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Obama Deplores Russia’s ‘Brute Force’ in Ukraine Obama Deplores Russia’s ‘Brute Force’ in Ukraine
(about 7 hours later)
BRUSSELS — President Obama offered a sustained and forceful rejoinder against Russia on Wednesday, denouncing the “brute force” he said it has used to intimidate neighbors like Ukraine and vowing that the United States “will never waver” in standing up for its NATO allies against aggression by Moscow. BRUSSELS — President Obama has spent much of his presidency mired in the challenges of a world well outside the borders of Europe — the turmoil of the Middle East, the power struggles in Asia and the terrorist threats percolating in northern Africa, Pakistan and elsewhere.
In a speech meant as a capstone to his trip to Europe in the midst of an East-West confrontation with Russia, Mr. Obama addressed Moscow’s justifications for its intervention in Ukraine point by point, dismissing them as “absurd” or unmerited. He even defended the Iraq war, which he had opposed as a senator, as a stark contrast to the way Russia has seized the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine. But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its stunningly fast annexation of Crimea have demanded a renewed focus on the part of the world that dominated American attention in the 20th century. Often accused of neglecting Europe in his first five years in office, Mr. Obama is using his trip here to recommit to the NATO alliance, rally the continent against Russian “brute force” and cast the showdown as a test of common values.
“America and the world and Europe has an interest in a strong and responsible Russia, not a weak one,” Mr. Obama told an audience of leading figures here in the capital of the European Union. “But that does not mean that Russia can run roughshod over its neighbors. Just because Russia has a deep history with Ukraine does not mean it should be able to dictate Ukraine’s future. No amount of propaganda can make right something the world knows is wrong.” To show resolve, Mr. Obama decided on Wednesday to modestly increase military deployments in Eastern Europe, and aides said he would intensify efforts to broaden energy security, negotiate a trade agreement with Europe and upgrade military capabilities. Yet it will be hard to back up words with resources. The United States has only a small fraction of the force it once had in Europe, expanded energy ties will take years, and his own party leaders oppose quick action on a new trade pact.
Mr. Obama rejected as false Moscow’s claims that Russian-speaking citizens were systematically imperiled in Ukraine and that Russia did nothing more in Crimea than the West had done in Kosovo. He also disclaimed any self-interested motivations in supporting a new pro-Western government in Ukraine that toppled Moscow’s ally, President Viktor F. Yanukovych, last month. Moreover, Mr. Obama next month will head back to Asia, and aides said he would again promote his policy of pivoting toward the region he believes represents the future. One goal then for Mr. Obama, aides said, is to challenge Europe to take more of a leadership role itself, a familiar theme from Washington but one infused with new urgency by the Ukraine crisis.
“Make no mistake: Neither the United States nor Europe has any interest in controlling Ukraine,” Mr. Obama said. “We have sent no troops there. What we want is for the Ukrainian people to make their own decisions, just like other free people around the world.” “Russia’s leadership is challenging truths that only a few weeks ago seemed self-evident,” Mr. Obama said in a speech here on Wednesday. “That in the 21st century, the borders of Europe cannot be redrawn with force; that international law matters; and that people and nations can make their own decisions about their future.”
Mr. Obama also took on and dismissed the Russian claim that the United States is being hypocritical because of its invasion of Iraq. He reminded the audience that he had opposed the war. “But even in Iraq, America sought to work within the international system,” he said. “We didn’t claim or annex Iraq’s territory. We did not grab its resources for our own gain.” “The contest of ideas,” he added, “continues.”
The speech came as Mr. Obama moved to deploy additional military forces to Eastern Europe to guard against Russian aggression. The president met with Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the secretary general of NATO, to discuss ways of reassuring Poland and the Baltic states, fellow alliance members that remain acutely nervous about Russia’s actions in the region. The United States has already sent additional planes to patrol the Baltic region and an aviation detachment to Poland. Julianne Smith, a former national security aide in Mr. Obama’s White House now at the Center for a New American Security, said she did not expect “a fundamental recalibration of U.S. foreign policy” toward Europe, but a more “symbolic” shift. “It’s a little bit less about what the U.S. is going to do above and beyond what it’s done and more about challenging Europe to stand up to the task, particularly on the defense side,” she said.
Mr. Obama vowed to live up to NATO obligations to defend alliance members. “We have to make sure that we have put together very real contingency plans for every one of these members, including those who came in out of Central and Eastern Europe,” he said at a news conference before his speech. “And over the last several years we have worked up a number of these contingency plans.” He said alliance ministers next month would discuss doing more to ensure a “regular NATO presence among some of these states that feel vulnerable.” Yet if the renewed American attention to Europe proves largely symbolic, that by itself might represent an important shift. European leaders and analysts have long complained of Mr. Obama’s lack of interest.
The United States has already sent an extra six F-15C Eagles and 60 airmen to Lithuania and 12 F-16 fighter jets and 200 service members to Poland in recent weeks. “We’re prepared to do more,” Mr. Obama said. While he came into office wildly popular in Europe and made six trips here in his first year, he stopped traveling so often in his second year and even skipped a summit meeting with the European Union, offending the hosts until it was eventually rescheduled. In 2012, as he ran for re-election, he made no trips to Europe.
Aides said the president would bolster that presence by rotating more ground and naval troops for exercises and training in Poland and the Baltic countries; update contingency planning for specific countries and update NATO’s threat assessment in the region; and increase the capacity of a NATO quick-response force. His poll numbers in Europe remain higher than President George W. Bush’s, but they have slipped since 2009 amid disenchantment with drone strikes and other policies. Analysts said he never forged particularly strong relationships with his European counterparts and spying revelations soured ties even more, especially with Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany.
Mr. Obama challenged other NATO nations to expand their own efforts, saying that they needed to upgrade their own militaries and help their Eastern allies. “Going forward, every NATO member state must step up and carry its share of the burden,” he said. But Russia’s actions in Ukraine appear to have sent an electric jolt through Mr. Obama and his team. At first, when a political crisis broke out in Kiev in November, he largely left the matter to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Since President Vladimir V. Putin ordered troops to seize Crimea, Mr. Obama has become increasingly engaged, blitzing foreign leaders with telephone calls, imposing sanctions and speaking out more frequently.
But in his speech, at the Palais des Beaux-Arts, perhaps the most prominent cultural site in Belgium, the president made a point of saying he did not consider the current showdown with Russia to be a new Cold War, noting that it was not a global struggle over ideology between blocs of nations but what he called an isolated, out-of-touch power flexing its muscles. To reassure nervous allies, he sent six extra F-15C Eagles to Lithuania and 12 F-16 fighter jets to Poland. Mr. Obama, who met here with Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the NATO secretary general, will further bolster defenses in Eastern Europe by rotating more ground and naval forces for exercises and training in Poland and the Baltic countries; update contingency planning; and increase the capacity of a NATO quick-response force.
“Russia’s leadership is challenging truths that only a few weeks ago seemed self-evident, that in the 21st century the borders of Europe cannot be redrawn with force, that international law matters, that people and nations can make their own decisions about their future,” he said. “Putin just declared war on the European order and it’s demanding that the United States focus on Europe again as a security issue,” said Damon Wilson, a former national security aide to Mr. Bush and now executive vice president of the Atlantic Council. While some Republicans have pushed the president to be tougher, Mr. Wilson praised Mr. Obama’s response. “I don’t think I’ve seen the president more personally engaged on any foreign policy crisis in a concerted way as he has been on Ukraine.”
Then in a nod to the inward focus of many Americans, Mr. Obama added that “if we applied a coldhearted calculus, we might decide to look the other way” since Russia’s intimidation of Ukraine did not directly threaten the United States. “But that kind of casual indifference would ignore the lessons that are written in the cemeteries of this continent,” he said. “It would allow the old way of doing things to regain a foothold in this young century.” Mr. Obama’s speech here on Wednesday offered his most extensive rejoinder yet to Russia, a point-by-point refutation of every justification offered by Moscow for its seizure of Crimea. He rejected Mr. Putin’s comparison of his actions in Crimea to the West’s actions in Kosovo. He said Kremlin claims of persecution of Russian speakers in Ukraine were not true and called it “absurd” to suggest America supported fascists in Kiev. “No amount of propaganda can make right something that the world knows is wrong,” he said.
The president has spent the first half of his European trip this week immersed in the gritty details of persuading his European allies to support sanctions against Russian officials, business leaders and politicians, and to help finance an economic recovery for Ukraine. Perhaps most strikingly for a Democrat who rose to prominence in part due to his opposition to the Iraq war, Mr. Obama took on and dismissed the Russian claim that the United States was hypocritical because it used force to dislodge Saddam Hussein. He reminded his audience that he spoke out against Mr. Bush’s decision to invade in 2003. “But even in Iraq, America sought to work within the international system,” he said. “We did not claim or annex Iraq’s territory. We did not grab its resources for our own gain.”
But the speech was an attempt to step back and look at the broader issues, aides said, in the hopes of helping to outline for Americans back home and for allies around the world why it is crucial to confront President Vladimir V. Putin after his takeover of Crimea. Mr. Obama also turned away from his own rhetoric in 2012 when he mocked Mitt Romney’s us-against-them assessment of Mr. Putin by suggesting it was old-world thinking at a time when history had largely moved on. Now, it was Mr. Obama who evoked history, visiting Flanders Field Cemetery, a burial ground in Belgium for thousands of Americans who died in World War I, and later recounting the “ongoing clash” of two sets of national ideas about power and values during the Cold War.
“For decades, this vision stood in sharp contrast to life on the other side of an Iron Curtain,” Mr. Obama said, describing democratic ideals fostered by European countries. “For decades, a contest was waged, and ultimately that contest was won.”
In his speech, the president called for a reaffirmation of Atlantic relationships, suggesting the Europeans and Americans had become complacent since the collapse of the Soviet Union. He said that “man’s darkest impulses” had returned to Europe and that Americans and their allies must not take the progress of the last 50 years for granted.
“Casual indifference would ignore the lessons that are written in the cemeteries of this continent,” Mr. Obama said. “It would allow the old way of doing things to gain a foothold in this young century. And that message would be heard, not just in Europe but in Asia and the Americas, in Africa and the Middle East.”