Wall Street Journal this week, just as the Senate was tying itself in knots over providing additional aid. “Others around the world are watching closely,” Scholz warned. “We must continue to move in a strategic lockstep on both sides of the Atlantic.”
Former President Trump bases his appeal on a promise to make America great again. But in fact, everything he says about Ukraine and NATO suggests a retreat from the world and from American greatness. No one in Europe will follow our lead if we abandon Ukraine. Withdrawing from NATO, as Trump has long threatened, would only isolate us further. The Western world is going in the other direction—not retreating but uniting and reasserting its combined strength.
Can we make America great again? Can we lead the world, advancing order and security and democratic values? That’s what will be at issue in the Senate and House in the coming days. The Senate has taken a first step in the right direction, but it’s only the beginning of the resolve that’s needed.