To the editor: A recent letter to the editor asked the rhetorical question of what if the U.S. said “not our war” in other historical instances (“Letters to the Editor: Global alliances ‘endure when responsibilities are shared and not avoided,’” March 21)? The letter writer also referenced the U.S.’s involvement in the war in Ukraine.
The answer is simply: Russia was clearly the aggressor. Ukraine did not launch an invasion of Russia. Russia invaded Ukraine, as it had done similarly with other former Soviet socialist “republics” that had gained independence at the breakup of the USSR.
Iran did not invade or attempt to invade either the United States or Israel. And there was a signed treaty, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, safeguarding against Iran becoming a nuclear weapons threat, providing for inspections of Iran’s nuclear program to ensure its enrichment only reached the level of reactor fuel, but not weapons grade, signed in 2015. President Trump withdrew the U.S. from that treaty in 2018, during his first term.
By all evidence, Trump created the pretext for starting this war, and needs to be held fully responsible for the consequences.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created to deter aggression; it was not created, nor ever intended, to facilitate it. Our European and Canadian allies are not, nor should they be, obligated to be our enablers.
Bill Seckler, Riverside