In this post, I considered Ron DeSantis’ mixed bag of a statement about the war in Ukraine. I agreed with his view that the U.S. should not support regime change in Russia, but did not consider some of the comments he made in favor of that view. To these, I now turn.
DeSantis said that regime change in Russia would not “produce a pro-American, Madisonian constitutionalist in the Kremlin.” He added, “history indicates that Putin’s successor would likely be even more ruthless.” He did not point to any such history.
Let’s start with the “Madisonian constitutionalist” part. This is isn’t just a tired cliché, it’s irrelevant in the context of Russia. A new leader in the Kremlin wouldn’t need to be a Madisonian constitutionalist to be less significantly less autocratic than Putin.
Furthermore, a new leader could be just as autocratic as Putin — just as “ruthless,” to use DeSantis’ word — and still be a significant improvement from America’s perspective. I’m confident DeSantis would agree that what matters most to the U.S. is the Kremlin’s external policies, not what goes on inside of Russia.
Thus, the bit about “Madisonian constitutionalism” looks to me like another example of DeSantis throwing around language that will sound good to a particular wing of the GOP, but is largely meaningless.
To some extent, the same criticism applies to DeSantis’ point that regime would not produce a pro-American leader. We don’t really need a pro-American leader in the Kremlin. However, it would be desirable to have a new Russian leader who is less likely to invade his European neighbors and less hostile to America.
Would regime change produce such a leader? No one knows for sure. It’s likely, though, that a new Russian leader would be far less inclined than Putin to attack his neighbors. For one thing a new, younger leader would have probably have less nostalgia for the Soviet Union, whose demise as an imperial power Putin laments.
Moreover, assuming the kind of setback for Russia that might produce regime change, even a new leader who wanted Russia to expand would likely learn the lessons of a failed venture in Ukraine. We could expect that leader to focus on rebuilding Russia while assuring its citizens they won’t suffer the consequences of a future foreign misadventure.
A Russia that’s inwardly focused for decade or two would be a boon to Europe and America. Among other advatages, it would enable us to be more focused on China’s military threat.
Would a new Russian leader be more pro-American than Putin? The answer depends, I think, on what that leader and the people around him conclude about how best to preserve their power and rebuild the Russian economy.
It’s certainly possible that the new leader would see a close alignment with China as best serving his interests, those of his inner circle, and maybe even the Russian people. However, it seems at least as likely that the new leader, seeing the consequences of the West’s assault on the Russian economy and on its plutocrats, would want to patch things up with America — the leader of the anti-Putin alliance — to some degree.
Therefore, although we can’t expect regime change to produce a pro-American, Madisonian constitutionalist, there’s a good chance it would produce significant benefits for America. The main likely benefit would be a much less aggressive Russia, such that we could focus on defending against China, rather than defending on two fronts. And a possible benefit might be a Russia willing to align itself somewhat more closely with the West.
DeSantis claims, though, that history indicates a new Russian leader would be more ruthless than Putin. I don’t know what history the governor has in mind or what he means by “ruthless.” It’s possible that, within Russia, a new leader would be as ruthless Putin, though it’s hard to imagine one being significantly more so. But in all likelihood, a new leader — ruthless or not — wouldn’t repeat Putin’s hyper-aggressive foreign policies, if what happens on the ground in Ukraine shows these policies to be grave mistakes.
This is not to say that regime change should be a U.S. goal in the Ukraine war. As I said in my earlier post, we should not declare this to be our goal. Nor should the desirability of regime change influence any of the decisions we make about the war.
But regime change in Russia is desirable. It’s unfortunate that DeSantis went out of his way to deny this.
DeSantis on regime change in Russia
Can you f'ing Warmongering nut-cases stop calling for regime changes in other countries?
Who the F do you think you are?
Putins hyper-aggressive foreign policy tactics?
HAVE you seen the USA's foreign policy over the last 70 years????
You state that DeSantis makes statements without support then proceed to do the same same. I’m interested in his thoughts and can follow up on my own. I’m not really interested in yours.