A vote for Biden is a vote for the extreme radical left – The Ukrainian Weekly

Joe Biden has a history of failed races for president, having run in 1988 and gotten two delegates and in 2008, when he dropped out after a fifth-place finish in the Iowa Caucuses with less than 1 percent of the vote. 
Yet, today Mr. Biden is the Democratic Party’s nominee after all other contenders incredibly withdrew just before “Super Tuesday.” Did Mr. Biden make a Faustian bargain with the extreme radical left of what once was the Democratic Party?

This is not conjecture – read the 110-page “Biden-Sanders Unity Task Force Recom­men­dations,” a socialist manifesto that Mr. Biden signed with Sen. Sanders, the successor to another failed “Socialist Democrat” for president, Eugene V. Debs. The Biden-Sanders manifesto is every bit as radical as Mr. Sanders wanted. In May, Mr. Biden vowed that he wants “not just to rebuild the economy, but to transform it.” (The Wall Street Journal, “The Biden-Sanders Manifes­to,” July 30). The world has seen what a “transformed economy” looks like in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and the Soviet Union.

The unity manifesto envisions an all-encompassing welfare state with every need guaranteed by taxpayer funding. Thus, no one should pay more than 30 percent of their income for housing. Public colleges should be “tuition free” for about 80 percent of the American people, including those here illegally. Student loans all become null and void. But, what if you happened to pay off your loans last year after 10 or 15 years of payments? Too bad, sucker. 
And, there’s “Medicare for All.” What about those who worked to age 65, contributed to the system and finally receive Medicare? Too bad, get in line for medical care if you can find it with those who contributed zero, including the millions of illegals. Did our grandparents and parents flee from the shackles of Socialism and Communism only to have a repeat performance in the United States? I know as certainly as there is God that this will not happen if the truth is known.

The choice between President Donald Trump and Vice-President Biden could not be clearer for all Americans, but especially for Ukrainian Americans who have the future of two countries at stake. Let’s look at what a Biden-Harris administration would mean for Ukraine.

Mr. Biden was not just vice-president, he was the “point man” on two countries that affect U.S. national security: Ukraine and China.  He failed miserably on both counts. The fact that Mr. Biden traveled to Ukraine frequently, some might say too frequently,  does not make him a supporter of Ukraine any more than it qualifies him to be an airline pilot. The question is what did he do or fail to do  with his portfolio for Ukraine? The answer is simple – he did nothing. To suggest that he was somehow muzzled by President Barack Obama  in what he could do begs the question, for they both did nothing in the face of the largest military assault against a sovereign European nation since World War II.

The invasion of Ukraine in 2014 violated every international treaty regarding Europe that Russia had signed since 1948, including,  most notably, the Budapest Memorandum of 1995. The Obama/Biden response was to direct U.S. forces in Europe to stand down, with NATO also following.  Whether the Budapest Memorandum was a treaty or not is irrelevant, because it was an agreement by the United States of America to stand by Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
 Obama/Biden are equally culpable for the disgrace of the United States in failing to live by its word and agreement.  I certainly know of no other instance where the United States has willfully ignored an agreement like the Budapest Memoran­dum.  After 2014, Obama/Biden refused to give or sell any defensive lethal weapons to Ukraine on the basis that to do so would only escalate  the Russia-Ukraine War. How can you escalate a war when your enemy has hundreds of tanks on your territory?

Ukraine will again get nothing under a Biden presidency because his new boss is Mr. Sanders, the honeymooner of Moscow. In 2017, the bill providing Ukraine with Javelin missiles passed the House by 419-3.  In the Senate, the vote was 97-2. Sen. Sanders voted “No.”

President Trump signed the bill and provided 210 Javelin missiles and 37 launchers. This is but one of a long list of actions taken by President Trump in support of a free, independent and sovereign Ukraine as an ally of the United States. In 2018, Mr. Trump authorized an additional 150 Javelin missiles and 10 launchers. He also signed and authorized $250 million of military assistance to Ukraine under the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) over and above the missiles. 

In 2019, he authorized the supply of Harpoon missiles to Ukraine, along with an additional $300 million under the NDAA for military defense.  That year, U.S. and NATO countries participated with Ukraine’s military in “Operation Rapid Trident.” President Trump has also publicly condemned Germany for its support for Nord Stream 2, a potential death knell for Ukraine’s energy sector.

In 2020, President Trump announced the relocation of 8,000 U.S. troops from Germany to Poland, which accomplished two strategic objectives: bringing U.S. troops and supplies physically closer to Ukraine and pressuring the NATO-delinquent Germans to act like a responsible member of the alliance.  Recently, the Department of Defense announced that Ukraine will acquire three batteries of RK-360MC Neptune coastal defense systems with R-360 cruise missiles, and the State Department recently cleared Ukraine to acquire 16 Mark VI patrol boats and gear worth $600 million. The U.S. is refurbishing Campia Turzii in Romania as a hub for U.S. Air Force operations. And, in a big slap in the face to Vladimir Putin, the U.S. will be upgrading a former Soviet naval base in Romania as a safe harbor for NATO vessels and Ukraine’s Navy in the Black Sea. Since Romania is a NATO member and shares a border with Ukraine, the importance to Ukraine’s Air Force and Navy cannot be overstated.

Mr. Trump has claimed, to ridicule, that he has helped Ukraine more than any other president. In fact, the record shows he has done more for the military defense of Ukraine than all U.S. presidents since 1991 combined. This compares to former Vice-President Biden who supporters say is a “friend of Ukraine” – yet, the Biden-Sanders manifesto does not mention the word “Ukraine” even once in 110 pages. As the saying goes, with friends like Joe Biden, who needs enemies? 

Bohdan Shandor is an attorney, President of the Ukrainian American Bar Association (1982-84 and 2019-2020) and a Member of Ukrainian Americans for Trump. He may be reached at [email protected] 

* "Monte Rosa", Memoir of an Accidental Spy, by Jaroslaw Martyniuk. Xlibris, decembre 2017.