President Biden’s secret visit to wartime Kyiv is an example of America in its finest tradition.
President Biden’s secret visit to wartime Kyiv is an example of America in its finest tradition.
The New York Times reports that after a “trans-Atlantic flight to Poland, Mr. Biden crossed the border by train, traveling for nearly 10 hours to Kyiv as other American officials have in recent months.”
This trip took guts.
Mr. Biden arrived unannounced early Monday morning to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky, and the two stepped out into the streets of Kyiv even as an air-raid siren sounded, a dramatic moment captured on video that underscored the investment the United States has made in Ukraine’s independence.
“One year later, Kyiv stands,” Mr. Biden declared at Mr. Zelensky’s side in Mariinsky Palace. “And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands.”
“Thank you so much for coming, Mr. President, at a huge moment for Ukraine,” Mr. Zelensky said.
The Times reports that Biden “slipped out of Washington in the dark of night without notice” in the early hours of Sunday morning on the East Coast: “Just a few reporters sworn to secrecy and deprived of their telephones were brought with him, along with Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser; Jen O’Malley Dillon, his deputy chief of staff; and Annie Tomasini, the director of Oval Office operations.”
The moment reminds me not so much of Presidents Bush, Obama, and Trump flying unannounced to Iraq or Afghanistan, but of President Roosevelt’s wartime travels across the Atlantic. Make no mistake, there was risk involved in this trip. Traveling to the capital of a nation fighting a shooting war with a great power, the U.S. had no way to choreograph with exactitude the circumstances of his travel or arrival. Neither the U.S. nor Ukraine has total control of the airspace. Neither the U.S. nor Ukraine could guarantee Biden’s security on the ground.
The president of the United States was inside the Russian WEZ — the weapons engagement zone — the entire trip. For that Joe Biden should receive credit.
Americans are allowed to disagree in good faith about what comes next — should the U.S. stand for a Ukraine whole and free no matter how long it takes to eject the Kremlin’s army, or is it in the American interest to urge the Ukrainians to accept a peace that doesn’t include all of its antebellum territory? — but no one should be under any illusion about the power of an American president going into a war zone to extend a hand to a beleaguered people and offer “unwavering support.”
Symbolism and morale matter to a nation at war. Indeed, as Napoleon said, “the moral is to the physical as three to one.”
At home, it may often feel like our republic is irretrievably fractured. Abroad, mistakes and wrong turns have tarnished our reputation for competence and steadfastness. But America is still, for all its faults, seen in dark and terrible places as the last best hope. Beyond our shores, people still react to our presidents with hope.
We should remember that.