Put America First by Aiding Ukraine

Neo-isolationists on the right and left dismiss Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as of little consequence to the U.S. To them, it’s a territorial dispute between faraway countries. Some even allege that America is largely responsible for the war: By encouraging democracy’s spread in Eastern Europe, the U.S. unnerved Vladimir Putin. It’s understandable, they say, that the dictator then unleashed his military to subjugate Ukraine.

That’s claptrap. Mr. Putin could have lived in peace with a democratic Ukraine just as Russia has coexisted for decades with neighboring democracies Finland and Norway. And the latter was one of the founding members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The blame for this war’s death and destruction lies squarely with the man in the Kremlin. It was Mr. Putin’s ambition to reconstruct Russia’s imperial empire that led Russia to seize Crimea in 2014 and invade the rest of Ukraine more than a year ago.