Sen. John McCain, revered in Ukraine, sounded alarms about Russia for years

Sen. John McCain saw it coming.

For years, McCain, R-Ariz., sounded the alarm about Russian President Vladimir Putin's aggression toward Ukraine and would not have been surprised to see the full-fledged Russian invasion that is now unfolding.

Routinely calling Putin a thug and a murderer, McCain was relentless about the need to supply Ukraine with the military hardware it needed to protect itself from Russia. He often blasted Russia for its March 2014 invasion and annexation of Crimea, for supporting separatist forces in eastern Ukraine and for fomenting internal strife in the country.

"One of my biggest disappointments is, of course, our failure to give Ukraine weapons with which to defend themselves while their country is being dismembered by Vladimir Putin," McCain told The Arizona Republic in 2014.

History would judge the United States "very harshly" for failing to protect people "who are victims of the most heinous crimes," he said.

McCain gained a reputation around the world as one of Putin's greatest antagonists, so much so that Russia officially sanctioned him in March 2014. A Kremlin spokesperson in 2017 said McCain was known for his "maniacal hatred towards our country." And during McCain's sixth and final Senate race in 2016, Russian trolls spread baseless conspiracy theories and insults on social media as part of a propaganda effort to smear him as a "traitor" or "RINO," or Republican In Name Only.

In Ukraine, McCain is revered.

Then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was among the Ukrainian politicians and activists grieving after McCain's death on Aug. 25, 2018, per the Kyiv Post. He would attend McCain's memorial service at National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

"Sad news for all Ukrainian people — died a great friend of Ukraine Senator John McCain," Poroshenko said in a Twitter message that shared McCain's image. "We will never forget his invaluable contribution to the development of democracy and freedom in Ukraine and the support of our state."

On April 4, 2019, the Kyiv City Council voted to rename a local street to honor McCain. The new John McCain Street replaced Ivana Kudry Street, which had been named after an old Soviet Union intelligence officer during World War II.

McCain's distrust of Putin predated the Ukrainian strife of the past decade. His worldview was shaped by the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union. As a naval aviator, McCain was on a nuclear aircraft carrier off Cuba during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. In 1967, he was shot down over North Vietnam by a Russian-made missile. His criticisms of Putin date to McCain's first campaign for president.

"He was an early critic of Putin, going back to the 2000 race, seeing him as an emerging threat to the international order the U.S. and its allies had maintained since the end of WW2, and which he believed creates the conditions for international stability and the advance of human freedom and prosperity," Mark Salter, McCain's longtime co-author, aide and friend, said Friday in an email.

"That was the great cause he felt he served all his life by serving his country. It was immensely important to him, and in 2013-14, he believed Ukraine was on the frontlines of the struggle to protect that order and the values on which it was based from threats from autocracies."

McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, never minced words when it came to Putin.

The United States should "treat Vladimir Putin for what he is: a KGB colonel who wants to restore the Russian empire," McCain said in 2014.

John McCain bio: A life of service, on the national stage

McCain addressed huge protest in Kyiv

McCain's relationship with the Ukrainian people blossomed in 2013, when McCain visited Kyiv at a volatile time when the government was violently cracking down on protesters.

On Dec. 15, 2013, McCain spoke before a huge crowd of anti-government protesters in Kyiv's Maidan Nezalezhnosti, or Independence Square. At issue generally was whether Ukraine would move in the direction of Europe or Russia. The unrest was sparked by then-Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych who, under pressure from Putin and Russia, refused to sign a trade and cooperation agreement that had been negotiated with the European Union.

"People of Ukraine, this is your moment. This is about you — no one else. This is about the future you want for your country," McCain told the protesters. "This is about the future you deserve. A future in Europe. A future of peace ...

"The free world is with you. America is with you. I am with you. And the destiny you seek lies in Europe. Ukraine will make Europe better, and Europe will make Ukraine better."

Yanukovych soon would be removed from office in a February 2014 revolution.

"It was a very inspiring experience to see 250,000 people in the sub-freezing weather demonstrating for freedom and democracy, an end to corruption and an alignment with the West," McCain, who sat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at the time, told The Republic after he returned.

McCain talked about speaking at the Maidan protest and later spending New Year's Eve 2016 with Ukrainian marines "as two of the most inspiring experiences of his life," Salter said.

McCain condemned Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea

Russia invaded Ukraine's Crimea region in February 2014 and by March 2 had captured the peninsula. Later in March, McCain led an eight-member bipartisan Senate delegation to Ukraine for meetings with government officials and other stakeholders and to condemn Russia's action.

"Eight of us had rushed to Kiev, five Republicans and three Democrats, in a show of American bipartisan solidarity with Ukraine as it confronted the Russian invasion," McCain and co-author Salter would write in his final memoir, "The Restless Wave: Good Times, Just Causes, Great Fights, and Other Appreciations," published in 2018.

"Just before we left the Wall Street Journal reported that the Obama administration had denied Ukraine's request for lethal assistance to defend its territory. Members of our delegation were divided on the subject, but not along party lines. I was in favor, and have argued continuously for the last three years that Ukraine has the right to defend itself from Russian invasion, which would soon include the Donbass region in Eastern Ukraine, and the U.S. should help provide it weapons for that purpose. The administration remained opposed, however, until its last day in office, as did (German) Chancellor (Angela) Merkel, who feared a wider war, and spoke for most of the EU on the subject."

The U.S. and E.U. dropped sanctions and other penalties on assorted Russian individuals, banks and companies; Russia hit back by sanctioning eight Americans, including McCain. "I guess this means my spring break in Siberia is off, Gazprom stock is lost & secret bank account in Moscow is frozen," he quipped in a March 20, 2014, Twitter message.

By April 2014, Kremlin-backed separatists were taking over parts of eastern Ukraine. McCain over the next months would keep Ukraine as one of his top foreign policy priorities and, with increasing frustration, continued to implore then-President Barack Obama to do more to help Kyiv. At one point in July 2014, he called the U.S. decision to not arm Ukraine "a cowardly act."

"Despite the, quote, cease-fire, unquote, Vladimir Putin's stooges, the so-called separatists who are really Russian military people among others, have taken a vital link in eastern Ukraine and we, as usual, have done nothing about it," McCain would say in February 2015 after the separatists captured Debaltseve in eastern Ukraine. "The slaughter of Ukrainians continues, now over 5,000, and still this president refuses to give them weapons with which to defend themselves. It's another disgraceful chapter in American leadership."

Obama later explained his take on the Russia-Ukraine situation in an interview with The Atlantic.

"The fact is that Ukraine, which is a non-NATO country, is going to be vulnerable to military domination by Russia no matter what we do," Obama said.

Under President Donald Trump, the United States in 2018 changed its policy and allowed the sale of anti-tank Javelin missiles to Ukraine.

How would John McCain react to latest Russian invasion of Ukraine?

Writing for The Atlantic, Salter, McCain's confidant, speculated about what McCain might say about the Russian invasion launched last week.

McCain likely would want the United States to let Russia know the consequences "without ambiguity," he wrote, so that Putin would understand that his actions "would result in the destruction of Russia's economy and the destabilization of his own political security."

"I can hear McCain insisting that anything the U.S. can do to strengthen Ukraine’s capability to exact from Russia the highest price possible for its aggression, we ought to do, short of deploying U.S. forces to the conflict," Salter wrote. "Let Putin explain to the Russian people why they should suffer grave losses for his reckless ambitions."

In one of his final sit-down interviews with The Republic, McCain gave some similar advice for how the United States should deal with Putin.

"We need to be strong and steadfast," McCain said. "Vladimir Putin is no fool. And he's going to figure out the profit and loss from actions that he can take. We have to make it clear to him that the cost exceeds the benefit. And that doesn't mean we're back in the Cold War. But it does mean that we take a realistic approach to Vladimir Putin and his ambitions."

Nowicki is The Republic's national political editor. He covered Sen. John McCain for two decades. Follow him on Twitter at @dannowicki.