Keeping Belarus Out Of The War Is (Probably) A Win For American Foreign Policy
An uncontroversial if somewhat obscure 2+2=4 proposition
Belarus holding back from entering the war is going to emerge, in retrospect, as a pretty significant victory for American foreign policy, I think.
The term “foreign policy” is doing a lot of heavy lifting for me here; I’m including under that umbrella whatever American hybrid-war assets are deployed to the situation (doubtlessly cyber-somethings and clandestine somethings-or-others, I don't want to know), as well as the railway hackings, and, today, leaks of Belarusian recordings of Russian embassy phone calls.
It's a little early to declare it, of course, but at least on the lawfare side of things, I think the positive effects of keeping Belarus out of the war are paying dividends.
It's in seemingly unrelated things, that start to look related if you “read in” on the background stories and trends; something like a story comes out, more often than not. Given how popular sanctions policies are in general, I don’t think it’s a popular story, or at least a very well-told one. Like, I don’t think there’s going to be any Treasury or State Department people on Fox News any time soon showcasing their 1,000-yard stares and talking about all the people they’ve sanctioned for “God and Country”.
The story is there, nonetheless.
So, the latest ISW readout on the Ukraine war’s status leads with a somewhat uncharacteristically direct, high-confidence assessment that Belarus will not enter the war:
The relevant part reads:
…Belarus remains unlikely to join the war in Ukraine due to the threat of domestic unrest that President Alexander Lukashenko faces if he involves already-limited Belarusian military assets in combat. Any Belarusian entrance into the war would also likely provoke further crippling sanctions on Belarus. Any unsupported Belarusian attack against northern Ukraine would likely be highly ineffective, and the quality of Belarusian troops remains low. ISW will continue to monitor Belarusian movements but does not forecast a Belarusian entrance into the war at this time. (emphasis added)
One of the reasons why Belarus is loath to enter the war is sanctions; ISW doesn’t cite a specific source on this, but this is common sense; they were already not-thrilled when the December 2nd sanctions went through and they threatened to retaliate the next day.
And as much as we've sanctioned in Belarus (and we've sanctioned a lot in Belarus) there's a lot more we could still go after.
It's a peculiarity of the leverage that these situations produce. To put it bluntly, the less I sanction you, the more leverage I have on your actions, because then I can blackmail you with more sanctions. Sanctions are indeed fungible, but practically speaking, it’s much easier to add people to the list than it is to take them off, even when sanctions designations have spillover consequences (e.g., the sanctions on Belarus’ own potash exports that triggered a price rally after the December 2nd designations, resulting in knock-on consequences on world fertilizer prices and, thus, food prices).
Thus, threatening to sanction someone, but not actually sanctioning them, constitutes one of the most effective deployments of the leverage that sanctions produce.
Put this in context of yesterday’s announcement from the White House, when President Biden quietly renewed the state of emergency with regard to Belarus.
If I declare my legal authority to sanction you, in fact, without declaring additional sanctions, it might be something pretty close to the quiet-speech/large-bludgeon Roosevelt dictum in action; a Good Idea In General, as it were, because it increases leverage without committing to a specific action.
Considering the state of ammunition supply in Ukraine as of four days ago, it seems prudent to heighten and carefully preserve sanctions-based leverage to continue to keep Belarus out of the war. And in that context, I wouldn’t call Belarus staying out of the war a win, yet. It’s at least a good spot of news to pick out and notice, though.
Like, good job, tax dollars.
Keep it up.