President Biden addressed a meeting of NATO allies in Vilnius, Lithuania on Wednesday, addressing that country and the world, comparing the war to oust Russia from Ukraine to the Cold War fight for Europe’s freedom and promising that “we will not.” How long will the nomadic” war continue?
His speech appeared to prepare the Americans and NATO countries for a clash that would give context to significant conflicts in Europe’s war-torn past. And they cast it as a test of will with Russian President Vladimir V. Putin, who has shown no interest in giving up an invasion that hasn’t gone according to plan, but has locked him in a war.
“Putin still mistakenly believes he can outmaneuver Ukraine,” Mr. Biden said, describing the Russian leader as someone who made a huge strategic mistake in invading a neighboring country and is now doubling down. “Putin still doubts our staying power after all this time. He’s making a bad bet.”
The speech at Vilnius University came at a time of rapid change for the alliance, after a series of major victories for Mr. Biden as NATO’s de facto leader.
His success in getting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to drop his objections to Sweden’s admission as NATO’s 32nd member would make it possible to turn the Baltic Sea into an area completely surrounded by the alliance (though Mr. Erdogan has indicated that Turkey’s parliament could do so, not taking up the issue until October). NATO nations have committed to increasing military spending, which the United States has complained is inadequate.
At the same time, Mr. Under NATO policy requiring collective defense, the president said, admitting to the Ukraine war would put the United States in direct conflict with Russia. NATO said on Tuesday that Ukraine would be invited to join someday, but not when or exactly under what conditions.
It prompted an angry outburst from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, facilitated by allies promising more aid and an inaugural meeting of the new “NATO-Ukraine Council” on Wednesday.
Mr. Zelensky, doing the best he could, called the move a victory on Wednesday and sat down for the first time as an official partner — if not a member — of NATO. It is essentially a non-voting member, Mr. Zelensky is selling at home as a halfway step to full status.
Mr Zelensky, in a statement, showed no such reluctance, although he has not given a timetable for Ukraine to join NATO. “I believe we will be in NATO as soon as the security situation is stabilized,” he said. “Simply put, the moment the war is over.”
Mr. Just days after Biden made the reluctant decision to give Ukraine the cluster munitions it wanted, NATO nations pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in new aid to Ukraine. The weapons are banned by treaty by more than 100 nations, but not by Russia, Ukraine or the United States, and have been used by both sides in the war.
“One thing that Zelensky understands is that it’s not relevant whether he’s in NATO now or not” because of alliance commitments, Mr. Biden told reporters as he departed for NATO’s newest member, Finland.
Mr. Biden’s speech, on a bright summer evening in the middle of the cobblestone streets of Vilnius’ restored “Old Town,” was attended by an enthusiastic crowd of about 10,000 people waving Lithuanian, American and Ukrainian flags. It was in Warsaw and throughout Europe that Mr. It had strong echoes of similar speeches given by Biden, extolling the power of alliances — apparently, if not spoken, by President Donald J. Contrast that with Trump’s efforts to dismantle NATO, which the former president has repeatedly called “obsolete.” .”
Like his other speeches gathering allies, Mr. Biden celebrated the new sense of unity and purpose that the Ukraine invasion has given NATO, as it expands and confronts a reality that seemed unlikely just two years ago: land war in Europe, mixing trench warfare and drone warfare.
But to face off against the Soviet Union Mr. The apparent references to Biden set this speech apart from previous speeches — the administration has so far rejected most Cold War comparisons.
“The United States has never recognized a Soviet invasion of the Baltics,” Mr. Biden told the cheering crowd. And in return, he made it clear that it would never recognize Mr. Putin’s territorial acquisition.
Mr. Recaptured by the Soviets in 1941 and 1944. It regained independence in the early 1990s and became a NATO member in 2004.
During the Nato meeting here, city buses flashed pro-Ukrainian messages, Vilnius residents put up placards with epithets about Mr Putin in their windows and huge crowds gathered to greet Mr Zelensky when he arrived. Crowds gathered to hear Mr. Biden speak, with children leaning out of windows to watch him.
Mr. Designed by Biden. He said the world is at an “inflection point” where it must choose between democracy and authoritarianism. This message has roots in his 2020 campaign, but he has leaned on it even more to convince Americans that they should care about a war thousands of miles from home.
In a nod to Asian allies who have aided Ukraine and helped isolate Russia, he emphasized the need to protect the Indo-Pacific, a region critical to the United States’ growing competition with China. And Mr Biden said the world needs to address the “accelerating threat of climate change”, another key focus of the NATO summit.
But there was also a sense at the meeting that NATO was entering a protracted struggle with Russia. The announcement, issued Tuesday, outlined Russia’s advances in nuclear weapons, space vehicles, cyberwarfare and disinformation, and members committed to new spending and new partnerships to counter it in all those areas.
Not once in their public comments did NATO leaders discuss negotiations with Russia for a cease-fire or a Korea-style truce — a tacit acknowledgment that Ukraine would insist on withdrawing much of its territory before talks could take place, and that Mr. Putin had expressed no willingness to withdraw.
At the press conference held at the end of the NATO sessions, Mr. Zelensky doubled down on his commitment not to cede an inch of land to Russia, saying there was no room for territorial compromise. “We will never give up our territories and we will never barter for any frozen conflict,” he told reporters.
Mr. Zelensky told reporters that the missile, pronounced “Attack ‘Ems,” has a range of 190 miles — farther than any other American-supplied weapon. Mr. Biden has so far refused to offer missiles to Ukraine because of concerns that it could prompt Mr. Putin to escalate.
Such arguments are a recurring theme of the war, Mr. Biden at first refused some weapons – how the Kremlin – whose officials have repeatedly threatened the use of nuclear weapons – could respond and finally agree to send them: Himars rocket artillery, Patriot air defense systems, tanks and more.
Mr. Zelensky said he “started the conversation about cluster munitions several months ago,” discussing ATACMS with Mr. Biden’s aides. “I’m very grateful to President Biden for the results we received,” he said, clearly aware of criticism that his public thanks to the administration were insufficient.
“So wait,” he said, “not all at once.”
A day after calling it “unprecedented and absurd” to not give a timetable for NATO membership, Mr. Biden went on to praise the administration. Throughout the war, the Ukrainian president has pressed the West for more weapons, funding and aid from the coalition in an effort to sustain the fight against the Russians.
But on Wednesday, he thanked the United States profusely for support, saying in a meeting with Mr. Biden, “You spend this money on our lives.”
The decision not to invite Ukraine to join NATO prompted some concern that the war could continue, as Mr Putin knows Kyiv could quickly join the alliance once the fighting ends.
“This is a Catch-22 for the alliance, and that may be why this and the next summit are an opportunity to make it clear that Ukraine is invited,” William B. Taylor Jr., a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine in the Bush and Obama administrations, said in an interview.
During a testy exchange at a NATO public forum on Wednesday, Daria Kaleniuk, director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, asked Jake Sullivan, Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, what he would say to his 2-year-old son, who has already experienced airstrikes in Ukraine: “That President Biden and NATO are going to Russia.” Wasn’t Ukraine invited to NATO because of fear?”
“The US is committed to providing an enormous amount of capability to help ensure that Ukraine’s brave soldiers have ammunition,” Mr Sullivan defended the administration.
He said, “The president simply said that he is not ready to have Ukraine in NATO now because that would mean that the United States and NATO are now at war with Russia.”
