America sleeps as Putin succeeds

The late Charlie Munger, who with longtime friend Warren Buffett turned Berkshire Hathaway into a behemoth, attributed his investment successes to his ability to pay sustained attention. "I did not succeed in life by intelligence," Munger recounted. "I succeeded because I have a long attention span." Americans are notorious for having a short attention span. And it happens we have a president who knows and cares less about history than anyone who has ever come close to occupying the Oval Office, let alone actually occupied it. Donald Trump's inattention to history, combined with an insistence on appeasing Vladimir Putin, now jeopardizes not only the freedom of Ukrainians but also the security of Europe more broadly. One of the great cons for which Trump will be remembered is his claim that he is an expert "dealmaker," and knew just how to end the war launched by Russia against Ukraine in 2022. Turns out that Trump's plan for ending the war was cutting off the U.S. military assistance Ukraine desperately needs to defend itself against Russia. Last week, Trump announced that he will be withholding air defense systems, artillery rounds, missiles and other key items from Ukraine. A Putin spokesman promptly announced his fervent approval and the reason for that approval: "The fewer weapons are supplied to Ukraine, the closer the end of (Russia's) military operation." Exactly. The less able Ukraine is to defend itself, the better Russia's chances of coercing it into capitulation. Hours after Trump had his latest phone call with Putin, with whom The Great Dealmaker professes ad infinitum to have a fabulous relationship, Russia set a new record for overnight drone strikes against Ukrainian civilians. It took no particular brilliance for Putin to understand at the moment his choice for U.S. president was elected last November that when it came to his military campaign to chew Ukraine up and swallow it, both Trump and time were on his side. Trump, whose identification with totalitarians is, well, total, is as ardent a booster of the ex-KGB agent as exists on the planet. Not to put too fine a point on it, Trump is happy to have Putin get what he wants, and what Putin wants -- for now -- is Ukraine. Putin therefore knew that Trump, who has been explicit about his intention to abandon Ukraine were he to retake the presidency, would cut or terminate the vital American military aid required by Ukraine to defend itself. And so he has. Disdainful of democracy and those who support it, Trump has regularly belittled Ukraine's right to be free of Russian aggression. His Oval Office humiliation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier this year was intended in part to send the message to MAGA World that we are done with Ukraine. Message received, not only in MAGA World but in Europe, whose governments confront domestic crises of the kind that turn citizens inward. Those governments recognize that they must step up their own efforts to check Russia, but face dwindling support for Ukraine, especially where the U.S. administration has made clear that it is going Full Appeasement. Even Poland, which shares a border with Russia and is especially familiar with Russia's historical designs on Eastern Europe, has seen a sharp drop in its citizens' willingness to extend themselves on Ukraine's behalf. A survey taken by Poland's Market Research Institute in late June found that almost half of Poles believe that both economic and military aid to Ukraine should either be reduced or terminated altogether. This is a far cry from the avid support for Ukraine in Poland when Russia first invaded -- and it is music to Vladimir Putin's ears. Riven by a demagogue who threatens democracy at home and hollowed out by the rise of cruel and crude extremism on both the left and the right, Americans have lost the thread. Putin, an amoral tyrant, seeks to subjugate the Ukrainians, who want only self-determination and a democracy. This isn't moral rocket science; whose side America should be on is not obscure. But we are not paying attention, and there are going to be consequences -- historic ones -- that we or those who come after us will regret if we do not snap to. Jeff Robbins is an attorney specializing in the First Amendment and a longtime columnist for the Boston Herald, writing on politics, national security, human rights and the Mideast. Editor's note: Late Monday, Trump reversed course and said the U.S. must send more weapons to Ukraine.