Ukraine Is Redefining America’s Interests
In the short six months between the fall of Kabul and the invasion of Ukraine, the triumph of one idea was eclipsed by the appearance of another. The wars that followed 9/11 ended for Americans on August 31, 2021. They ended with relief and bitterness and the sense that the United States would now have to learn restraint—that we lacked the ability, the will, and the means to involve ourselves in the affairs of other countries. Pax Americana was over, and so was the 20 Years’ War, and now it was time to turn inward and address our own considerable problems. After all, who were we, with our political rot, our social conflicts, and our COVID disaster, to act as a leader of anything to anyone?
This view was widespread across the political firmament. The progressive version leaned pacifist, the reactionary version was nationalist, and in the center a new “realism”—a
