politics, but including german politics. one of the really difficult diplomatic tasks of the biden administration in the case of invasion would be to try to keep the western alliance or even just the european alliance on board. the british, the poles, the collection, french, balts, other countries have given weapons to ukraine and said they will help ukraine deter an invasion but we don t know what germany would do and it s important that biden continue to work on them. david, i want you to quickly weigh in on this issue of western unity but then i want to ask you about afghanistan because you re very active there, the irc is very active there. first, a quick thought on western unity. well, divided houses fall and it s imperative that words and deeds are aligned by the west. i think that is possible because i think that the actions of president putin have actually
energy, but a shut off of russian gas, would, as you correctly said earlier, would be a major disruption in germany. in addition to that there s quite a lot of russian influence both political influence but also financial influence in germany, all of which makes germany, in fact, right now quite divided on this question of what to do. and that makes it a kind of unreliable partner, whether it s going to be for union need sanctions against russia or whether it s for helping ukraine deter russia. i think, of course, putin knows this and he s playing into this as well. he s a meddler in all of our politics, but including german politics. one of the really difficult diplomatic tasks of the biden administration in the case of invasion would be to try to keep the western alliance or even just the european alliance on board. the british, the polls, the collection, french, ballots, other countries have given