Hi, it's Allison, and if you're a frequent listener of this show, you know that responding to Russia's invasion of Ukraine is one of the top priorities of the Biden administration. We've examined Biden's response and explored how his choices might play out in the future. This week, though, we're going to look back at how Biden's history with war is shaping his response to Russia today. And for that, Can He Do That? producer Arjun Singh is going to take the reins. You may remember him from our series we did in the fall about Biden's history with the war in Afghanistan. All right, here's the show.
It's been almost two months since Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded the Eastern European country of Ukraine. It was a move that the U.S. had been warning was coming for months and was immediately met with a swift response from President Biden. We've shared declassified evidence about Russia's plans and cyber attacks and false pretexts so that there could be no confusion or cover up about what Putin was doing. Putin is the aggressor. Putin chose this war.
And now he and his country will bear the consequences. The invasion is one of the strongest tests of Biden's foreign policy promises, that he will restore America standing abroad, and that the U.S. would lead the fight against authoritarian aggression around the world. But amidst this crisis in Ukraine, Biden's goals have proven challenging. And that's in part because this is the same president whose unwavering commitment to get the U.S. out of military conflicts led to a very messy withdrawal from Afghanistan last year, a withdrawal that for many challenged their faith that Biden could be an effective world leader. So how has that experience in Afghanistan informed Biden's choices in Ukraine?
We spent a lot of time diving into Biden's history with global leadership, war, and American intervention. What can all of that tell us about Biden's response in Europe now? This is Kenny Do That. I'm Arjun Singh. And on this episode, we bring you an epilogue of sorts to our earlier series on Biden and the withdrawal from Afghanistan. But this next chapter of Biden's evolution in American involvement is a foreign war playing out in Europe right now. And it's clear that his history is shaping his response today.
The reason the withdrawal hurt him politically, domestically, was because of those images, desperate Americans, and especially Afghans, clinging to the wings of airplanes. And it felt chaotic, and it felt dangerous, and it sort of felt like everything Joe Biden had promised would not happen in his administration. Ashley Parker is the White House bureau chief of The Washington Post. Recently, she traveled to Europe with President Biden, and she's closely been covering his response to the invasion. My sense in talking to people in the administration is it didn't change how the White House...
made decisions on Ukraine, but that one very serious and significant silver lining was that Ukraine offered an opportunity for Joe Biden to do one of the things he had promised, which was sort of restore America's traditional role as a leader on democratic ideals on the world stage in the face of Russian aggression in a way that he would have long wanted to do, although probably not under these circumstances. What did your recent trip abroad with President Biden reveal about his approach to the conflict in Ukraine? This was a trip to Brussels and then Poland that came about incredibly quickly and entirely at the urging of President Biden. The war in Ukraine was about a month in, and Biden decided that this is just going to get much harder. The alliance has been held together sort of on the strength of momentum and adrenaline, but a month in, it makes sense to touch base with our allies and reinforce the collective resolve and unity. So he scrambles this trip, which is a two-part trip. It starts off with a day of meetings in Brussels with NATO, the European Union, and the G7. Good evening, everyone. With all the press that's here, you must be getting very tired. Am I the 16th or 17th?
And then while Biden is traveling, it became clear pretty quickly he was going to want to do a second stop. Poland was, of course, an obvious choice because Poland is the country that borders Ukraine, is the country that has taken in the majority of the Ukrainian refugees, that is under a lot of pressure from sort of all sides, from the West to stand up to Russia, and then, of course, from Russia. And so it was a country that absolutely made sense to visit. What it will do, it will reinforce my commitment to have the United States make sure we are a major piece. of dealing with the relocation of all those folks, as well as humanitarian assistance. And how did Biden himself seem during this trip? Was he upbeat? Did he seem like he wanted to be there? How was his attitude? Would you characterize it? This is the sort of trip, especially this region of the world.
that has always animated Biden and is the sort of thing that the former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the former vice president who was the Obama administration's point person on Ukraine, it's an area of the world he knows well, it's an area of the world he's comfortable in, it's an area of the world he cares deeply about, and it's an area of the world where he has a lot of pre-existing relationships. So the trip, of course, was under crisis conditions, but this is Joe Biden's absolute wheelhouse, and that came through in his demeanor and him, frankly, being the one who really initiated this trip. Putin is getting exactly the opposite of what he intended to have as a consequence of going into Ukraine. We've built that same unity with the European Union and with a leading democracy. And Biden gave a speech in Poland at the end of the trip. So knowing what you know about Biden's approach to international relations, what was your impression of that speech? So this speech in Warsaw on the final night of his entire trip was supposed to be the capstone. It was something he had worked very hard on. He and his team were very excited about. He's sort of delivering this speech at night.
at Warsaw's royal castle, which is already a place of historic cultural and political significance for the Polish people. Basically, the goal of this speech is sort of a forceful and muscular moral response about the crisis in Ukraine to the world. So in this hour... Let the words of Pope John Paul burn as brightly today. Never, ever give up hope. Never doubt. Never tire. Never become discouraged. Be not afraid. He spoke directly to the American public. He spoke directly to the Ukrainian people. He spoke directly to the Russian people. He spoke directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin. And it was to sort of put this crisis in historical and moral context and show the world, and particularly these countries involved, that the United States and the Western alliance is not backing down. Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia, for free people refuse to live in a world of hopelessness and darkness.
And that is what 28 out of 29 minutes of that speech was. And so to set the stage again, it was incredibly cold and chilly there. And it was night and it was kind of windy. And it's literally the end of the speech. And I'm just kind of thinking about like, okay, I can like pack up my bag and like go get on the bus. And literally right before he basically says, you know, thank you, thank you. God bless the troops. Thank you. He says these nine words. For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power.
I almost thought I had misheard something. And I remember I kind of looked up and looked around at the people to the left and the right of me. We were all kind of like, I was like, did he just say, did he just call for regime change? Immediately, I emailed the White House to say, did he mean to say this? Is this what he was saying with these remarks? And we all kind of collectively all jumped up from our seats and went looking for any White House aid we could find to say, hey, did you just hear what we heard? Was that intentional? What does it mean? And you could tell from their faces and expressions that they knew it was not in the script. They knew it was potentially a problem, but they didn't have a good answer for it yet because they hadn't been expecting it. And basically in 37 minutes from when he uttered that final.
ad lib. They had a scrambled meeting. They came up with a statement and they blasted it out. It's interesting that this phrase really stood out because, you know, in the past, Biden has not minced words with Putin. He's at one point even said that he told him personally he didn't think he had a soul. What was it about this line that was considered so provocative? It's a great question. And it was something people, not even reporters, but sort of lawmakers and diplomats and foreign policy experts did kind of.
wonder aloud and said, we know Biden didn't mean to say this, but once he said it, reasonable people can agree it's not that crazy to think that a leader who invaded with no provocation a sovereign country should not be in power, right? That's something a lot of people agree with and he shouldn't have walked it back. That was a sentiment you heard from a number of people. But the reason it was so problematic and provocative was because all along the administration had made a decision that one of the things that Putin feared the most and that the White House feared would make him act irrationally was if he believed that the Western... intervention and assistance in Ukraine was about regime change in Russia. And so they very much did not want to give Putin any reason to believe his worst fears. And then you have Biden coming out and all but saying the very thing that Putin deeply fears and that the administration for months had taken very deliberate and careful pains not to say. It's interesting because we could...
absolutely see what had happened which is biden had been on this couple day trip through europe hours before he had delivered the speech he had met with ukrainian refugees who had newly arrived in poland we'd seen pictures and images of him picking up this adorable little probably three or four year old girl with pigtails dressed all in pink who had to flee And then you watch him deliver the speech that he worked very hard on, that he clearly believed in deeply and delivered in that manner. You didn't get the sense that it was someone reading words off a teleprompter, and you could kind of see himself working himself up into kind of a state of moral outrage, and then it just naturally is kind of the next thing that slips out. And for what it's worth, that's basically what he said back in Washington. You know, he said, I wasn't changing policy there, nor am I walking it back now. Given his recent behavior, people should understand that he is going to do what he thinks he should do, period. He's not affected by anybody else, including, unfortunately, apparently his own advisors.
This is a guy who goes to the beat of his own drummer. And the idea that he is going to do something outrageous because I called him for what he was and what he's doing, I think is just not rational. And that was clear even in that moment if you were watching closely. Is presidential improvisation during a speech something that's common? This is the first time that Biden has said something improvised that's gotten him in a little bit of trouble. So I'm just wondering, is there an explanation for these improvised moments? Is he doing that on purpose? Or is this more normal than it feels? And because he's the president, we are just paying more attention to it right now?
When you're the president of the United States, you've been a candidate for the presidency, your words are, your words, your actions, your past, your history, your every contact is parsed ad nauseum, and that's just the reality. So stipulated that anything the president of the United States says deservedly gets outside attention, Biden is someone who, well before this evening in Warsaw, is known for... going off script, his ad-libs, his gaffs. And you've especially seen this play out in the Ukraine crisis. I think that moment in Warsaw is probably the best example, but I could take you back just a couple of weeks to Washington, where the administration had not yet made the decision because there's a process to declare someone a war criminal. The administration had not yet made that distinction about Russia. They were being very careful not to publicly say something they hadn't officially decided through all the proper channels. And Biden, again, on a very emotional day, this was the day that Ukrainian President Zelensky had addressed Congress and, frankly, the world via a very emotional video appeal. Later that day, Biden was asked a version of a question.
he and his aides had tried to ignore for a little while, which was, do you think Putin's a war criminal? Biden just turned around. Oh, I think he is a war criminal. And that's another example of, you know, Biden sort of going off script and ad-libbing and getting ahead of his team. But especially on this issue, it follows a very familiar pattern of him saying something that he deeply believes that is coming from a place of sort of emotion and moral outrage.
yeah you know i remember from our biden afghanistan series that we did here on the show that this is a part of the world you know and along with the idea of expanding nato that really left a strong impression on biden in the 1990s like he would go to the senate floor give these really passionate speeches about the u.s supporting democracy in eastern europe so i'm wondering if you've seen some of that emotional connection come out in his handling of ukraine Yes. You know, if you talk to anyone, Biden fashions himself as a foreign policy guy, and he has a lot of strong and long-held feelings on all parts of the world, including, as we saw early in his presidency, Afghanistan. But as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee especially, when you talk to people who have worked with him and know him, they say he's been thinking about this part of the world in post-Cold War terms since he was a senator. And this really is his passion. The role of NATO is something he cares about and feels deeply and understands well. And in Ukraine in particular, he, as President Obama's vice president, was given the Ukraine portfolio. And while he was vice president, he made six trips to the region. That's a lot of trips. He knows the people.
If you read his memoir that he wrote in 2017, he devotes the epilogue almost exclusively to talking about his work in Ukraine and a speech he gave as vice president in 2015 to the RADA, which is Ukrainian's parliament. Let me be crystal clear. The United States does not, will not, never will recognize Russia's attempt to annex to Crimea. That's what he believes and that's what he feels. And it's deeply held in a very passionate issue for him.
When it comes to the big questions, who you ask matters. From breaking news to politics that impact your life, to advice you can trust. Get answers you don't have to question with Ask the Post AI, trained exclusively on post journalism with clear sourcing. And if we don't know the answer, we'll tell you. Ask the Post AI. Find it on WashingtonPost.com or in the app. For someone like Biden, who has a lot of knowledge on these issues, a lot of experience, what is his relationship like with the staff who advise him on foreign policy? And do we know who the people who he really leans on in this area are?
It's a good question. I mean, in many ways, it's a lot of the usual suspects you would imagine in his administration. Obviously, Tony Blinken, the Secretary of State, who has been described as basically like a son to him. Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, are both big players. And then, you know, on some of these issues, there are areas where he's very much deferred to his military advisors, the intelligence community. There were some decisions he made very early on to do something that really hasn't been done before, which is to begin declassifying intelligence and sharing it both privately with allies and publicly with the world. And that's something that he signed off on and he was the final decision. But, you know, he would not have done without.
close consultation with the intelligence community. So those are also communities where he's getting a lot of input from. When he served in the Obama administration, Biden was the one who Obama valued as kind of going against his grain. Would you say on these foreign policy issues, is there a voice that we know of who really acts as the contrarian, the one who pushes back against Biden, someone who Biden knows will likely have a different opinion than him, but he embraces that? Or are they generally all in lockstep with each other? That is a great question, because a lot of these people who he trusts and he respects are longtime...
employees of his. They've worked for him in a range of different capacities. When he was a senator, when he was a chairman on different committees, when he was in the vice presidency, the White House has stood up these tiger teams, which kind of go through and do contingency planning of what is the worst case scenario? What is the second worst case scenario? What is the third worst case scenario? And if this happens, how do we respond? And if we respond this way, what are the four or five ways Putin could respond? So it's not that he's not getting or hearing a range of different...
options and scenarios and viewpoints, but there may not be someone who can push back quite as forcefully as he could to Obama. And I think the other thing that very much informs this, and it was more acute on Afghanistan, but is that Biden was often contrarian to Obama on foreign policy, but he wasn't contrarian just for the sake of being contrarian. He was contrarian because that's what he deeply felt and believed. And so the way it was described on Afghanistan was that for eight years, he sat in the situation room, six inches to Obama's left or right, and disagreed with the policy, always deferred to Obama when Obama made a decision. But he knew that if he had been in that chair, he knew what he would have done. So he gets elected, he's in that chair. And that's why he...
made such a swift and, in many ways, controversial decision on Afghanistan. Like, he knew what he wanted to do. He didn't need any more input or debate or discussion. He'd known for eight years. On Ukraine, it's certainly not as acute, but you see a little bit of that. When he was Obama's vice president, Biden internally was arguing to be more aggressive in terms of arming the Ukrainians with lethal assistance and with javelin missiles. And a lot of people in the administration felt that way. And the Obama...
himself ultimately decided it would be viewed as too provocative and escalatory with Russia. And he felt it was more of Europe's problem. And it just wasn't a step he was willing to take. Well, now we have sent thousands of javelins to Ukraine under President Biden. So you are getting to see on certain foreign policy instances, him implement sort of the beliefs and policies he would have done as vice president if only he had been president. Where in this crisis have you seen uniquely Joe Biden moments? And how would you say Biden's left his imprint on the way Ukraine has happened? You know, it's a great question. And I think broadly, it's kind of what we've discussed. His approach has been very deliberate and strategic.
and yet also impulsive in many key moments. And so it's sort of that balance between methodically and deliberately deciding we have to get NATO together and calling a meeting and going in there with very clear goals of who he wanted to meet with and what he wanted to talk about and what sorts of things they wanted to announce. And then going out and saying something like he did about how Putin can't be in power. And he's left his imprint sort of in these ways, both intentional and unintentional and in ways that have complicated the process and really helped it along. I think you see his imprint in the fact that, you know, Joe Biden, the president of the United States, decided the allies need to meet in person. And they all said, Joe Biden said, let's meet at NATO. And we all said, great.
Great. We'll see you there. Joe Biden is someone who, unlike his predecessor, believes strongly in the NATO alliance and also believes strongly in personal diplomacy and also has sort of the relationship and the clout and the respect that he could call up all of these people and get them on the phone whenever he needed to push them to do big and hard things, often quite successfully. Ashley, thank you so much for your time. Thank you. This has been another episode of Can You Do That? Can You Do That? is a team effort here at The Post. This episode was edited by Allison Michaels and produced by me, Arjun Singh, with help from Sharla Freeland and logo art by Greg Manifold and theme music by Ted Muldoon.
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