Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, relatively few in the Western commentariat have been willing to call for the United States to engage in direct war against Moscow. The reasons for this caution are obvious β Russia is a nuclear state, and has a military that, its recent underperformance notwithstanding, is still vastly more formidable than any recent target of U.
Yet despite β or perhaps because of β this general resistance to direct U. In spite of its innocuous and legalistic name, the Biden administration soundly rejected this proposal as its enforcement would rather obviously entail shooting down Russian aircraft, which in turn would lead to a wider war.
More recently, as the danger of a global food crisis made worse by the loss of grain exports from Ukraine and Russia has increased, new calls have emerged for the United States and allies to use naval power to ensure that Ukrainian grain can safely transit the Black Sea. Similar to demands for a no-fly zone, these ideas have been wrapped in humanitarian language. But in reality, they amount to a call for highly risky U. While these proposals vary in detail, all invoke the rhetoric of humanitarian intervention to justify and legitimize the action.
The Wall Street Journal calls for a U. Compared to the invasion of Iraq, these proposals have a much greater claim to humanitarian purpose. The growing global food crisis, exacerbated both by sanctions and the Russian blockade, threatens to cause famine and other dire consequences especially in the Middle East and North Africa.
A naval escort, however, would by definition require significant military forces, both to carry out demining operations and to wield a serious threat of retaliation against any Russian attacks on shipping. While this tension may have been possible to ignore when intervening in failed states or against far weaker powers with limited ability to retaliate, to do so would be far more perilous in this case.
