To Be or Not to Be at War:

The United States Role in the Russo-Ukrainian War as History of the Cuban Missile Crisis Perceives It to Be

Luis Sidney N. Mariano

Edited by Luis Sidney N. Mariano

Introduction

The war in Ukraine has affected all countries in the world. It was on February 24, 2022, that Russia finally invaded the land of Ukraine to prevent it from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) (Psaropoulos, 2022). Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky allied with the U.S. and Europe, which explained the continuous economic sanctions and aid of military arms. The U.S. is not directly participating in the war to avoid the possibility of another world war. For one, the U.S. government is polarized — some wanted them to enter the war and some argued that it is not a valuable investment (Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2022).

Thus, this paper will try to relate the U.S.’s positive actions toward Ukraine to the Cuban missile crisis, wherein the U.S. and Russia also had a confrontation. This research is divided into two parts: (1) the status quo and the possibility of nuclear war and (2) the lessons brought by the Cuban missile crisis.

Russia’s Perspective

The Russian government needs to win this war more than anything else — it goes with security, domination, and ideology. With the U.S. being the most powerful country in the world (Most Powerful Countries, 2022), Russia wanted to reclaim what they have lost during the Cold War and the Soviet Union (Elsherbiny, 2022). Russia would not just allow the U.S. to have control over Ukraine, whose geographical location is 4,663 kilometers away from them. Ukraine is a key factor in Russia’s dream of regional hegemony (Wilson, 2017). If the U.S. has a close relationship with Ukraine, the former could easily place their military arms in their region. Additionally, there is also the issue of ideological warfare, which is democracy against fascism (Hiro, 2020). President Vladimir Putin is scared that the Russians will be influenced by the Western values of freedom, liberty, and diversity (Elsherbiny, 2022). Such values could overthrow his position in power.

The U.S. and Allies’ Perspective

The U.S. and its allies’ deterrence of Russia is enough as of now but the war is still unpredictable (History.com Editors, 2020). The war in Ukraine means world peace and domination of the West for the U.S. If Russia won over Ukraine, the NATO members would be threatened with their safety as well (Elsherbiny, 2022). These are the reasons why they continue to fight the fight that is not theirs in the first place. Many care about this campaign against Russia, U.S. major political parties have come together for public policy, and major companies in the U.S. and Europe are stopping sales in Russia (VOA News, 2022; Elsherbiny, 2022). They are not participating directly hoping that this would not tempt Russia into going full-scale (Bauer, 2022; Elsherbiny, 2022; Albert & Baitei, 2022). On the other hand, Russia also has its help coming from China and Turkey (Elsherbiny, 2022). However, China has a crucial role, being the second most powerful country. Its decision can make or break the Russo-Ukrainian War.

The Russo-Ukrainian War’s Fruition

If the war goes on, there could only be one end: nuclear war. Russia was firm when it said that it would invade Ukraine and that other countries should not intervene in this. As such, fighting alongside Ukraine using military men would not sit right with Russia. President Putin said so himself (Elsherbiny, 2022), “We were ready to put nuclear weapons on alert.” Yehuda Bauer (2022) assessed President Putin with Joseph Staling, saying they both have indifference toward morality at the expense of power. Russia’s threat is real, more so their nuclear weapons (Bauer, 2022); at the same time, the U.S. and France have a nuclear arsenal ready for take-off (Elsherbiny, 2022; Arms Control Association, 2022). If worse comes to worst, the Russo-Ukrainian War will turn into a cold war, there will be two alliances of nation-states: West (America and Europe) and the East (China, Russia, India, Middle East, Africa, Latin America, and some parts of Europe) (Bauer, 2022; Elsherbiny, 2022). Without precaution, this would mean the end of the world and the death of humanity.

Lesson 1: Deterrence and Foresight

During the Cuban missile crisis, all the U.S. had was nuclear deterrence against Russia, but foresight might have prevented them from reaching the climax early on (Blight et al., 1987). The U.S. understood that deterrence is complex and played by the various groups comprising the nation (Sherwin, 2020). One wrong move and the Soviet Union would have fired the missiles from Cuba and the U.S. would retaliate and so on. The reason why the Cuban missile crisis had a different ending was because of President John F. Kennedy’s knack for diplomacy and for not succumbing to the heat of the moment (Sherwin, 2020; Blight et al., 1987). With foresight, he examined all possible alternatives just to prevent a possible nuclear war and he did so successfully.

The best route for the U.S. is to avoid another world war (Blight et al., 1987; Weldes, 1999; White, 2002). Currently, the U.S. is no longer superior when it comes to nuclear arsenal (Blight et al., 1987); Russia has the highest number of nuclear stockpiles 6,257 (Arms Control Association, 2022). Although Russia would not want them to get involved with Ukraine, the U.S. could not watch and tend to Russia’s requests, they still need to reprimand Russia for their actions (Sherwin, 2020; Blight et al., 1987). Not only that, the U.S.’s power is inhibited by their principles of peace and democracy and what they would like in front of NATO members if they ever sent troops to Ukraine (Weldes, 1999; Sherwin, 2020). Hence, if the U.S. is willing to let go of Cuba at the time of world peace, they will have to do it again in Ukraine (Sherwin, 2020; Beauchamp, 2022). The risks are far too high (losing more lives). The U.S. is better off on the sidelines of this war and let Russia seize Ukraine.

Lesson 2: National Interest

Having a clear definition of what national interest means guided the success of the Cuban missile crisis. Weldes (1999) argued, “National interests are social constructions [formed by a series of representations].” Back then, the U.S. did not remove the missiles in Cuba placed by the Russians and settled for a naval blockade instead. The U.S.’s national interest could be defined as the purveyor of freedom and democracy. Henceforth, the U.S. needed to respect the national interest of Cuba as they are also a sovereign state. It is important to have a commitment and credibility toward their national interest in times of war (Weldes, 1999).

In terms of the Russo-Ukrainian War, the U.S. and other allies’ national interest is for the independence of Ukraine. Russia’s authoritarianism, NATO’s interest, and the role of the U.S. are things to consider whenever a country should assess its stance on the war. Moreover, the sanctions and deterrence are only schemes to buy more time to negotiate with Russia (Ryan et al., 2022). The Russian government has no response to this and remains to be distant and cold (Crowley & Shear, 2022). It is important to note that negotiations in the context of “national interest” will be the U.S.’s greatest arsenal to protect against world war, if not, end Russia’s invasion.

Conclusion

The U.S. and its allies’s help to sanction Russia is strategic for their end and Ukraine. In such a way they can advance their security and reprimand Russia for their violence and greed. However, if Russia continues to pursue Ukraine and succeeds at that, the U.S. should let Ukraine do its bidding in order to prevent more escalation of war.

In the counterfactual, Russia might get Ukraine and decide to attack other NATO members who have moved against them. The U.S. and allies should immediately respond to Russia even if it meant having to use nuclear weapons. Here, other countries who believe in the virtue of independence should come together and shatter Russia into pieces.

Despite having these predictions, the Russo-Ukrainian War is still uncertain. The U.S. should continue deterrence, have various options in the future, and think of national interest first when interacting with Russia.

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Sidney Mariano is a loud and proud public administration student from the University of the Philippines Diliman. Currently, he has been competing in various local debate tournaments as part of the UP Debate Society. His greatest goal in life — is to be a public servant and a lawyer — and maybe a writer wannabe on the side. So far on his journey, he has received highly treasured accolades both in academics and extracurricular activities.