Resolved: The United States Should Offer Military Aid to Ukraine

I will use a Lincoln Douglas format to make my speech easily legible and understandable. So to start, my value for today's debate will be Enlightened Self-Interest, which will be reinforced by my value criterion, the Hegemonic Stability Theory. Definition of Value/Criterion: Value: Enlightened self-interest is a philosophy in ethics which states that persons who act to further the interests of others (or the interests of the group or groups to which they belong), ultimately serve their own self-interest.[1][2][3] http://en.wikipedia.org... Value Criterion: Hegemonic stability theory (HST) is a theory of international relations. Rooted in research from the fields of political science, economics, and history, HST indicates that the international system is more likely to remain stable when a single nation-state is the dominant world power, or hegemon.[1] I suppose I should start with a brief justification of my values and why they are fitting and proper for today's debate, and then go on to show how providing aid to ukraine militarily upholds these values. Enlightened Self-Interest: Enlightened self-interest states that when one person (or country in this case) acts on the behalf of others, that person is acting in their own interests. In this case, that would be the USA intervening in the current conflict occurring between Russia and Ukraine. While the US would most likely be acting in it's own interests (to undermine Russia's regional hegemony), it would contribute to world peace and stability. This idea can be reinforced by by value criterion, The Hegemonic Stability Theory. Hegemonic Stability Theory: To begin my justification for this criterion, I will use a quote that I believe nicely sums up the Hegemonic Stability Theory; "We have about 50% of the world's wealth, but only 6.3% of its population. ... In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity. ... To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. ... We should cease to talk about vague and ... unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better." ""George F. Kennan, Policy Planning Study 23 (PPS23), Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS), 1948 To condense the quote in to something that would support my argument, I will offer a brief analyzation; Basically, whether the sovereignty of Ukraine is upheld or the russian ethnic minorities in Ukraine's eastern regions are protected or not should be considered a byproduct, the true ends of the united states should be, and would be to maintain its role of world hegemon. I will speak about why this is important in my first contention. Contention One: The US Providing Militarily Equipment to Ukraine would Impose a Minimal Burden The United States of America, despite current reductions in their budget and personnel size, has the most well equipped and technologically advanced military in the world, I do not think anyone disputes this, so I need not provide a source. What I will cite though, that the US has billions of dollars of highly sophisticated, unused equipment that it disposes of periodically that could be given to Ukraine. The US has 4.5 billion dollars of unused counter terrorism equipment that was purchased after 9/11 that it never used and now wishes to dispose of. The US has roughly 6 billion dollars of US equipment in Afghanistan that it is simply going to leave there (not even for the Afghan armed forces to use, it will just sit and rot). The US also has over 35 billion dollars of aircraft in a boneyard in arizona that will never be used again, some of those aircraft are brand new, ordered from Italy. The dozen Italian-built C-27J Spartans have been shipped to an Air Force facility in Arizona dubbed "the boneyard." We are ordering five more, which are expected to be immediately sent with the others into mothballs. The Air Force has spent $567 million on 21 of the planes which will join some 4,400 other aircraft and 13 aerospace vehicles at the boneyard "" more than $35 billion of unused airplanes. With all of this, the US could provide over $40 billion in military aid to Ukraine and it would impose only the burden of transporting it there. As you can see, the US clearly could significantly increase Ukraine's military capability for very little to no cost. http://www.monitor.net... http://freepatriot.org... http://www.washingtonsblog.com... jonathanturley.org Subpoint A: It is Unlikely Russia would Invade if the US Sent Armed Personnel to Ukraine: Section Six of the North Atlantic Treaty: [1]For the purpose of Article 5, an armed attack on one or more of the Parties is deemed to include an armed attack: on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer. http://en.wikisource.org... Under section five of the treaty, if Russia attacked US forces on Ukrainian soil, they would essentially be declaring war on all of NATO. For this reason, we can conclude that sending US personnel to Ukraine would actually deter an invasion. We can also conclude that sending thousands of US personnel to Ukraine would impose a minimal burden, as there are already 30,000+ US armed personnel in Europe http://www.eur.army.mil... Contention Two: The US Intervening in Ukraine Militarily would be Enlightened Self-Interest It is my belief that the united states intervening in Ukraine would be an action of enlightened self-interest. To further my point, I will refer to my criterion, the Hegemonic Stability Theory. According to the Hegemonic Stability Theory, to maintain world peace there can only be one international hegemon, if this hegemon is undermined or allows a new hegemon to rise, world stability and peace will be threatened. If the HST's conclusion is correct, allowing Russia to invade Ukraine militarily would further solidify their recognized status as a regional hegemon, which would undermine US hegemony in Eastern and Central Europe. Why can we not have multiple hegemons, you ask? According to the father of the HST, Charles Kindlebeger, conflict is more likely to occur when there are multiple hegemons with competing interests. Clear examples of this are WWI, WWII, and the cold war (which resulted in multiple bloody wars). We can then conclude that in the current state of affairs, only the United States re asserting its role as hegemon will maintain peace, which upholds my value of Enlightened Self-Interest. Thank you, I eagerly await my opponent's reply.