If there’s one guy who can provide David French a move for his money as the self-absorbed “principled Christian” who’s truly a cankerous plague on the liberal movement as a whole, it’s the editor-in-chief of Christianity Today — Russell Moore.
We’ve chronicled Moore’s spiritual bankruptcy some times here at The Federalist, from his unwillingness to observe the overturning of Roe v. Wade because Trump achieved it to his development of program propaganda during the Covid-19 pandemic and his involvement in the push for amnesty for illegal aliens.
In brief, he’s an oafish clown no one should appear to for moral or social assistance. Though amusing to insult, dimwits can be harmful to the health of people discourse when they manage to neglect forward into a position of prominence and begin to believe that they really earned that spot.
No fear believing that his “expertise” gives him the right to post on such things, Moore decided to weigh in on the ongoing work by President Donald Trump to broker a peace deal in the Russo-Ukraine War with a bit condescendingly titled,” The Spiritual Cost of Slaughtering Ukraine”. Moore, an unrepentant Never Trumper, wasted no time equating Trump’s attempts to bring both sides to the table to end this destructive three-year war with “abandoning Ukraine”.
” As many have noted, the geopolitical, military, and diplomatic costs of attacking allies and appeasing enemies are incalculable. As American Christians, though, we should also consider the moral cost of abandoning Ukraine”, Moore writes.
” Decisions about war and peace are often morally complex. But in this case, the defense of the indefensible is happening through a social Darwinist argument that is already hollowing out much of American life”, he continues.
Like many Ukraine war hawks, Moore seems to believe that the only acceptable outcome to this conflict is the overthrow of the Putin regime and the total transformation of Russia into a Western-style democracy ( how has that worked out for us the other dozen times we’ve tried it? ).
If that is Moore’s true conviction and indicative of his general foreign policy outlook, he should look here.
In an attempt to further smear the president and his supporters ( or anyone else who is clear-sighted on how this war is going to end, really ), Moore pulls out a historical analogy that only manages to reveal his own historical ignorance — the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.
Signed by German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov on August 23, 1939, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact created a non-aggression pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, while a secret provision carved out zones of influence for each nation in Eastern Europe.
On Sept. 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, beginning World War II. Sixteen days after that, the Soviet Union also invaded Poland, taking the eastern half of the country for itself. The USSR remained neutral as Germany fought the Western Allies, and it gobbled up more territory for itself in the Baltic States and on its border with Romania. The pact ended when Germany launched its invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941.
Moore mentions the pact multiple times throughout the piece, referring to it as the” Hitler-Stalin Pact” to make sure that you, dear reader, know that it was very icky and bad.
He describes how Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin would condemn his allies and embrace his enemies in accordance with his own whims and lust for greater power. ( Moore surely thinks this is a very clever parallel to Trump’s overtures to Putin. )
” The moral cognitive dissonance of all this was on display every time Stalin swapped partners. Those who were’ heroes of the Revolution’ were suddenly enemies in the show trials. Fascism was an evil—until the signing of the Hitler-Stalin Pact. It was then an evil once again when Hitler and the Soviets split”, Moore writes.
He spends the rest of the piece hammering home his belief that any accord with Putin is no different from appeasing the Nazis or befriending bloodthirsty commies, but his primary analogy makes no sense.
First off, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact didn’t resolve an ongoing war — it was a cynical agreement by two powers to split Eastern Europe between them.
The U. S. already has an established sphere of influence — NATO — and already has a hefty amount of influence over Ukraine, so negotiating on which individual provinces Russia might be able to keep is in no way comparable to the agreement within the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which effectively carved up half a continent between the two powers. The United States does not intend to invade Ukraine after the peace negotiations. We’re not betraying Ukraine or exploiting them by recognizing the reality of the situation and working toward a ceasefire. We’re making sure their country doesn’t implode. In fact, any peace agreement will likely involve security guarantees for Ukraine in case Russia decides to invade again.
Also, the Molotov-Ribbentrop was signed by two highly aggressive military powers that were gearing up for a string of conquests. Germany signed the pact to secure its flank when it invaded Poland and then turned west to take on Britain and France. The USSR signed so it would have a free hand to bully its smaller neighbors — Finland, Romania, the Baltic States — into ceding territory.
If anything, the course of the Ukraine war should deter Russia from any further attempts at expansion.
The United States already has an alliance built to resist further Russian aggression, NATO, and it has expanded to include another country on Russia’s border, Finland, during the war itself. If Putin wants to extend his influence further into Europe, he will have to attack a NATO member, which will garner a far more direct response from Europe and the U. S. And based on his military’s performance against Ukraine alone ( albeit with massive aid from the West ), Putin would truly have to be a Hitler-level madman to attempt it.
And Trump’s move to bring Ukraine and Russia to the negotiating table is in line with his policy of ending the United States ‘ involvement in foreign conflicts, which certainly doesn’t sound like the machinations of a power-mad dictator.
Of course, the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union caused untold destruction and cost tens of millions of lives, but it’s worth pointing out that it did end with Hitler dead, the Soviet flag flying triumphantly over Berlin, and the USSR as the second most powerful country on the planet.
So, by Moore’s example, Putin — presumably the untrustworthy, eventual backstabber in this analogy — should be rather hesitant to enter into any new Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact if he does in fact intend to betray the terms of the agreement.
Neither the Nazis nor the Soviets ever saw the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact as a genuine detente or sign of friendship. Both saw it as a way to buy time. Hitler had repeatedly made it clear, beginning with Mein Kampf in 1924, that he intended to invade the Soviet Union at some point. And Stalin didn’t trust Hitler to maintain the non-aggression pact, he only thought that the Germans wouldn’t be ready for an invasion of that magnitude until 1942 at the earliest.
Moore’s example of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact is so inapt that it boggles the mind. It’s wrong on almost every level. Its usefulness in the piece hinges solely on the reader’s culturally ingrained revulsion toward the words fascism,” Hitler”, and” Stalin”.
The Russo-Ukraine War has become the victim of an almost endless stream of bad historical analogies, the most popular of which invariably involve World War II. Hitler is Putin. Peace talks with Russia are no different from the Munich Agreement or the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact. Trump is the new Neville Chamberlain.
It’s all so dumb and tiresome to be lectured by people who have obviously only seen one History Channel documentary about World War II and feel the need to pontificate about it. It only reveals the historical illiteracy that has run rampant in this country. That’s why we need to ban idiots from using historical analogies in their writing and speeches. At this point, it would be an invaluable public service.
Hayden Daniel is a staff editor at The Federalist. He previously worked as an editor at The Daily Wire and as deputy editor/opinion editor at The Daily Caller. He received his B. A. in European History from Washington and Lee University with minors in Philosophy and Classics. Follow him on Twitter at @HaydenWDaniel
