Biden warns Putin of ‘swift and severe costs’
INVADING UKRAINE WILL CAUSE ‘WIDESPREAD SUFFERING’
US President Joe Biden told Russia’s Vladimir Putin that invading Ukraine would cause “widespread human suffering” and that the West was committed to diplomacy to end the crisis but “equally prepared for other scenarios,” the White House said yesterday.
Biden also said the United States and its allies would respond “decisively and impose swift and severe costs” if the Kremlin attacked its neighbour, according to a White House description of the hourlong call.
“President Biden was clear with President Putin that while the United States remains prepared to engage in diplomacy, in full coordination with our Allies and partners, we are equally prepared for other scenarios,” the White House statement said.
The two presidents spoke a day after Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, warned that US intelligence shows that a Russian invasion could begin within days and before the Winter Olympics in Beijing end February 20.
The call produced “no fundamental change in the dynamic that has been unfolding now for several weeks,” according to a senior administration official who briefed reporters following the call.
The official, who discussed the call on condition of anonymity, added that it remains unclear whether Putin has made a final decision to move forward with military action. The Biden administration has been warning for weeks that Russia could invade Ukraine soon, but US officials had previously said the Kremlin would likely wait until after the Games ended so as not to antagonise China.
Military action
Sullivan told reporters on Friday that US intelligence shows that Russia could take military action during the Olympics.
Russia has massed well over 100,000 troops near the Ukraine border and has sent troops to exercises in neighbouring Belarus, but denies that it intends to launch an offensive against Ukraine. Before talking to Biden, Putin had a telephone call with French President Emmanuel Macron, who met with him in Moscow earlier in the week to try to resolve the biggest security crisis between Russia and the West since the Cold War. A Kremlin summary of the call suggested that little progress was made toward cooling down the tensions.
In a sign that American officials are getting ready for a worst-case scenario, the United States announced plans to evacuate its embassy in the Ukrainian capital, and Britain joined other European nations in urging its citizens to leave Ukraine.
It was a week of mad-dash diplomacy for European leaders, a dramatic shift after two years in which the pandemic halted most international travel.
French President Emmanuel Macron hit Moscow, Kyiv and Berlin. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson met with the head of Nato in Brussels, then flew to visit British troops deployed in Poland. And new German Chancellor Olaf Scholz made his first official trip to Washington and plans to visit Kyiv and Moscow next week.
Macron, Johnson and Scholz are trying to prove themselves on the world stage and send specific signals to their domestic constituents. But they also share the same overarching goal: to stop a looming ground war involving Russia on the European continent.
Whether they will succeed is unclear. Many European governments had made a deliberate choice to keep their embassy staffs in Ukraine while other countries were evacuating some of theirs in the past days and weeks. But as US officials warned Friday that Putin could invade Ukraine within the week, one country after another told its nationals to leave immediately.
When Russia last invaded Ukraine, in 2014, it was German Chancellor Angela Merkel, with her fluent Russian and more than a decade of experience in dealing with Vladimir Putin, who naturally took the lead in shepherding a European response with sanctions. And it was Merkel and French President François Hollande who eventually brokered a peace deal with the Minsk Agreement. But now, as Europe faces its first security crisis since Merkel’s departure in December, the absence of her influence is being felt.
Challenge for Scholz
Although Scholz is only a few months into the job, being chancellor of the European Union’s most populous nation and biggest economy automatically conveys clout. His approach has often mirrored Merkel’s cautious style, and as her finance minister and vice chancellor, he built a reputation as a steady hand during crises. But the standoff over Ukraine has been a highstakes test for the new leader.
Some in Merkel’s camp have drawn a contrast between Scholz’s performance and the former chancellor’s studied competence. It would be good “if Olaf Scholz consulted Angela Merkel,” said Markus Sder, the head of the smaller sister party of Scholz and Merkel’s Christian Democrats. Germany’s new chancellor just needs time to find his feet, said Wolfgang Ischinger, a former German ambassador to the United States and the chairman of the Munich Security Conference.
Macron claims central role
Long overshadowed on the international stage by Merkel, Macron has claimed a central role in negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. He has been pushing for a diplomatic resolution through what is known as “Normandy Format” talks — involving France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia. And in addition to his 5-hour meeting with Putin in Moscow, he has spoken to the Russian leader multiple times by phone in recent days and had another call scheduled for Saturday.
The Johnson factor
The departure of Britain from the European Union has made it harder for the country to claim the title of leader of Europe. But that didn’t stop Johnson from boasting that he and his government were “bringing the West together” on Ukraine.
Britain undoubtedly plays an outsize role in military support for Ukraine. It has supplied 2,000 anti-tank weapons, provided training for 22,000 Ukrainian soldiers and committed $110 million to bolster the Ukrainian navy.
Johnson has emphasised that British soldiers will not fight in Ukraine. But he is sending 350 Royal Marines to Poland. And when meeting with Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg this week, the prime minister said he offered to double the British troop numbers in Estonia, deploy more Royal Air Force jets to southern Europe and dispatch a destroyer and offshore patrol vessel to the eastern Mediterranean.