Republican Senator Goes Viral With Blazing Takedown Of Those Who Want to Negotiate Peace With Putin

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) went viral over the weekend after a clip of him speaking at the Halifax International Security Forum was widely praised for his blazing takedown of the idea that peace in Ukraine should be negotiated by giving concessions to Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Rounds said in the clip that his take was “my opinion, it’s not the opinion of the administration, it’s not the opinion of the next administration coming in.”

“But for those folks in Ukraine that are fighting against a Russian aggression that we can all see. I just feel so frustrated that we have not been able to provide them all of the equipment that they need and all of the weapon systems that they need in order to respond to absolute tyranny coming from Russia. A neighbor who has absolutely unjustly invaded their country,” said the conservative Republican and close Trump ally, adding:

And it’s been done after a time in which Russia was one of the guarantees of their safety. From 1994, when they gave up the nuclear weapons that they had. And they did it because they thought that all of us would defend them in that decision. And now here we are this many years later with Putin, the aggressor, looking at us as literally hundreds of thousands of his own people die in the front line as cannon fodder and as he inflicts huge, huge amounts of damage and destruction in a neighbor, an innocent neighbor who wanted peace.

And I wonder why we haven’t done more and more quickly than what we have, all of us. The United States has put in over $46 billion in direct aid to Ukraine already. But what we have offered is our treasure, not our blood. Ukraine has offered not just everything they have, and to have this fight on their own homeland, but they have offered the blood of their own kids. And in fact, if you take a look at what’s happened, they have had the older men going. So that the younger ones can have a life.

Choking up a bit, Rounds continued, “It’s not easy to be logical when the emotions are that strong. That I think all of us feel in the defense of freedom of a democracy against a tyrant. The Biden administration has stood strong, but I have been frustrated with their slow response in many ways to provide the necessary resources. As a fearful, as being afraid of escalating and actually causing more damage in Ukraine and elsewhere. And I understand that.” He added:

But folks, it’s time to take a hard look at this thing and really ask ourselves, do you believe that this tyrant, if you offer him a part of a free country, do you think he’s going to stop? Or do you think he’s going to have to go back home and say, you see, when we stand strong, the weak, the west, these people who are decadent, do you think for one second he’s going to turn around and walk back in and say, but we most certainly have our freedom now that we’ve been defended by this and that we have everything we need.

Or do you think he’s going to look at that and say, you see, we’re strength, we’re Russian strength? See, I think that’s what happens. I think the best thing in the world that we can do is make our commitment to Ukraine. Allow them to participate in deciding whether or not victory is actually achieved and whether or not Russia would continue to support a tyrant as the body bags continue to come home.

I wish I could say there was an easy way out. There is not. And while the vast majority of all wars end with a peace treaty. It didn’t happen in Germany. It didn’t happen in Japan. I fear as much as I would love to say that there is a path towards a peaceful resolution to this by negotiating with this tyrant. I suspect that we may be deceiving ourselves.

Rounds concluded by warning that if America’s enemies sense weakness the current cost of the war in Ukraine will pale in comparison to a wider multifront-war that could erupt in a power vacuum. “I think we pay the insurance premium. We pay it by making damn sure that we are not only perceived as being the strongest. But we are the strongest without doubt. That’s the way. That’s the way you make sure that your young men and women aren’t spreading their blood in Europe or elsewhere in the next few years,” he concluded.

Below are some of the reactions praising Rounds:

Watch the clip above.