Only One Adult Left in the Room

Like it or not, we all depend on Russia keeping its cool after Washington’s latest escalation

It’s official now: Although incredibly busy with not noticing Israel crossing every “red line” in every book while it is close to completing eight months of its US-sponsored genocide of the Palestinians (and promising at least seven more), President Joe Biden has made some time to get us all a little closer to World War III. His administration has announced that it is now officially and explicitly allowing Ukraine to use American weapons to strike inside Russia.

It is true that this new policy (at least in its openness) comes with a caveat, for now: Kiev, Washington is trying to reassure us, will “only” be permitted to use American weapons for “counter-fire purposes,” that is, to go after Russian targets on Russian territory if those targets are close to the border and involved in the fighting inside Ukraine. The Kharkov/Kharkiv region, where Russia launched a fresh if limited offensive three weeks ago, serves as a de facto precedent for this approach. Ukraine, so the White House, will still not be allowed to fire American ATACM missiles deep into Russia. (Britain, by the way, has never officially revoked its permission to do so with its Storm Shadow missiles.) But that attempt to contain the political – and perhaps in the not so long run, literal – fall-out from this American escalation offers scant comfort. And as far as it may, that will actually depend most of all on Russia, about which more below.