President Biden will speak with Ukrainian President Volodmyr Zelensky and leaders of key European allies in order to “coordinate his message” and go into his Tuesday video call with Russian president Vladimir Putin with “unity and strong transatlantic solidarity on the way forward,” a senior administration official said Monday.
The official said Mr Biden plans to raise America’s “deep concern” with Russia’s military buildup along its’ border with Ukraine when he speaks to Mr Putin, as well as “other critical issues “ such as “strategic stability, cyber and Iran’s nuclear program”.
“The President will conduct this discussion the same way he has with past discussions with Putin in a professional, candid, straightforward manner, where he will make clear — without any kind of rhetorical flourish or finger wagging — what the United States is prepared to do, both in respect to deterrence and in respect to diplomacy,” the official said.
In recent weeks, Russian forces have begun a buildup of troops and materiel along Ukraine’s eastern frontier that experts say is reminiscent of what preceded Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea.
The administration official, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity, stressed the US does not know whether Mr Putin has made a decision about “further military escalation” in Ukraine. But they added that he appears to be “putting in place the capacity to engage in such such escalation should he decide to do so”.
“We’ve seen this Russian playbook before in 2014 ... they intensified disinformation in an effort to portray Ukraine as the aggressor and use that in an effort to justify what was a pre-planned military offensive”.
The official said Mr Biden will “will make clear that there will be very real costs should Russia choose to proceed,” while leaving room for “an effective way forward” with diplomatic efforts.
Those costs, the official said, will include further financial sanctions imposed in concert with European allies, with whom US officials have been in “intensive interactions” in recent weeks about how respond should Mr Putin choose to send troops over the border.
“We believe that we have a path forward that would involve substantial economic countermeasures by both the Europeans and the United States that would impose significant and severe economic harm on the Russian economy, should they choose to proceed,” they said, adding that such countermeasures would impose “genuine and meaningful and enduring costs”.
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