I understand that Biden has about as much to do with directing U.S. foreign policy as Humpty Dumpty or the Man in the Moon. Nonetheless, the semi-secret cabal of supposed experts who will run things for another 40-odd days does so in the name of Joe Biden, which makes Biden a convenient shorthand for “those in charge.” And “those in charge” clearly mean to undermine the Trump team as it assumes responsibility for our national security on Jan. 20. There’s no better example of this than Biden’s recently announced final military aid package for Ukraine and the lifting of restrictions on the use of U.S.-supplied missiles. We’ve been told by no less than Trump himself that he has a plan for Ukraine, a plan that will end the current bloody stalemate and re-establish peace and stability in Eastern Europe. There’s been much speculation concerning the outlines of such a plan. The article by Armando Simon The American Spectator represents a vision that I would like to see realized, although I recognize that there’s a good dose of wishful thinking involved. (READ MORE: Trump Will Force a Compromise on Ukraine) Moreover, we’ve been treated to all sorts of optimism in the wake of the informal “summit” that accompanied the re-opening of Notre Dame this past week. One hopes that all the smiles and handshakes bespeak a willingness on the part of European leaders to put aside the snark that marked their response to the first Trump administration. Perhaps this time they might try to work with the leadership that he seems more than willing to provide. Some of them, Giorgia Meloni for one, appear ready to get on board. (READ MORE: Trump and the Advent of the Pax Americana) The Setup One can hope for many good things but hope scarcely makes for success in foreign policy. The most important of “Murphy’s Laws of Combat,” truly, the one that underlies almost all the others, is that “the enemy always gets a vote.” The same is true of foreign and national security policy, even — no, especially — when we exaggerate our power to shape the problems we face. The abiding sin of U.S. foreign policy since the end of the Cold War has been hubris, the conviction that our power and influence enable us to bend a recalcitrant world to our wishes. Even when we choose to withdraw behind our ocean “moats,” comforting ourselves with the notion that we are too big and too strong to need friends and allies, the world has a way of intruding — think Pearl Harbor, or 9/11, or any of a dozen other assaults on our way of life. We have, of course, too often foolishly engaged in “wars of choice,” but there have also been times when war has chosen us. So forgive me if I offer the suspicion that, with the best will in the world on the part of the new administration, the war in Ukraine will likely end very badly, and not just for the Ukrainians. The assumption that Putin wants a peace that the Ukrainians can live with beggars belief. Even if, as some believe, an opportunity existed several years ago for a negotiated peace, too much Russian blood has been spilled for Putin to accept anything less than the humiliation of Ukraine — and too much Ukrainian blood has been spent to accept it. The best the Ukrainians might hope for would be a frozen border, something akin to the Cold War’s “Finlandization” or the DMZ between the Koreas. More likely is a return to the situation that existed after 2014, a return to hybrid warfare, with “little green men” running rampant in the contested border areas. Given the predictable residual bitterness, Ukraine might also respond with its own “little green men.” Such persistent low-level conflict might be the best that the world can expect. Just as likely would be the disintegration of Ukraine into warring factions. Proportionally, Ukraine has paid an even higher price in blood and treasure than Russia, with massive casualties and infrastructure laid waste by repeated missile and drone attacks. We can comfort ourselves with the notion that an exhausted country will readily accept peace and simply go about the business of rebuilding. But history suggests that there will be bitter-enders who will refuse to accept this outcome, who will rebel against those who “surrendered.” Think of what happened in the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia, but magnified enormously. Or think about the thirst for vengeance that destroyed Weimar Germany and opened a path to a renewed and wider war. The Trap One way or another, this could get very ugly very quickly, and, even with the best will in the world and the best strategy for achieving peace, the Trump administration could well find itself contending with something akin to Afghanistan. No American troops, one would hope, although this begs the question of who else might police the line between Russia and Ukraine. Let’s at least hope we’d not allow ourselves to be drawn into that version of American “boots on the ground.” But a failed peace, particularly one to which our president has attached his name and our nation’s prestige, is not going to go down well. Herein lies the trap that Biden now seems to be laying for Trump. Since the election, and with much fanfare, Biden lifted restrictions on the use of the long-ish missiles we’ve supplied to Ukraine, enabling their use against bases from which the Russians have launched some of their most devastating attacks. Only days ago, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced a nearly $1 billion military aid package for Ukraine, while emphasizing that, since Putin’s invasion, the U.S. has provided some $62 billion in military aid. Since World War II, we’ve been treated, repeatedly, to bitter debates along the lines of “who lost” this or that country or interest. Who lost China, or Cuba, or Vietnam, or Iran, or Iraq, or Afghanistan? Time and again, these questions have been used to browbeat whichever American leader could somehow be blamed for an outcome nobody wanted. When everything goes awry and, “Who lost Ukraine?” becomes the complaint du jour, the Biden team is laying a foundation to shift the blame to Trump. As Democrats look ahead to 2028, a matchup perhaps with Vance, they are certainly recalling how the disastrous ending to our Afghanistan involvement marked the turning point in the American public’s perception of Biden’s competence as a president. They would love to turn the tables. They will say, “We did everything we could to save Ukraine.” They will trot out the list of all the weapons supplied, they will highlight all the billions provided. “Not our fault,” they will insist. “Trump owns this one. He promised peace, and brought catastrophe instead.” As the Afghanistan example makes clear, while the American people rightly disdain involvement in foreign wars, they also react angrily to any perception of national embarrassment — and they are quick to punish perceived failures. Avoiding the Trap But if failure looms in Ukraine, its most notable author will be Joe Biden. Every dollar of U.S. assistance has come with paralyzing strings attached or has been released and delivered long after it could have achieved decisive results. As one example, the Danes and the Dutch were eager to donate their F-16 fighter jets (fabricated in Belgium, not the U.S.), but the Biden administration dragged its feet about allowing this to go forward. Furthermore, as the Trump team takes up the burden of dealing with the mess they’ve been handed in Ukraine, they would do well to point out just how behindhanded Biden’s support for Ukraine has been. While the $62 billion might well have been spent on other priorities — hurricane relief comes to mind — it pales beside so much else the Biden administration has spent foolishly. By one estimate Biden has already spent some $620 billion on student debt cancellation, almost precisely ten times the military assistance sent to Ukraine. The Trump team might also point to the billions in military equipment abandoned to the Taliban Or they might offer context in the form of a comparison with what other countries have done. As a percentage of GDP, the U.S. contribution to the Ukrainian war effort lags far behind the Baltic and Scandinavian states, and Poland. One might dismiss this as reflecting their status as “frontline states” facing the Russian threat, but the Netherlands. On a dollar basis, even the much-maligned Germans have outspent us. Again, of course, I’m speaking here as a percentage of GDP — in absolute terms, the U.S. has spent far more. But these percentages strongly suggest that when the dark times come, as they likely will, neither Biden nor whatever Democrat wishes to become president in 2028 should be allowed to wrap themselves in the Ukrainian flag. The best outcome might have been peace built upon a humiliating defeat for Putin’s aggression, but that ship sailed a long time ago, with Biden standing uselessly in the pilot house. There are hard days ahead for the Ukrainians. There are also hard days for President Trump as he tries to fulfill his promise to bring a fair and just peace in Ukraine. History never offers a “clean slate,” and, inevitably, the pursuit of peace in Ukraine will be burdened by the repeated failures of the Biden administration. Part of making a good start, however, will require an honest accounting of these failures, and an adamant refusal to allow last-minute grandstanding by Biden to claim the narrative on the Democrat’s behalf. James H. McGee retired in 2018 after nearly four decades as a national security and counter-terrorism professional, working primarily in the nuclear security field. Since retiring, he’s begun a second career as a thriller writer. His recent novel, Letter of Reprisal, tells the tale of a desperate mission to destroy a Chinese bioweapon facility hidden in the heart of the central African conflict region. A forthcoming sequel finds the Reprisal team fighting against terrorists who’ve infiltrated our southern border in a conspiracy that ranges across the globe. You can find Letter of Reprisal on Amazon in both Kindle and paperback editions and on Kindle Unlimited. READ MORE from James H. 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