Warsaw, Mar. 27, (dpa/GNA) - US President Joe Biden warned Russian President Vladimir Putin against any attack on NATO soil, saying the US and its NATO partners had a “sacred obligation” to defend alliance territory with the combined might of all its members.
Putin had miscalculated with the war of aggression in Ukraine, Biden said in a speech at Warsaw’s Royal Castle on Saturday evening, adding that NATO and the West were now stronger and “more united” than ever.
“We stand with you,” Biden told Ukrainians, adding that Russia was trying to crush democracy in its own country and was also endangering its neighbours.
In comments addressed directly to the Russian people, the US president said, “This is not who you are, this is not the future you deserve for your families and your children.”
“This war is not worthy of you, the Russian people, who can and must end this war. The American people will stand with you and the brave citizens of Ukraine who want peace,” he said in a historic speech that came at the close of a two-day visit to Poland.
He also called on Western allies to show “staying power” in the conflict. “We must commit now to be in this fight for the long haul. We must remain unified today and tomorrow and the day after and for the years and decades to come,” Biden said.
“It will not be easy. There will be cost, but it’s a price we have to pay because the darkness that drives autocracy is no match for the flame of liberty that lights the souls of free people everywhere,” he said.
Biden admitted the battle would take time and that he expected an extended conflict over the future international order.
At stake was “the great battle of freedom, the battle between democracy and autocracy, between liberty and repression, between a rules-based order and one governed by brute force,” Biden said.
“We need to be clear-eyed, this battle will not be won in days or months either. We need to steel ourselves for the long fight ahead,” he said.
Tough Western sanctions on Moscow were having an effect, Biden stressed, predicting that they would eventually lead to the size of the Russian economy is “cut in half” over the next few years.
“As a result of these unprecedented sanctions, the rouble was almost immediately reduced to rubble,” Biden said, referring to the dramatic devaluation of the Russian national currency. “The economy is on track to be cut in half,” he added.
Biden also condemned Putin’s justification for the war. “Putin has the gall to say that he is de-Nazifying Ukraine. It’s a lie, it’s just cynical, he knows that it is also obscene,” Biden said.
“For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power,” Biden said, without mentioning the Russian president by name, though he did so at several other points during his speech.
Shortly afterwards, a senior White House official sought to clarify that the president’s remarks were not a direct call for Putin’s overthrow.
“The president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbours or the region,” the official said. “He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.”
Earlier, Biden assured Poland of NATO’s support amid Russia’s continuing war on Ukraine.
“We consider Article 5 a sacred obligation, and you can count on that,” Biden told Polish President Andrzej Duda on the second day of his visit to the country as the two met for bilateral talks on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Duda welcomed Biden to the presidential palace in Warsaw where they were joined for talks by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, and Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau and Defence Minister Mariusz Blaszczak.
Earlier, Biden attended a reception ceremony in the capital and also briefly met Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov.
Biden’s schedule also included a visit to Warsaw’s National Stadium with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, where he saw first-hand the registration of Ukrainian refugees and the aid efforts being made to support them.
On meeting those who have fled the war, Biden described Putin as a “butcher,” when asked by a journalist what he thought of the Russian president given the suffering caused by the invasion. His comment was later slammed by the Kremlin.
Almost 2.27 million refugees from Ukraine have entered Poland since the Russian invasion began about a month ago, the country’s border guard tweeted on Saturday.
GNA