Biden pays surprise visit to war-torn Kyiv
KYIV, Ukraine — President Joe Biden made a surprise trip to the capital of embattled Ukraine on Monday, traveling under a cloak of secrecy into a war zone to demonstrate what he called America’s “unwavering support” for the effort to beat back Russian forces nearly a year after they invaded the country.
Biden arrived early Monday to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy after a 10-hour overnight train ride through Ukraine, and the two stepped out into the streets of Kyiv even as an air-raid siren sounded, a dramatic moment that underscored the investment the United States has made in Ukraine’s independence.
“One year later, Kyiv stands,” Biden declared at Zelenskyy’s side in Mariinsky Palace, the gilded ceremonial home of the Ukrainian president. “And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands.”
“Thank you so much for coming, Mr. President, at a huge moment for Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said.
In Kyiv for just five hours, Biden promised to release another $500 million in military aid in coming days, mentioning artillery ammunition, Javelin missiles and howitzers, but he did not talk about the advanced arms that Ukraine has sought. Zelenskyy told reporters that he and Biden had spoken about “long-range weapons and the weapons that may still be supplied to Ukraine even though it wasn’t supplied before.”
Biden joined Zelenskyy for a visit to St. Michael’s monastery in downtown Kyiv, where the sun glittered off the golden domes as the air-raid alarm wailed. Trailing two soldiers bearing a wreath, the two leaders walked along the Wall of Remembrance, with portraits of more than 4,500 soldiers who have died since Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014 and first fomented a rebellion in eastern Ukraine.
The air-raid alarm added to the bristling tension of the moment. Ukrainian officials have been warning that Russia is planning a large-scale missile bombardment to be timed to the anniversary of the war Friday.
The White House alerted Russian officials that Biden would be traveling to Kyiv several hours before he arrived in Ukraine, in an effort to “deconflict” with Russian military forces operating in the country, Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser, told reporters Monday.
Biden was already scheduled to arrive in Warsaw, Poland, on Tuesday morning for a two-day visit, and White House officials had repeatedly brushed off questions about whether he might also travel to Ukraine. The White House on Sunday night issued a public schedule for Monday showing the president still in Washington and leaving in the evening for Warsaw, when he was already half a world away.
But the president has made U.S. support for Ukraine the centerpiece of his argument for a revitalized alliance in Europe, and he had told advisers that he wanted to mark the anniversary of the invasion as a way of reassuring allies that his administration remained committed.
Sullivan said Biden made a final decision to go to Ukraine during a huddle with top advisers and security officials in the Oval Office on Friday. Planning for the president’s highly secretive mission to the country had been underway for months, but knowledge about the trip was highly limited, even within the White House and the Pentagon.
Even by the standards of past presidential trips into war zones, Biden’s 40-hour journey in and out of Kyiv was remarkable.
Traveling on an Air Force C-32 often used to fly into smaller airports during domestic travel, Biden took off at 4:15 a.m. Sunday. Just two reporters, sworn to secrecy and deprived of their telephones for almost 24 hours, were brought with him, along with Sullivan; Jen O’Malley Dillon, the deputy chief of staff; and Annie Tomasini, the director of Oval Office operations.
After landing in Poland and making his way to the Przemysl Główny train station on the border with Ukraine, Biden — long a fan of train travel as a senator and vice president — rolled through the night toward Kyiv, the shades of the purple train’s large square windows mostly drawn.
At roughly 8 a.m., Biden’s train stopped at the Kyiv-Pasazhyrsky station, where Bridget Brink, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, was waiting for the president. The morning air was chilly, and the platform had been cleared of people.
The reporters traveling with him were allowed to send a pool report to other journalists only after Biden’s arrival and were not permitted to further describe how he had traveled to Kyiv while he was still in the country.
Sullivan described the president’s visit to Kyiv as “not a celebration but an affirmation of commitment, of the resilience of the Ukrainian people.” He said the president had decided that sending that message was worth the risk of traveling to a country at war, where the United States has no troops on the ground and only a very small diplomatic presence.
Wearing a blue suit with a tie of blue and yellow, the colors of the Ukrainian flag, Biden greeted the American ambassador.
“It’s good to be back in Kyiv,” he said.
He took a motorcade through streets that had been cleared of local traffic to Mariinsky Palace, where he was greeted by Zelenskyy, wearing his signature black sweatshirt with dark green pants.
“Thank you for coming,” Zelenskyy said, shaking Biden’s hand.
Biden arrived in Kyiv at a pivotal moment of the war, both at home and abroad. Some of America’s staunchest allies have pressed Ukraine to begin negotiating a peace deal that might involve giving up territory to Russia. And in the United States, some Republican lawmakers have demanded an end to what they call “a blank check” for the war effort.
A new Associated PressNORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll last week found public support for aid to Ukraine softening, with 48 percent of Americans in favor of sending arms, down from 60 percent in May. Biden sought to reassure Ukrainians: “For all the disagreement we have in our Congress on some issues, there is significant agreement on support for Ukraine.”
On Tuesday morning, Biden is scheduled to meet with President Andrzej Duda of Poland, and later that afternoon he will deliver a speech from Warsaw Castle. President Vladimir Putin of Russia is expected to speak the same day, creating a splitscreen image of the two leaders making their separate arguments about the war.
Russia’s state media quickly started using Biden’s visit as evidence of the Kremlin’s claim that the West is waging a proxy war against Russia.
“We’re not at war with Ukraine, certainly not with the Ukrainian people,” the RIA Novosti news agency quoted an analyst as saying. “The Kyiv authorities embody an instrument of the collective West.”