With much fanfare, the Russian Defense Ministry announced yesterday that they were pulling back some troops that had been stationed on the Ukraine border. The U.S. and NATO are still unable to confirm the pullback, which doesn’t matter anyway. The withdrawal has not been followed up with any other movements by Russian forces, nor has there been a slow-down in Russian preparations.
There are still nearly 130,000 Russian troops, tanks, artillery pieces, rocket launchers, and all that Vladimir Putin needs to invade Ukraine successfully poised on the border.
Joe Biden gave a speech on Ukraine on Tuesday. It was eminently forgettable and a little pathetic.
Biden said diplomacy remains a live option to wind down the crisis and urged Russia to engage. If Russia invades Ukraine, the United States and its allies are prepared to respond with penalties aimed at exacting economic pain and global isolation, he said.
“The United States is prepared no matter what happens,” he said.
Much of Biden’s remarks were aimed squarely at Putin, who has demanded that NATO not accept Ukraine as a member and stop any further eastward expansion. Biden’s threats of repercussions for Russia have yet to persuade Putin to back down.
Biden doesn’t appear to understand Putin or what his motivations are.
“The United States and NATO are not a threat to Russia. Ukraine is not threatening Russia. Neither the U.S. nor NATO have missiles in Ukraine. We do not, do not have plans to put them there as well. We are not targeting the people of Russia. We do not seek to destabilize Russia,” said Biden.
The American president also appealed directly to Russian citizens.
“To the citizens of Russia: you are not our enemy, and I don’t believe you want a bloody, destructive war against Ukraine,” Biden said.
Putin doesn’t believe the U.S. is not a threat to Russia—a lie that only Biden could tell. We’ve got 2,500 nuclear weapons aimed at Russia, so of course we’re a threat.
But does Putin really care if Ukraine is not a “threat”? Of course not. Putin’s propaganda rationale for war—that Ukraine is a threat because they’re going to join NATO and NATO is going to place missiles there—has always been bogus.
Related: What if They Had a War But There Was No One There to Begin With?
Biden’s embarrassing appeal to the “citizens of Russia”—who voted overwhelmingly for Putin in the last election—only shows that Biden hasn’t lost his naivete about American enemies.
Putin’s terms for a settlement with NATO haven’t changed. He’s still demanding that Ukraine be forbidden now and forever from joining NATO and that the alliance pull back its forces from Eastern Europe. But Putin has changed his tone slightly and Biden and the Europeans have leaped upon that as evidence that peace is nearly at hand.
Russia denied reports that it was planning to attack Ukraine imminently, telling the German newspaper Die Welt: “Wars in Europe rarely start on a Wednesday.”
Russia’s envoy to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, told Die Welt in an article published on Wednesday: “As far as Russia is concerned, I can assure you that there will be no attack this Wednesday.”
“There will be no escalation in the coming week either, or in the week after that, or in the coming month.”
New German Chancellor Olaf Scholz refused to reject Putin’s “olive branch” outright.
Scholz, who met on Monday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, called Putin’s offer to talk a “good sign.”
“Likewise, NATO, the EU, and we do not agree with the demands of Russia, but we believe there are some points in there that are worth discussing,” he said.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said only Kiev and NATO should be able to determine whether his country can join the alliance.
A “good sign”? If you’re Vladimir Putin, that must be music to your ears.
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