Rep. Mike Rogers and colleagues warn that Russians are helping China obtain plutonium
On Thursday, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Mike Turner urged National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, to utilize the full application of sanctions, export controls, and diplomacy, to hinder the nuclear cooperation between Russia’s Rosatom and China. In the letter, Rogers and the other Chairmen wrote, “Russia’s state-owned nuclear energy corporation, Rosatom, is helping the People’s Republic of China (PRC) acquire enough weapons-grade plutonium to fuel its strategic nuclear breakout. Beyond fueling the PRC’s strategic nuclear breakout, then-U.S. Strategic Command commander Admiral Charles Richard called “breathtaking,” Rosatom helps fuel Putin’s war efforts in Ukraine. We call on the Administration to view this cooperation for what it is, a direct threat to U.S. security and more evidence that Russia and China are working in tandem against the United States. The Administration should use all tools at its disposal to stop Rosatom and the PRC’s dangerous cooperation.” “Despite these malign activities, Rosatom’s position in the global market is only getting stronger,” Rogers et al. wrote. “The longer we wait to act, the more difficult it will be to address Rosatom’s nefarious and malign dealings. Putin uses these funds to fund his war machine and keep his favorite weapons programs on schedule. In short, every dollar and euro that Rosatom brings in directly finances the death and destruction we see in Ukraine, China’s nuclear weapon expansion, and is a direct threat to the American way of life.” The chairmen say in the letter is based on “Our classified correspondence from earlier this year.” “Russia’s role in China’s nuclear energy program is well documented,” the Chairmen wrote. “Rosatom opened an office in Beijing in 2016 and partnered extensively with the PRC’s China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) on major projects worth billions. On May 19, 2021, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin tuned in via video link to witness the commencement ceremony of two of the countries’ major nuclear energy cooperation projects, the Tianwan Nuclear Power Plant and Xudabao Nuclear Power Plant.” “Rosatom now appears to be supplying equipment and highly enriched uranium (HEU) for the PRC’ CFR-600 sodium-cooled fast breeder nuclear reactors, which will produce plutonium, fissile material critical to the PRC’s nuclear breakout,” the Chairmen wrote. “Russian deliveries of HEU to the PRC are slated to begin this year. The Department of Defense’s 2022 report to Congress on the Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China noted the key role that increased weapons-grade plutonium production is key to the PRC nuclear program, stating: “The PRC is also supporting this expansion by increasing its capacity to produce and separate plutonium by constructing fast breeder reactors and reprocessing facilities.” The DoD report also cites the CFR-600 reactors and notes that each will be capable of producing “enough plutonium for dozens of nuclear warheads annually.” This buildup puts the PRC in violation of Article VI of the NPT, requiring states to make good-faith efforts to cease an arms race and to engage in good-faith arms control negotiations. Make no mistake, the PRC and Russia’s actions constitute an acceleration of their ongoing arms race.” According to the U.S. Intelligence National Threat Assessment, “China is building hundreds of new ICBM silos.” “Moscow continues to develop long-range nuclear-capable missile and underwater delivery systems meant to penetrate or bypass U.S. missile defenses,” said the report. “Russia is expanding and modernizing its large, diverse, and modern set of nonstrategic systems, which are capable of delivering nuclear or conventional warheads because Moscow believes such systems offer options to deter adversaries, control the escalation of potential hostilities, and counter U.S. and allied conventional forces.” In response to China and Russia’s modernization of their strategic forces, including the development of hypersonics, the U.S. is rushing to deploy hypersonics. The U.S. Air Force is expected to deploy Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon, a boost-glide vehicle, as soon as this fall. Russia has begun deploying its conventionally armed Kinzhal hypersonic missiles in Ukraine. Kyiv says that it is unable to defend itself against the strikes. Rogers is in his eleventh term representing Alabama’s Third Congressional District. To connect with the author of this story or to comment, email brandonmreporter@gmail.com.
Joe Biden: U.S. would intervene with military to defend Taiwan
President Joe Biden said Monday that the U.S. would intervene militarily if China were to invade Taiwan, saying the burden to protect Taiwan is “even stronger’ after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It was one of the most forceful presidential statements in support of self-governing in decades. Biden, at a news conference in Tokyo, said “yes” when asked if he was willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan if China invaded. “That’s the commitment we made,” he added. The U.S. traditionally has avoided making such an explicit security guarantee to Taiwan, with which it no longer has a mutual defense treaty, instead maintaining a policy of “strategic ambiguity” about how far it would be willing to go if China invaded. The 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, which has governed U.S. relations with the island, does not require the U.S. to step in militarily to defend Taiwan if China invades but makes it American policy to ensure Taiwan has the resources to defend itself and to prevent any unilateral change of status in Taiwan by Beijing. Biden’s comments drew a sharp response from the mainland, which has claimed Taiwan to be a rogue province. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin expressed “strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition” to Biden’s comments. “China has no room for compromise or concessions on issues involving China’s core interests such as sovereignty and territorial integrity.” He added, “China will take firm action to safeguard its sovereignty and security interests, and we will do what we say.” A White House official said Biden’s comments did not reflect a policy shift. Speaking alongside Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Biden said any effort by China to use force against Taiwan would “just not be appropriate,” adding that it “will dislocate the entire region and be another action similar to what happened in Ukraine.” China has stepped up its military provocations against democratic Taiwan in recent years aimed at intimidating it into accepting Beijing’s demands to unify with the communist mainland. “They’re already flirting with danger right now by flying so close and all the maneuvers that are undertaken,” Biden said of China. Under the “one China” policy, the U.S. recognizes Beijing as the government of China and doesn’t have diplomatic relations with Taiwan. However, the U.S. maintains unofficial contacts, including a de facto embassy in Taipei, the capital, and supplies military equipment for the island’s defense. Biden said it is his “expectation” that China would not try to seize Taiwan by force, but he said that assessment “depends upon just how strong the world makes clear that that kind of action is going to result in long-term disapprobation by the rest of the community.” He added that deterring China from attacking Taiwan was one reason why it’s important that Russian President Vladimir Putin “pay a dear price for his barbarism in Ukraine,” lest China and other nations get the idea that such action is acceptable. Fearing escalation with nuclear-armed Russia, Biden quickly ruled out putting U.S. forces into direct conflict with Russia, but he has shipped billions of dollars in U.S. military assistance that has helped Ukraine put up a stiffer-than-expected resistance to Russia’s onslaught. Taipei cheered Biden’s remarks, with Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Joanne Ou expressing “sincere welcome and gratitude” for the comments. “The challenge posed by China to the security of the Taiwan Strait has drawn great concern in the international community,” said Ou. “Taiwan will continue to improve its self-defense capabilities and deepen cooperation with the United States and Japan and other like-minded countries to jointly defend the security of the Taiwan Strait and the rules-based international order while promoting peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region.” It’s not the first time Biden has pledged to defend Taiwan against a Chinese attack, only for administration officials to later claim there had been no change to American policy. In a CNN town hall in October, Biden was asked about using the U.S. military to defend Taiwan and replied, “Yes, we have a commitment to do that.” Biden’s comments came just before he formally launched a long-anticipated Indo-Pacific trade pact that excludes Taiwan. White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan confirmed Sunday that Taiwan isn’t among the governments signed up for the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, which is meant to allow the U.S. to work more closely with key Asian economies on issues like supply chains, digital trade, clean energy, and anti-corruption. Inclusion of Taiwan would have irked China. Sullivan said the U.S. wants to deepen its economic partnership with Taiwan on a one-to-one basis. Republished with the permission of The Associated Press.
Joe Biden finds no respite at home after returning from Europe
With the last nine unscripted words of an impassioned speech about Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, President Joe Biden created a troubling distraction, undermining his effectiveness as he returned home to face restive Americans who strongly disapprove of his performance on issues that matter most to them. His comment that Russia’s Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power” — an assertion that his aides were forced to quickly clean up — overshadowed his larger message of solidifying the Western coalition that’s confronting Moscow. It punctuated another frustrating moment for an administration that’s struggled to regain its footing — and the American electorate’s support — in the face of an ongoing pandemic, escalating inflation, and an increasingly complicated foreign policy crisis that raises the specter of nuclear conflict. Although he’s forged a united front to punish Russia with sanctions for the invasion of Ukraine, polls show Americans feel no better about his leadership as the bloody war continues. Meanwhile, Democrats are in danger of losing control of Congress in November’s midterm elections, leaving Biden with limited opportunities to advance a progressive domestic agenda that remains stalled. The president is on the verge of securing the confirmation of the first Black woman, Ketanji Brown Jackson, on the U.S. Supreme Court, yet there’s no clear path forward for him to fulfill other campaign promises around voting rights, criminal justice reform, and fighting climate change. While polls show that Jackson is broadly supported by Americans, it hasn’t helped improve Biden’s standing with voters less than eight months before the midterms, which Republicans hope to frame as a referendum on the president. The war in Russia has consumed much of the White House’s messaging bandwidth, but Biden is looking to turn the spotlight onto some of his domestic priorities this week. He is expected to unveil a new budget proposal on Monday, which includes a renewed focus on cutting the federal deficit and a populist proposal to increase taxes on the wealthiest Americans. If approved by Congress — far from a certainty — households worth more than $100 million — a measurement of wealth, not income — would have to pay a minimum tax of 20% on their earnings. The added revenue could help keep the deficit in check and finance some of Biden’s domestic priorities, including expanded safety net programs. There are few if any signs of Republican support for the proposal so far, and even some Democrats have been lukewarm to the idea. Biden’s case isn’t helped by his approval ratings. A slim 34% of Americans think Biden is doing a good job handling the economy, which is normally the top issue for voters in an election year, according to a poll released Thursday by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. His contentious assertion about Putin in his Warsaw speech did little to help things. The White House rushed to clarify that Biden wasn’t actually calling for “regime change,” but by the next day, it became clear that the dramatic statement had produced some of the first overt cracks in unity among NATO nations that had just convened in Brussels for an emergency meeting. Some leading Western European allies, including France and Germany, tend to be more cautious than the U.S. about how to confront Russia. Until Saturday night, Biden had calibrated his words carefully. French President Emmanuel Macron said Biden’s remarks could make it harder to resolve the conflict. “I wouldn’t use those terms because I continue to speak to President Putin, because what do we want to do collectively?” he said. “We want to stop the war that Russia launched in Ukraine, without waging war and without escalation.” In Berlin, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Sunday that neither NATO nor Biden seek regime change in Russia. Asked about Biden’s remarks during an appearance on ARD television, Scholz also said Biden had not made a dangerous mistake. “We both agree completely that regime change is not an object and aim of policy that we pursue together,” the chancellor said. Biden has enjoyed some rare bipartisan support for his handling of the Ukraine crisis. But some Republicans who have been generally supportive of his approach to the crisis chided him for his comments. Sen. James Risch of Idaho, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, dryly noted on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday, “Please, Mr. President, stay on script.” Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Biden’s final comment “plays into the hands of the Russian propagandists and plays into the hands of Vladimir Putin.” Secretary of State Antony Blinken was forced to continue clarifying Biden’s speech during a trip through the Middle East, where he had intended to focus on solidifying American partnerships as the administration seeks a renewed nuclear agreement with Iran. Speaking at a news conference in Jerusalem, Blinken said Biden meant that “Putin cannot be empowered to wage war or engage in aggression against Ukraine or anyone else.” In case there was any doubt, Biden gave an emphatic “No!” when asked by a reporter outside of church Sunday if he was calling for regime change with the remark. Even as Biden seemed to go too far for some allies with his speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy seemed to draw little comfort from it. He accused Western nations of lacking courage to confront Russia, and he said criticized their “ping-pong about who and how should hand over jets” and other weapons to the Ukrainian military. The speech in Warsaw was the third, and by far most consequential, of instances from the trip where Biden’s aides needed to clean up his comments. During a news conference in Brussels on Thursday, he said the U.S. would respond “in-kind” if Putin used chemical weapons in Ukraine. The next day, national security advisor Jake Sullivan said the president meant that “we’ll respond accordingly,” not that the U.S. would use chemical weapons of its own. And then, while speaking to members of the 82nd Airborne Division soldiers recently deployed to Poland, Biden seemed to suggest they would be going to Ukraine.
Joe Biden in Poland to see U.S. troops, Ukraine refugees
President Joe Biden will hear directly from U.S. troops stationed near Poland’s border with Ukraine on Friday and learn about the growing humanitarian response to the millions of Ukrainians fleeing to Poland to escape Russia’s assault on their homeland. Biden planned to meet with members of the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, who are serving alongside Polish troops. He arrived Friday afternoon at the airport in Rzeszow, the largest city in southeastern Poland, where some U.S. troops are based about an hour’s drive from the Ukrainian border. He will be in Warsaw on Saturday for talks with Polish President Andrzej Duda and others. The Polish leader was to welcome Biden at the airport on Friday, but his plane was delayed by a technical problem. The European Union says some 3.5 million Ukrainians — half of them children — have fled the country, with more than 2.2 million ending up in Poland. The U.S. Congress this month approved spending more than $13 billion on humanitarian and military assistance for Ukraine. The administration has begun allocating those funds. White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden will hear directly from the American troops and humanitarian experts about the situation on the ground and “what further steps need to be taken to make sure that we’re investing” U.S. dollars in the right place. Biden, who spent Thursday lobbying U.S. allies to stay united against Russia, speculated that what he sees in Poland “will reinforce my commitment to have the United States make sure we are a major piece of dealing with the relocation of all those folks, as well as humanitarian assistance needed both inside Ukraine and outside Ukraine.” Speaking in Brussels after meetings with other world leaders, Biden said he had visited many war zones and refugee camps during his political career and “it’s devastating” to see young children without parents or men and women with blank looks on their faces wondering, “My God, where am I? What’s going to happen to me?” He said Poland, Romania, and Germany shouldn’t be left on their own to deal with the largest refugee crisis in Europe since World War II. “This is an international responsibility,” Biden said shortly after he announced $1 billion in additional assistance to help Ukrainian refugees. He also announced that the United States would take in up to 100,000 of those refugees. The White House has said most Ukrainian refugees eventually want to return home. Biden said the United States is obligated to be “engaged and do all we can to ease the suffering and pain of innocent women and children and men” who make it across the border. He said, “I plan on attempting to see those folks … I hope I get to see a lot of people.” Some refugees interviewed Friday at the train station in Przemysl, Poland, said they hoped to eventually return to Ukraine. They also weren’t very hopeful about Biden’s visit. “For sure, I do not have any expectations” about Biden, said a tearful Ira Satula, 32, from Kremenchug. Satula was grateful for all the support and Poland’s warm reception. “But home is home, and I hope we’ll be there soon,” Satula said. Olga Antonovna, 68, from Chernigov, said “it’s really 50-50” that Biden will help enough. “I think that we needed help a long time ago, long before,” she said. Sullivan said Biden will give a speech Saturday on “the stakes of this moment, the urgency of the challenge that lies ahead, what the conflict in Ukraine means for the world.” Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Joe Biden pledges new Ukraine aid, warns Russia on chemical weapons
President Joe Biden and Western allies pledged new sanctions and humanitarian aid on Thursday in response to Vladimir Putin’s assault on Ukraine, but their offers fell short of the more robust military assistance that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pleaded for in a pair of live-video appearances. Biden also announced the U.S. would welcome up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees — though he said many probably prefer to stay closer to home — and provide an additional $1 billion in food, medicine, water, and other supplies. The Western leaders spent Thursday crafting next steps to counter Russia’s month-old invasion — and huddling over how they might respond should Putin deploy chemical, biological, or even a nuclear weapon. They met in a trio of emergency summits that had them shuttling across Brussels for back-to-back-to-back meetings of NATO, the Group of Seven industrialized nations, and the 27-member European Council. Biden, in an early evening news conference after the meetings, warned that a chemical attack by Russia “would trigger a response in kind.” “You’re asking whether NATO would cross. We’d make that decision at the time,” Biden said. However, a White House official said later that did not imply any shift in the U.S. position against direct military action in Ukraine. Biden and NATO allies have stressed that the U.S. and NATO would not put troops on the ground in Ukraine. The official was not authorized to comment publicly by name and spoke only on condition of anonymity. Zelenskyy, while thankful for the newly promised help, made clear to the Western allies he needed far more than they’re currently willing to give. “One percent of all your planes, one percent of all your tanks,” Zelenskyy asked members of the NATO alliance. “We can’t just buy those. When we will have all this, it will give us, just like you, 100% security.” Biden said more aid was on its way. But the Western leaders were treading carefully so as not to further escalate the conflict beyond the borders of Ukraine. “NATO has made a choice to support Ukraine in this war without going to war with Russia,” said French President Emmanuel Macron. “Therefore, we have decided to intensify our ongoing work to prevent any escalation and to get organized in case there is an escalation.” Poland and other eastern flank NATO countries are seeking clarity on how the U.S. and European nations can assist in dealing with their growing concerns about Russian aggression as well as the refugee crisis. More than 3.5 million refugees have fled Ukraine in recent weeks, including more than 2 million to Poland. Biden is to visit Rzeszów, Poland, on Friday, where energy and refugee issues are expected to be at the center of talks with President Andrzej Duda. He’ll get a briefing on humanitarian aid efforts to assist fleeing refugees and he’ll meet with U.S. troops from the 82nd Airborne Division who have been deployed in recent weeks to bolster NATO’s eastern flank. Billions of dollars of military hardware have already been provided to Ukraine. A U.S. official, who requested anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said Western nations were discussing the possibility of providing anti-ship weapons amid concerns that Russia will launch amphibious assaults along the Black Sea coast. Biden said his top priority at Thursday’s meetings was to make certain that the West stayed on the same page in its response to Russian aggression against Ukraine. “The single most important thing is for us to stay unified,” he said. Finland announced Thursday it would send more military equipment to Ukraine, its second shipment in about three weeks. And Belgium announced it will add one billion euros to its defense budget in response to Russia’s invasion. At the same time, Washington will expand its sanctions on Russia, targeting members of the country’s parliament along with defense contractors. The U.S. said it will also work with other Western nations to ensure gold reserves held by Russia’s central bank are subject to existing sanctions. With Russia facing increasing international isolation, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg also warned China against coming to Moscow’s rescue. He called on Beijing “to join the rest of the world and clearly condemn the brutal war against Ukraine and not support Russia.” But Stoltenberg, too, made clear that the West had a “responsibility to prevent this conflict from becoming a full-fledged war in Europe.” The possibility that Russia will use chemical or even nuclear weapons has been a grim topic of conversation in Brussels. Stoltenberg said that NATO leaders agreed Thursday to send equipment to Ukraine to help protect it against a chemical weapons attack. White House officials said that both the U.S. and NATO have been working on contingency planning should Russia deploy nonconventional weaponry. NATO has specially trained and equipped forces if there should be such an attack against a member nation’s population, territory, or forces. Ukraine is not a member. Stoltenberg said in an NBC News interview that if Russia deployed chemical weapons, that would make “an unpredictable, dangerous situation even more dangerous and even more unpredictable.” He declined to comment about how the alliance might respond. The White House National Security Council launched efforts days after the invasion through its “Tiger Team,” which is tasked with planning three months out, and a second strategy group working on a longer-term review of any geopolitical shift that may come, according to a senior administration official. The official was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. Both teams are conducting contingency planning for scenarios including Russia’s potential use of chemical or biological weapons, targeting of U.S. security convoys in the region, disruptions to global food supply chains, and the growing refugee crisis. Biden before departing for Europe on Wednesday said that the possibility of a chemical attack was a “real threat.” In addition, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told CNN this week that Russia could consider using its nuclear weapons if it felt there were “an existential threat for our country.” Finland’s Prime Minister Sanna Marin on Thursday warned, “Russia is capable
Joe Biden to announce new Russia sanctions while in Brussels
President Joe Biden plans to announce new sanctions against Russia on Thursday while in Brussels for meetings with NATO and European allies, according to a top national security aide. Biden, who will take part in a special meeting of NATO and address the European Council summit, is also expected to underscore efforts to enforce the avalanche of existing sanctions already announced by the U.S. and allies. “He will join our partners in imposing further sanctions on Russia and tightening the existing sanctions to crack down on evasion and to ensure robust enforcement,” said White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan, who declined to further preview new sanctions the president will announce. Biden is traveling to Brussels and Poland — which has received more than 2 million Ukrainian refugees who have fled since the February 24 invasion — looking to press for continued unity among Western allies as Russia presses on with its brutal invasion of Ukraine. In Poland, Biden will meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda, who has requested further U.S. aid and a stepped-up military presence on NATO’s eastern flank as the war grinds on. The U.S. has already more than doubled its regular troop presence of more than 4,000 U.S. troops. Currently, there are about 10,000 U.S. troops in Poland. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania have also called for a greater NATO or U.S. military presence in recent weeks. Sullivan suggested that could be coming soon as Biden plans to have talks “on longer-term adjustments to NATO force posture on the eastern flank.” “We feel that it is the right place for him to go to be able to see troops, to be able to see humanitarian experts, and to be able to meet with a frontline and very vulnerable ally,” Sullivan said of Biden’s visit to Poland. Talks on troop adjustments are already underway. Last week, at NATO’s Brussels headquarters, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and his counterparts weighed what defenses to set up on the organization’s eastern flank, from Estonia in the north through Latvia, Lithuania and Poland down to Bulgaria and Romania on the Black Sea. The aim is to deter President Vladimir Putin from ordering an invasion of any of the 30 allies; not just for the duration of this war but for the next 5-10 years. Before launching it, Putin had demanded that NATO stop expanding and withdraw its forces from the east. The opposite is happening. In just the past two months, the U.S. presence in Europe has jumped from about 80,000 troops to about 100,000, which is nearly as many as were there in 1997 when the United States and its NATO allies began an expansion of the alliance that Putin says threatens Russia and must be reversed. By comparison, in 1991, the year the Soviet Union dissolved, the United States had 305,000 troops in Europe, including 224,000 in Germany alone, according to Pentagon records. The number then dropped steadily, reaching 101,000 in 2005 and about 64,000 as recently as 2020. Biden and NATO have said repeatedly that while the U.S. and NATO will provide weapons and other defensive support to non-NATO member Ukraine, they are determined to avoid any escalation on behalf of Kyiv that risks a broader war with Russia. Polish leaders have called for a Western peacekeeping mission to intervene in Ukraine, a step that the U.S. and other allies worry could lead to a broadening of the war. Sullivan added that Biden will also “announce joint action on enhancing European energy security and reducing Europe’s dependence on Russian gas.” Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
War fears grow as Vladimir Putin orders troops to eastern Ukraine
A long-feared Russian invasion of Ukraine appeared to be imminent Monday, if not already underway, with Russian President Vladimir Putin ordering forces into separatist regions of eastern Ukraine. A vaguely worded decree signed by Putin did not say if troops were on the move, and it cast the order as an effort to “maintain peace.” But it appeared to dash the slim remaining hopes of averting a major conflict in Europe that could cause massive casualties, energy shortages on the continent, and economic chaos around the globe. Putin’s directive came hours after he recognized the separatist areas in a rambling, fact-bending discourse on European history. The move paved the way to provide them military support, antagonizing Western leaders who regard such a move as a breach of world order and set off a frenzied scramble by the U.S. and others to respond. Underscoring the urgency, the U.N. Security Council set a rare nighttime emergency meeting on Monday at the request of Ukraine, the U.S., and other countries. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, sought to project calm, telling the country: “We are not afraid of anyone or anything. We don’t owe anyone anything. And we won’t give anything to anyone.” The White House issued an executive order to prohibit U.S. investment and trade in the separatist regions, and additional measures — likely sanctions — were to be announced Tuesday. Those sanctions are independent of what Washington has prepared in the event of a Russian invasion, according to a senior administration official who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity. The developments came amid a spike in skirmishes in the eastern regions that Western powers believe Russia could use as a pretext for an attack on the western-looking democracy that has defied Moscow’s attempts to pull it back into its orbit. Putin justified his decision in a far-reaching, pre-recorded speech blaming NATO for the current crisis and calling the U.S.-led alliance an existential threat to Russia. Sweeping through more than a century of history, he painted today’s Ukraine as a modern construct that is inextricably linked to Russia. He charged that Ukraine had inherited Russia’s historic lands and, after the Soviet collapse was used by the West to contain Russia. “I consider it necessary to take a long-overdue decision: To immediately recognize the independence and sovereignty of Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic,” Putin said. Afterward, he signed decrees recognizing the Donetsk and Luhansk regions’ independence, eight years after fighting erupted between Russia-backed separatists and Ukrainian forces, and called on lawmakers to approve measures paving the way for military support. Until now, Ukraine and the West have accused Russia of supporting the separatists, but Moscow has denied that, saying that Russians who fought there were volunteers. At an earlier meeting of Putin’s Security Council, a stream of top officials argued for recognizing the regions’ independence. At one point, one slipped up and said he favored including them as part of Russian territory — but Putin quickly corrected him. Recognizing the separatist regions’ independence is likely to be popular in Russia, where many share Putin’s worldview. Russian state media released images of people in Donetsk launching fireworks, waving large Russian flags, and playing Russia’s national anthem. Ukrainians in Kyiv, meanwhile, bristled at the move. “Why should Russia recognize (the rebel-held regions)? If neighbors come to you and say, ‘This room will be ours,’ would you care about their opinion or not? It’s your flat, and it will be always your flat,” said Maria Levchyshchyna, a 48-year-old painter in the Ukrainian capital. “Let them recognize whatever they want. But in my view, it can also provoke a war, because normal people will fight for their country.” With an estimated 150,000 Russian troops massed on three sides of Ukraine, the U.S. has warned that Moscow has already decided to invade. Still, Joe Biden and Putin tentatively agreed to a meeting brokered by French President Emmanuel Macron in a last-ditch effort to avoid war. If Russia moves in, the meeting will be off, but the prospect of a face-to-face summit resuscitated hopes in diplomacy to prevent a conflict that could cause massive casualties and huge economic damage across Europe, which is heavily dependent on Russian energy. Russia says it wants Western guarantees that NATO won’t allow Ukraine and other former Soviet countries to join as members — and Putin said Monday that a simple moratorium on Ukraine’s accession wouldn’t be enough. Moscow has also demanded the alliance halt weapons deployments to Ukraine and roll back its forces from Eastern Europe — demands flatly rejected by the West. Macron’s office said both leaders had “accepted the principle of such a summit,” to be followed by a broader meeting that would include other “relevant stakeholders to discuss security and strategic stability in Europe.” U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan, meanwhile, said the administration has always been ready to talk to avert a war — but was also prepared to respond to any attack. Putin’s announcement shattered a 2015 peace deal signed in Minsk requiring Ukrainian authorities to offer broad self-rule to the rebel regions, a major diplomatic coup for Moscow. That deal was resented by many in Ukraine who saw it as a capitulation, a blow to the country’s integrity, and a betrayal of national interests. Putin and other officials argued Monday that Ukrainian authorities have shown no appetite for implementing it. Over 14,000 people have been killed since the conflict erupted in the eastern industrial heartland in 2014, shortly after Moscow annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula. Potential flashpoints multiplied. Sustained shelling continued Monday along the tense line of contact separating the opposing forces. Unusually, Russia said it had fended off an “incursion” from Ukraine — which Ukrainian officials denied. And Russia decided to prolong military drills in Belarus, which could offer a staging ground for an attack on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. Ukraine and the separatist rebels have traded blame for massive cease-fire violations, with hundreds of explosions recorded daily. While separatists have charged that Ukrainian forces were firing on residential
White House: U.S. has capacity to evacuate remaining Americans
The United States has the capacity to evacuate the approximately 300 U.S. citizens remaining in Afghanistan who want to leave before President Joe Biden’s Tuesday deadline, senior Biden administration officials said Sunday, as another U.S. drone strike against suspected Islamic State militants underscored the grave threat in the war’s final days. “This is the most dangerous time in an already extraordinarily dangerous mission these last couple of days,” America’s top diplomat, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, said not long before confirmation of that airstrike in Kabul, the capital. The evacuation flow of Americans kept pace even as a new State Department security alert issued hours before the military action instructed people to leave the airport area immediately “due to a specific, credible threat.” Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said that for those U.S. citizens seeking immediately to leave Afghanistan by the looming deadline, “we have the capacity to have 300 Americans, which is roughly the number we think are remaining, come to the airport and get on planes in the time that is remaining. We moved out more than that number just yesterday. So from our point of view, there is an opportunity right now for American citizens to come, to be admitted to the airport and to be evacuated safely and effectively.” Sullivan said the U.S. does not currently plan to have an ongoing embassy presence after the final U.S. troop withdrawal. But he pledged the U.S. “will make sure there is safe passage for any American citizen, any legal permanent resident” after Tuesday, as well as for “those Afghans who helped us.” But untold numbers of vulnerable Afghans, fearful of a return to the brutality of pre-2001 Taliban rule, are likely to be left behind. Blinken said the U.S. was working with other countries in the region to either keep the Kabul airport open after Tuesday or to reopen it “in a timely fashion.” He also said that while the airport is critical, “there are other ways to leave Afghanistan, including by road and many countries border Afghanistan.” The U.S., he said, is “making sure that we have in place all of the necessary tools and means to facilitate the travel for those who seek to leave Afghanistan” after Tuesday. There also are roughly 280 others who have said they are Americans but who have told the State Department they plan to remain in the country or are still undecided. According to the latest totals, about 114,000 people have been evacuated since the Taliban takeover on Aug. 14, including approximately 2,900 on military and coalition flights during the 24 hours ending at 3 a.m. on Sunday. Members of Congress criticized the chaotic and violent evacuation. “We didn’t have to be in this rush-rush circumstance with terrorists breathing down our neck,” said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah. “But it’s really the responsibility of the prior administration and this administration that has caused this crisis to be upon us and has led to what is without question a humanitarian and foreign policy tragedy.” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said the U.S. policy in Afghanistan, with 2,500 troops on the ground, had been working. “We were, in effect, keeping the lid on, keeping terrorists from reconstituting, and having a light footprint in the country,” he said. U.S. officials said the American drone strike hit a vehicle carrying multiple Islamic State suicide bombers, causing secondary explosions indicating the presence of a substantial amount of explosive material. A senior U.S. official said the military drone fired a Hellfire missile at a vehicle in a compound between two buildings after individuals were seen loading explosives into the trunk. The official said there was an initial explosion caused by the missile, followed by a much larger fireball, believed to be the result of the substantial amount of explosives inside the vehicle. The U.S. believes that two Islamic State group individuals who were targeted were killed. In a statement, U.S. Central Command said it is looking into the reports of civilian casualties that may have been caused by the secondary explosions. An Afghan official said three children were killed in the strike. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations. It was the second airstrike in recent days the U.S. has conducted against the militant group, which claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing Thursday at the Kabul airport gate that killed 13 U.S. service members and scores of Afghans struggling to get out of the country and escape the new Taliban rule. The Pentagon said a U.S. drone mission in eastern Afghanistan killed two members of IS’ Afghanistan affiliate early Saturday local time in retaliation for the airport bombing. In Delaware, Biden met privately with the families of the American troops killed in the suicide attack and solemnly watched as the remains of the fallen returned to U.S. soil from Afghanistan. First lady Jill Biden and many of the top U.S. defense and military leaders joined him on the tarmac at Dover Air Force Base to grieve with loved ones as the “dignified transfer” of remains unfolded, a military ritual for those killed in foreign combat. Sullivan said earlier that the U.S. would continue strikes against IS and consider “other operations to go after these guys, to get them and to take them off the battlefield.” He added: “We will continue to bring the fight to the terrorists in Afghanistan to make sure they do not represent a threat to the United States. In a joint statement, the U.S. and about 100 other nations said they are committed to ensuring that their citizens, employees, Afghans, and others at risk will be able to travel freely from Afghanistan. The statement said the Taliban had made assurances that “all foreign nationals and any Afghan citizen with travel authorization from our countries will be allowed to proceed in a safe and orderly manner to points of departure and travel outside the country.” The 13 service members were the first U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan since
U.S. troops surge evacuations out of Kabul but threats persist
The U.S. military reported its biggest day of evacuation flights out of Afghanistan by far on Monday, but deadly violence that has blocked many desperate evacuees from entering Kabul’s airport persisted, and the Taliban signaled they might soon seek to shut down the airlifts. Twenty-eight U.S. military flights ferried about 10,400 people to safety out of Taliban-held Afghanistan over 24 hours that ended early Monday morning, and 15 C-17 flights over the next 12 hours brought out another 6,660, White House officials said. The chief Pentagon spokesman, John Kirby, said the faster pace of evacuation was due in part to coordination with Taliban commanders on getting evacuees into the airport. “Thus far, and going forward, it does require constant coordination and deconfliction with the Taliban,” Kirby said. “What we’ve seen is, this deconfliction has worked well in terms of allowing access and flow as well as reducing the overall size of the crowds just outside the airport.” With access still difficult, the U.S. military went beyond the airport to carry out another helicopter retrieval of Americans. U.S. officials said a military helicopter picked up 16 American citizens Monday and brought them onto the airfield for evacuation. This was at least the second such rescue mission beyond the airport; Kirby said that last Thursday, three Army helicopters picked up 169 Americans near a hotel just beyond the airport gate and flew them onto the airfield. President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said at the White House that talks with the Taliban are continuing as the administration looks for additional ways to safely move more Americans and others into the Kabul airport. “We are in talks with the Taliban on a daily basis through both political and security channels,” he said, adding that ultimately it will be Biden’s decision alone whether to continue military-led evacuation operations beyond Aug. 31. In a reminder of the urgency felt amid a dizzying array of security threats to the evacuation effort, the Pentagon posted a video of a laser near the airport targeting a U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft and apparently attempting to disrupt the pilot during landing. After more than a week of evacuations plagued by major obstacles, including Taliban forces and crushing crowds that are making approaching the airport difficult and dangerous, the number of people flown out met — and exceeded — U.S. projections for the first time. The count was more than twice the 3,900 flown out in the previous 24 hours on U.S. military planes. Army Gen. Stephen Lyons, head of U.S. Transportation Command, which manages the military aircraft that are executing the Kabul airlift, told a Pentagon news conference that more than 200 planes are involved, including aerial refueling planes, and that arriving planes are spending less than an hour on the tarmac at Kabul before loading and taking off. He said the nonstop mission is taking a toll on aircrews. “They’re tired,” Lyons said of the crews. “They’re probably exhausted in some cases.” On a more positive note, Lyons said that in addition to the widely reported case of an Afghan woman giving birth aboard a U.S. evacuation aircraft, two other babies have been born in similar circumstances. He did not provide details. The Pentagon said it has added a fourth U.S. military base, in New Jersey, to three others — in Virginia, Texas, and Wisconsin — that are prepared to temporarily house arriving Afghans. Maj. Gen. Hank Williams, the Joint Staff deputy director for regional operations, told reporters there are now about 1,200 Afghans at those military bases. The four bases combined are capable of housing up to 25,000 evacuees, Kirby said. Afghan evacuees continued to arrive at Dulles International Airport outside of Washington. A bus carried some of the latest arrivals from Dulles airport to another site for what would be one of many processing stops before they reach new homes in the United States. Exhaustion clouded the faces of many of the adults. How does it feel to be here, a journalist asked one man. “We are safe,” he answered. An older woman sank with relief into an offered wheelchair, and a little girl carried by an older boy shaded her eyes to look curiously around. It was an interim stop for what had been a grueling struggle over days for many to get flights out of what is now Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. The scramble to evacuate left many arrivals carrying only a book bag or purse or a plastic shopping bag of belongings. Some arrived for their new lives entirely empty-handed. Biden said Sunday he would not rule out extending the evacuation beyond Aug. 31, the date he had set for completing the withdrawal of troops. And British Prime Minister Boris Johnson plans to press Biden for an extension to get out the maximum number of foreigners and Afghan allies possible. Biden is to face the U.S.’s G-7 allies in a virtual summit on Afghanistan Tuesday. Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen, in an interview with Sky News, said that Aug. 31 is a “red line” the U.S. must not cross and that extending the American presence would “provoke a reaction.” Since the Taliban seized the capital on August 15, completing a stunning rout of the U.S.-backed Afghan government and military, the U.S. has been carrying out the evacuation in coordination with the Taliban, who have held off on attacking under a 2020 withdrawal deal with the Trump administration. Monday’s warning signaled the Taliban could insist on shutting down the airlifts out of the Kabul airport in just over a week. Lawmakers, refugee groups, veterans’ organizations, and U.S. allies have said ending the evacuation then could strand countless Afghans and foreigners still hoping for flights out. Since August 14, the U.S. has evacuated and facilitated the evacuation of about 37,000 people. A firefight just outside the airport killed at least one Afghan soldier early Monday, German officials said. It was the latest in days of often-lethal turmoil outside the airport. People coming in hopes of escaping Taliban
Joe Biden tells Israel president he won’t tolerate nuclear Iran
President Joe Biden sought to assure Israel that he would not tolerate a nuclear Iran as he met with outgoing Israeli President Reuven Rivlin on Monday amid a major shakeup in Israeli politics and growing angst in Tel Aviv over the U.S. administration’s effort to reenter the Iran nuclear deal. Biden noted that he had ordered airstrikes a day earlier targeting facilities the U.S. military says were used by Iran-backed militia groups near the border between Iraq and Syria. The rhetoric seemed to underscore that he would remain tough on malign Iran’s activity even as he seeks a diplomatic track to stem Tehran’s nuclear program. “What I can say to you is that Iran will never get a nuclear weapon on my watch,” Biden said at the White House meeting. The meeting with Rivlin, who is making his final foreign trip of his presidency, took place just weeks after Naftali Bennett became Israel’s new prime minister, replacing Benjamin Netanyahu. The Biden administration, meanwhile, has intensified efforts to revive Iran’s 2015 accord with world powers to limit Tehran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons. Former President Donald Trump, with Netanyahu’s backing, scrapped the accord in 2018. Biden said he hoped to meet the new prime minister at the White House “very soon.” Rivlin is set to leave office on July 7 after a seven-year term. Isaac Herzog, a former parliament member who most recently headed a nonprofit that works closely with the government to promote immigration to Israel, will take over as Israeli president. Rivlin met later Monday with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Both leaders stressed the friendship between their countries, although Rivlin noted disagreements as well. Biden said he and the Israeli president would talk about Iran and the aftermath of the Gaza war. The president also underscored his support for continued normalization of relations between Israel and countries in the Arab and Muslim world and planned to reiterate the administration’s promise to resupply Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, which was depleted during the 11-day war with Hamas in Gaza. The latest conflict claimed at least 254 Palestinian lives and killed 13 people in Israel. Biden has low hopes, at least for the moment, of reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, according to an official familiar with Biden administration deliberations. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations, said Biden administration officials are starting at square one in building contacts with the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, a relationship that eroded during the Trump administration. The meeting with Rivlin comes one day after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met in Rome with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, a centrist who along with Bennett and six other political allies built a fragile coalition government that put Netanyahu in the opposition. Aviv Kochavi, chief of staff of Israel Defense Forces, met last week with Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, and other senior national security officials. Kochavi reiterated Israel’s opposition to efforts by the Biden administration to revive the 2015 accord. Administration officials, however, have countered in talks with Kochavi and others in the new Israeli government that it’s worth giving diplomacy a shot at stopping Tehran from acquiring a nuclear weapons system, even if it’s not guaranteed, the official said. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
At an arms control crossroads, Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin face choices
At a low point in U.S.-Russian relations, President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin appear to agree broadly on at least one thing — their first face-to-face meeting Wednesday is a chance to set the stage for a new era in arms control. Whether that leads to actual arms negotiations is another matter, complicated by the soured relationship and accusations by each country that the other has cheated on past arms treaties. The fabric of arms control has been fraying, notably with the abandonment in 2019 — first by Washington, then by Moscow — of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which had governed a whole class of missiles for more than three decades. The Trump administration also pulled the United States out of the Open Skies Treaty, which had allowed surveillance flights over military facilities in both countries. Last month the Biden administration informed the Russians that it would not reenter the treaty, and last week Putin confirmed Russia’s exit. Biden and Putin now face choices about how and when to restart a dialogue over arms control priorities, even as Biden faces pressure from Congress on China’s growing military might and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. Despite its importance, the arms control issue may get overshadowed at the Biden-Putin summit, given heightened U.S. focus on ransomware attacks, alleged Russian interference in U.S. elections, Russia’s military buildup on Ukraine’s border, and allegations that the Kremlin was behind the SolarWinds hacking campaign. International arms control groups are pressing the Russian and American leaders to start a push for new arms control by holding “strategic stability” talks — a series of government-to-government discussions meant to sort through the many areas of disagreement and tension on the national security front. There also are calls for such consultations to include Europe because the talks could cover a wide range of issues, including cyber threats, space operations, and missile defenses, in addition to nuclear weapons. Officials in Moscow and Washington have indicated they see value in strategic stability talks, which probably would not be an arms control negotiation but rather a series of discussions at lower levels aimed at deciding how to organize and prioritize an eventual arms control agenda. “What we are looking to do is for the two presidents to be able to send a clear signal to their teams on questions of strategic stability so that we can make progress on arms control and other nuclear areas to reduce tension and instability in that aspect of the relationship,” Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said last week. Washington broke off strategic stability talks with Moscow in 2014 in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its military intervention in support of separatists in eastern Ukraine. Talks resumed in 2017 but gained little traction and failed during the Trump administration’s final weeks to produce an agreement on extending the New START treaty limiting nuclear weapons. Shortly after Biden took office in January, the two sides agreed to a five-year extension but with no road map for future talks. Biden wrote in The Washington Post, previewing his trip to Europe, that he already has made clear to Putin that the United States wants to avoid conflict. Biden will attend a NATO summit meeting and consult with European Union officials before the Geneva session with Putin. “We want a stable and predictable relationship where we can work with Russia on issues like strategic stability and arms control,” Biden wrote. Putin said he, too, is ready for such talks. “Strategic stability is extremely important,” Putin said June 3 in remarks to heads of international news agencies. “We don’t want to scare anyone with our new weapons systems. Yes, we are developing them, and we have achieved certain results and successes. But all leading countries and leading military powers are doing this, and we are just one step ahead.” “We realize that other high-tech powers, such as the United States and other countries, will achieve similar results sooner or later,” Putin added. “Therefore, I believe that it is better to reach an agreement in advance on how we will live together in a changing world. We are ready for this.” Putin appeared to be alluding to what some call Russia’s exotic strategic weapons such as the Poseidon nuclear-armed, nuclear-powered torpedo, and the experimental Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile. Putin has said these can be discussed as part of a strategic stability dialogue. But the Americans must be prepared to include for discussion their work on strategic missile defenses, which Moscow has long called an impediment to arms control. International arms control experts want to ensure that Europe has a place at the table. Some favor a restart of direct consultations between NATO and Russia, which were cut off after Russia seized Crimea, not as an arms control forum but as a means of discussing tensions and reducing risks of war. In the past, the U.S., Europe, and Russia shared a mutual understanding of the ways to avoid accidents and miscalculations leading to conflict. “Today, however, clashing national interests, insufficient dialogue, eroding arms control agreements, advanced missile systems, and new cyber and hypersonic weapons have destabilized the old equilibrium and are increasing the risk of nuclear conflict,” U.S., European and Russian members of the Euro-Atlantic Security Leadership Group wrote in a statement last Monday urging more attention to arms control. In a separate appeal to Putin and Biden, a group of Russian and American organizations, nuclear policy experts, and former senior government officials called for resuming a strategic dialogue “that is regular, frequent, comprehensive and result-oriented leading to further reduction of the nuclear risk hanging over the world and to the rediscovery of the road to a world free of nuclear weapons.” Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Joe Biden opens overseas trip declaring ‘United States is back’
President Joe Biden opened the first overseas trip of his term Wednesday with a declaration that “the United States is back” as he seeks to reassert the nation on the world stage and steady European allies deeply shaken by his predecessor. Biden has set the stakes for his eight-day trip in sweeping terms, believing the West must publicly demonstrate it can compete economically with China as the world emerges from the coronavirus pandemic. It is an open repudiation of his predecessor, Donald Trump, who scorned alliances and withdrew from a global climate change agreement that Biden has since rejoined. The president’s first stop was a visit with U.S. troops and their families at Royal Air Force Mildenhall, where he laid out his mission for the trip. “We’re going to make it clear that the United States is back and democracies are standing together to tackle the toughest challenges and issues that matter the most to our future,” he said. “That we’re committed to leading with strength, defending our values, and delivering for our people.” The challenges awaiting Biden overseas were clear as the president, and the audience wore masks — a reminder of the pandemic that is still raging around much of the world even as its threat recedes within the United States. “We have to end COVID-19 not just at home — which we’re doing — but everywhere,” Biden said. Shortly before the president spoke, people briefed on the matter said the Biden administration had brokered an agreement with Pfizer to purchase 500 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to be donated to 92 lower-income countries and the African Union over the next year. National security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that Biden was committed to sharing vaccines because it was in the public health and strategic interests of the U.S. He added that Biden is aiming to show “that democracies are the countries that can best deliver solutions for people everywhere.” “As he said in his joint session (address), we were the ‘arsenal of democracy’ in World War II,” Sullivan said. “We’re going to be the ‘arsenal of vaccines’ over this next period to help end the pandemic.” Building toward his trip-ending summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Biden will aim to reassure European capitals that the United States can once again be counted on as a dependable partner to thwart Moscow’s aggression both on their eastern front and their internet battlefields. The trip will be far more about messaging than specific actions or deals. And the paramount priority for Biden is to convince the world that his Democratic administration is not just a fleeting deviation in the trajectory of an American foreign policy that many allies fear irrevocably drifted toward a more transactional outlook under Trump. “The trip, at its core, will advance the fundamental thrust of Joe Biden’s foreign policy,” Sullivan said, “to rally the world’s democracies to tackle the great challenges of our time.” Biden’s to-do list is ambitious. In their face-to-face sit-down in Geneva, Biden wants to privately pressure Putin to end myriad provocations, including cybersecurity attacks on American businesses by Russian-based hackers, the jailing of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and repeated overt and covert efforts by the Kremlin to interfere in U.S. elections. Biden is also looking to rally allies on their COVID-19 response and to urge them to coalesce around a strategy to check emerging economic and national security competitor China even as the U.S. expresses concern about Europe’s economic links to Moscow. Biden also wants to nudge outlying allies, including Australia, to make more aggressive commitments to the worldwide effort to curb global warming. The week-plus journey is a big moment for Biden, who traveled the world for decades as vice president and as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has now stepped off Air Force One onto international soil as commander in chief. He will face world leaders still grappling with the virus and rattled by four years of Trump’s inward-looking foreign policy and moves that strained longtime alliances as the Republican former president made overtures to strongmen. The president first attends a summit of the Group of Seven leaders in the U.K. and then visits Brussels for a NATO summit and a meeting with the heads of the European Union. The trip comes at a moment when Europeans have diminished expectations for what they can expect of U.S. leadership on the foreign stage. Central and Eastern Europeans are desperately hoping to bind the U.S. more tightly to their security. Germany is looking to see the U.S. troop presence maintained there, so it doesn’t need to build up its own. France, meanwhile, has taken the tack that the U.S. can’t be trusted as it once was and that the European Union must pursue greater strategic autonomy going forward. “I think the concern is real that the Trumpian tendencies in the U.S. could return full bore in the midterms or in the next presidential election,” said Alexander Vershbow, a former U.S. diplomat and once deputy secretary general of NATO. The sequencing of the trip is deliberate: Biden consulting with Western European allies for much of a week as a show of unity before his summit with Putin. He holds a sitdown Thursday with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson a day ahead of the G-7 summit to be held above the craggy cliffs of Cornwall overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. The most tactile of politicians, Biden has grown frustrated by the diplomacy-via-Zoom dynamics of the pandemic and has relished the ability to again have face-to-face meetings that allow him to size up and connect with world leaders. While Biden himself is a veteran statesman, many of the world leaders he will see in England, including Johnson and French President Emmanuel Macron, took office after Biden left the vice presidency. Another, Germany’s Angela Merkel, will leave office later this year. There are several potential areas of tension. On climate change, the U.S. is aiming to regain its credibility after Trump pulled the country back from the fight against global warming. Biden could also feel pressure on
