The first month of Russia's barbaric campaign to conquer Ukraine and the Ukrainians' inspiring resistance has reminded Americans of a fact that has gotten obscured in recent years: It's crucial that the United States maintain an overwhelmingly strong national defense and stay prepared to lead on the world stage.

The proposition that America must have a first-in-class military, and that it has to make the investments necessary to guarantee that we have it, has been derided in the Left-most sectors of the Democratic Party, where a certain obliviousness to the world and what occurs if America is unprepared to lead it holds sway. Cliches to the effect that we "cannot be the world's policeman" go only so far; the need for a military fully ready to defend America and help defend its allies has not seemed so obvious since the late 1940s. The Russian slaughter of Ukrainians and its threats to do unto other former Soviet republics what it is doing unto Ukraine has not placed the traditional progressive nostrums about defense preparedness in an especially favorable light.

Directly or indirectly, Ukrainians look to America for sophisticated military hardware so that they can save themselves from the Russian onslaught. In order to provide it we need to have it; in order to have it we need to pay for it. Our allies in eastern, central and even western Europe rely on America to partner with them in protecting themselves against Russia, and wishing that it weren't that way doesn't do much good.

That means that the United States simply must have the capacity to project military force. If some have mocked the notion of "peace through strength," the Ukrainians' experience has made the notion seem quite a bit less mockable.

And it isn't only Russia that we need to be sufficiently well-armed to deter. It is China, which threatens Taiwan. It is North Korea, which threatens South Korea at a minimum. And it is Iran, long designated by our State Department as the world's foremost state sponsor of terrorism, racing to acquire nuclear weapons and winning that race, which threatens the entire Middle East and beyond.

This doesn't mean toadying to the defense industry and its lobbyists or succumbing to contractors' con jobs about weapons systems that aren't needed, or that don't work or that aren't worth the money. But it does mean drawing the lesson that the Russian aggression against Ukraine has retaught the world: Democracies cannot invite aggression and must be prepared to stop it.

Fortunately, even a Congress split right down the middle along party lines and afflicted by historically vitriolic partisanship sees eye to eye on the need to preserve, and even improve, American strength. "While the voices calling for America to cut back on defense may have loud bullhorns," wrote Thomas Spoehr of the Heritage Center last December, "they are in the distinct minority." Spoehr was referring to lopsided votes in both houses of Congress in favor of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act. The Senate approved it by 88 to 11 after the House did so by 363 to 70. And this was two months before Russia invaded Ukraine.

Americans have also been reminded of what it means when we lead the free world. By his dignity, his respect for our allies and his willingness to do diplomacy's difficult work patiently and out of public view, President Joe Biden has helped restore at least a measure of our lost credibility — and self-respect.

But a prerequisite for leading is deserving to lead. That will mean sidelining embarrassing fruitcakes like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and dangerous demagogues like Prince Bone Spurs of Mar-a-Lago. It will mean holding those responsible for the attempted Jan. 6, 2021, coup d'etat fully and publicly accountable, and more.

It is at once a terrible time and, in some respects, a strangely hopeful one. For America, it is a time to summon whatever is necessary to rise to the occasion.

Jeff Robbins, a former assistant United States attorney and United States delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, was chief counsel for the minority of the United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. An attorney specializing in the First Amendment, he is a longtime columnist for the Boston Herald, writing on politics, national security, human rights and the Mideast.

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