Washington is trying to create a quagmire for Moscow in Ukraine. But there’s a rising risk Ukraine starts winning.

(Originally published Aug. 24 in “What in the World“) It’s always dangerous to corner a big, angry animal. It’s probably even more dangerous to think you’ve got a big, angry animal cornered if you haven’t.

In a piece this month in Foreign Affairs, American Enterprise Institute thinkers Oriana Skylar Mastro and Derek Scissors argue that China isn’t boxed in over Taiwan the way Washington fears. Policymakers in Washington, they argue, believe Beijing fears the window is closing on its chance to reunify with Taiwan as it reaches the zenith of its own military, economic and technological strength. But China, they say, will only become a greater military rival to the U.S. over the next decade. That means Beijing can afford to bide its time before swooping in for the kill. If the U.S. wants to counter China, therefore, it’s going to take a much bigger commitment than sending a few legislators to Taipei.

Foreign Affairs also includes a new warning from Univ. of Chicago foreign policy professor John Mearsheimer, whom this newsletter has cited before, that the U.S. is wrong to underestimate the risk that a desperate Russia escalates the war in Ukraine and embroils U.S. forces in direct combat. Mearsheimer has argued that Russia does feel cornered by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in eastern Europe and Ukraine. Washington’s error, Mearsheimer says, is thinking that Russia will tolerate a stalemate and eventually strike a diplomatic bargain favorable to NATO and Ukraine.

But it’s just that kind of stalemate some criticize Washington of trying to create—one that keeps Moscow bogged down in Ukraine, unable to expand the conflict, unable to win, but also not faced pushed to defeat. As if to confirm that strategy, reports are emerging that the U.S. plans this week to announce an additional $3 billion in funding to supply and train Ukrainian forces for a war that smolders on for years.

There’s only one problem: the weapons the U.S. is already supplying Ukraine, including $800 million in new aid announced last week, are allowing Ukraine to turn the tide. For Washington, that raises the risk that Russian President Vladimir Putin resorts to more drastic measures that draw the U.S. and its allies into direct conflict with Russia.