Why the US Is Threatening to Send Cluster Bombs to Ukraine
By: George Friedman
U.S. President Joe Biden announced last week that Washington will give Ukraine cluster bombs, adding with apparent emotion that the decision was enormously difficult for him to make.
In general, presidents don’t make weapons transfer announcements, although on occasion they approve them.
Usually, such statements are left to lesser figures in the Defense Department who reveal as little as possible on the nature of the weapons or the reasons for the delivery.
Certainly, they do not indulge public agony.
Having never seen Biden do this before, we must consider what may be going on here.
In my view, this is part of the maneuvering over a termination of the war.
There is little evidence of U.S.-Russian meetings or calls over Ukraine.
The Russians need to end the war, but they can’t do so in a way that appears to be a defeat.
This is the case with participants in most wars, but given the Wagner Group’s attempted coup, the serious doubts about senior Russian military officials’ commitment to the Russian leadership and questions over what exactly is happening in Moscow, bringing the war to an end is a delicate matter.
On the American side, the war does not strike at the heart of the republic.
Unlike in other conflicts, no body bags have flown into Dover Air Force Base, removing the urgency to end the war, although its financial costs have perturbed some.
On the other hand, the president is running for reelection and his poll numbers do not provide much hope at the moment.
Bringing a war to a successful conclusion is something any president in his position would want.
This creates a little more than the normal amount of urgency to conclude the conflict.
The Russians cannot come away from it with nothing more than dead soldiers.
They are under political pressure both to end the conflict and to show that the troops did not die in vain.
The war was fought to take Ukraine, deepen Russia’s strategic depth and place Russian troops on the border of NATO.
The Americans supported Ukraine to prevent all this from happening and to demonstrate their will to preserve Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
Russia obviously can’t get all of Ukraine, but President Vladimir Putin needs to come away with part of it.
However, even if Washington and Kyiv would accept a partition, there is no logical, defendable line separating eastern Ukraine from western Ukraine.
The most likely area that Ukraine might concede is the Donbas along the eastern border with Russia.
It is heavily populated by ethnic Russians, and Russia had a presence in that region before the war.
The problem is that Moscow would be ending the war pretty much where it started.
This type of concession wouldn’t give Russia a deep strategic presence in Ukraine, and though Putin could still claim a stunning victory, no one would believe him.
Putin is in a tough spot and must change the dynamic of the negotiations.
He needs a convincing military victory both to end the war on his terms and to justify its initiation to the Russian public.
There is a great deal of evidence that the Russians are readying a massive assault to block the Ukrainian counteroffensive and drive deep into the country.
Though previous Russian offensives generally had less success than required, this one must be effective.
Russia has one real advantage this time.
The troops they field will not be from the Wagner Group, seasoned soldiers notwithstanding.
They will likely be troops from the regular army under the leadership of commanders answerable to the Russian General Staff.
There will be a mixed bag of experience, but it has been a long war, and Russia needs fresh troops as well as experienced ones.
On the Ukrainian side, Ukrainian troops have fought well, but they are tired and their reserves are limited.
From the American point of view, the war must end now through a negotiated settlement.
That is the only way the Russians will accept the kind of conclusion the U.S. and Ukraine need.
Washington needs a settlement for domestic reasons, particularly to sway voters, many of whom are either dubious about the war or simply oppose it.
If the Russian offensive shatters Ukrainian defenses, or even if it just massively dents them, these voters will be even more unconvinced by the necessity of U.S. support for Ukraine’s war effort.
The U.S. simply isn’t certain that the Ukrainians aren’t exhausted.
Hence the cluster bombs and Biden’s angst.
If the Russians attack under the pressure of cluster bombs, they will suffer massive casualties, and the force might simply be shattered.
In any case, the Russians will have lost their last chance at creating a peace negotiation where they can force the needed concessions.
Thus, the presidential promise of delivering cluster bombs, anguish aside, was intended both to force the Russians into negotiations and to minimize their demands.
The Russians might miss a statement about U.S. arms support by a military officer, but they can’t ignore a presidential threat.
The one thing left uncertain for me is the quality of the U.S. intelligence that says Russia has few or no cluster bombs, and that it might turn its nuclear bluff into reality.
Biden doesn’t plan to lose, whatever that means to him, and neither does Putin.
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