25 January—It’s most gratifying that Germany has taken The Monitor’s subtle hints and decided to send its Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine and allow other of its customers to do the same, which they were going to do anyway. Of course, Richie Blumenthal helped.

We all agree with Germany’s insistence that she is not actually entering war against Russia by sending the tanks and/or doing anything else against Russia’s imperialist interest. And we realize, moreover, that, as the Russian ambassador in Washington warns us, the tank shipments are “another blatant provocation.”

It’s just as gratifying that the Biden administration, also at The Monitor’s suggestion (with Richie’s valuable cooperation, to be sure), is on the brink of sending Ukraine some 30 Abrams M1 tanks even though the Ukrainians won’t know how to operate or maintain them and the Kremlin insists they’ll “burn like all the rest.” Presumably the Kremlin spokesman is referring to all the Russian tanks captured and now being used by the Ukrainian army to burn the Russians.

Now we’re just waiting for Joe Biden to actually give the word to send the tanks so we can cut to the really important stuff that may well determine the future of the world. Like the Academy Awards . . .