The U.S. must Trump-proof the nuclear codes before 2024

And with the Democrats likely to lose their majority in the 2022 midterm elections, time is running out.Whatever the outcome of the crisis, it offers an opportunity to reflect on how events might be unfolding had Putin begun rolling his tanks to the Ukrainian border while Trump was still in office.It is hard to imagine a situation that drives home the risks that Donald Trump as commander in chief posed to national and global security as clearly as Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.The unfolding war requires a U.S. president who can stand tough against Putin’s aggression, maximize support for Ukraine while minimizing the risk of war between Russia and NATO, unite a fractious set of European allies and artfully utilize intelligence findings to pre-empt Russian disinformation campaigns without divulging intelligence methods or sources.​ Most importantly, Russia’s war on Ukraine makes evident the necessity of electing level-headed U.S. presidents capable of evaluating the potential consequences of escalating a conflict with a nuclear superpower.As a political scientist who has been conducting research in the former Soviet Union for more than two decades, I can say with confidence that on every one of these counts, the challenges posed by the Russia-Ukraine crisis would have been amplified manifold were Trump still in office.Far from standing up to Putin, he was infamous for his sycophantic statements about Russia’s president — a trend that continues to this day with Trump bizarrely praising Putin as “savvy” for his “genius” decision to recognize the sovereignty of Ukraine’s separatist regions.