MADRID – President Biden on Thursday promised that the United States and NATO would support Ukraine for as long as necessary to ward off Russia’s invasion, despite waves of economic pain rolling through world markets and voters’ homes, saying it is the Kremlin who calculated incorrectly in its aggression, and not the West to oppose it.
At a news conference at the end of a NATO summit in Madrid, Mr. Biden said Americans and the rest of the world would have to pay more for gasoline and energy than a price to combat Russian aggression. How long? “As long as it takes, Russia cannot, in fact, defeat Ukraine and move past Ukraine,” he said.
But his remarks underscored the kaleidoscope of problems he and other NATO leaders face in committing their people to supporting Ukraine with money, weapons and sanctions against Russia, despite the damage it does to Western economies. cause and an uncertain outcome on the battlefield.
“You can already see in the media that interest is waning, and it also affects the public, and the public affects the politicians,” said Ann Linde, Sweden’s foreign minister. “It is therefore our responsibility to keep Ukraine and what Russia does high on our agenda. We’ve seen it so many times – you have a catastrophe, you have a war, and it’s just going on, but it’s slipping away. “
The 30 member states of NATO concluded an important, even transformative summit in Madrid this week, taking the first step in allowing Sweden and Finland, emphasizing their unity in support of Ukraine and approving plans to join the alliance’s forces. noticeably enlarged in countries on its eastern flank, closest to Russia and its ally, Belarus. The decisions, all prompted by the Russian invasion, are expected to strengthen the alliance, especially in its ability to defend the Baltic nations, while significantly expanding its border with Russia.
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia aimed to fragment NATO and prevent its expansion, but Mr. Biden said he started before the war, he had Mr. Putin warns that if he invades Ukraine, “NATO will not only become stronger, but also get more united, and we will see the democracies in the world rise up and resist its aggression and defend the rule-based order. . ” That, he said, was “exactly what we see today.”
But he and the leaders face economic crises, division at home and increasingly tired voters. Fuel prices are soaring, driven by war, high inflation and Western efforts to punish Moscow by its main exports, oil and gas. The United States, distracted and polarized by major court rulings, hearings on the Capitol riots and upcoming elections, is on the brink of a recession. German leaders warn of a potentially desperate energy crisis, and food prices rise as Russia blocks critical exports from Ukraine.
Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi had to leave the summit to help strengthen his political coalition, which is partly deeply unhappy about his firm support for Ukraine and the costs it entails.
Anna Wieslander, the Swedish director for Northern Europe for the Atlantic Council, said that although support for Ukraine mostly held over the alliance, it was unequal: the strongest in nations with long experience and deep fears of Russian domination, such as Poland and the Baltic states, and more difficult to maintain in countries such as Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and Greece.
Better understand the Russia-Ukraine war
“There it is rather a hard sell, with inflation, high energy prices and war fatigue, and will they really buy this geopolitical argument that we should do it now or things will be worse? We are not there yet, but it will be more difficult, “she said.
And the promises of some members to strengthen their armies remain far from changing the material conditions of the alliance. Spain spends barely 1 percent of its GDP on defense, half of NATO’s goal; Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has promised to reach 2 per cent only in 2029, and he must first persuade reluctant political parties to support the increase.
Ukraine’s leaders are still calling for more weapons, delivered faster, to repel Russia’s slow march. President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed NATO leaders and said this week that Ukraine needs about $ 5 billion a month just to make its government work.
The announcement of a strong expanded NATO response force, of some 300,000 troops or more, rather than the current 40,000, also illustrated the challenge that Western leaders face in realizing their rhetoric. The allies need to consult on which troops will be part of the force, spend money on equipping them, train them and decide on the logistics of deployments – a process that is likely to take at least a year.
“A lot has to be done by different countries, and it will take a lot of hard work” to develop an integrated force that can fight a major land war in Europe, said Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director of the Royal United Services Institute. a military research group in Britain. But NATO can no longer focus on “expeditionary forces” to fight in places like Afghanistan, he said, so “this summit was transformative.”
While NATO and its allies have been straining to navigate politics, find cash and move troops, China and India have filled the gap in Russia’s finances by buying the crude oil that fuels the Kremlin’s war machine. And Mr. Putin has appeared abroad again for the first time in months, appearing newly confident and patient, to engage in diplomatic delights in Central Asia.
“The work is going smoothly, rhythmically,” he told journalists in Turkmenistan late Wednesday, describing the fighting by Russian forces. He maintained that he was in no hurry to end the war, saying: “It is not necessary to talk about the timing.”
Despite that allegation, neither Russia nor Ukraine appear to have broken through the other side’s lines in any significant way in recent days, despite heavy bombardment and fighting in the eastern Donbas region and parts of southern Ukraine. Both sides were severely exhausted, after suffering heavy casualties and equipment losses.
After repeated Ukrainian attacks – including with powerful, newly arrived Western weapons – the last Russian troops retreated overnight by speedboats from Snake Island, a small piece of land in the Black Sea that Russia seized and used as a base around the Ukrainian coast to threaten.
But it was unclear whether Ukraine would be able to reoccupy the island, which could affect shipping control near Odessa. Russia has blocked Odessa and other ports, preventing the export of millions of tons of grain and contributing to a global food crisis.
Instead, neither party may be able to hold the island in the near future, as Russian warships are kept at a distance by Ukrainian missiles, but still patrol the Black Sea alongside submarines in greater numbers than Ukraine could sink.
The consensus among U.S. intelligence agencies is that the war is probably far from over, said Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence, on Wednesday in her first public update on the war in more than a month.
Ukrainian forces have occupied many of their fighting positions in Donbas, which includes the provinces of Luhansk and Donetsk. Although Russia has secured a large part of Luhansk province, US officials believe it will be difficult for the Russian military to seize the part of Donetsk that it does not already control.
“The conflict remains a grinding struggle in which the Russians are making increasing profits, but no breakthrough,” she said. Haines said. “In short, the picture remains rather bleak.”
Steven Erlanger, Michael D Shear and Jim Tankersley reported from Madrid, and Alan Yuhas of New York. Reporting contributed by Anton Troyanovsky of Berlin, Ivan Nechepurenko of Tbilisi, Georgia, Mark Santora of Warsaw, and Julian E Barnes of Washington.