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Obama, in Warsaw, Pledges Solidarity With Eastern Europe Obama, in Poland, Renews Commitment to Security
(about 11 hours later)
WARSAW — As he began a four-day trip to Europe, President Obama announced new measures intended to bolster security in Central and Eastern Europe in response to Russia’s intervention in the crisis in Ukraine, including its annexation of Crimea. WARSAW — President Obama flew here Tuesday to unveil a $1 billion security plan intended to demonstrate the United States’ “rock-solid commitment” to stand with Central and Eastern Europe against Russian aggression, but it did not settle nerves rattled by the crisis in neighboring Ukraine.
Mr. Obama tried to make a point of demonstrating solidarity with America’s friends in the region as soon as he landed in Poland, the first stop on his itinerary. Striding across the tarmac from Air Force One, he visited a hangar where four American F-16 fighter jets were parked, and addressed about 50 American and Polish airmen and soldiers with a message of resolve. Arriving here for the start of a four-day swing through Europe certain to be dominated by the continuing tension with Moscow, Mr. Obama announced a program to expand military training, joint exercises and troop rotations while prepositioning equipment in the region to bolster defenses for American allies.
“I’m starting the visit here because our commitment to Poland’s security as well as the security of our allies in central and eastern Europe is a cornerstone of our own security and it is sacrosanct,” Mr. Obama told the troops, with President Bronislaw Komorowski of Poland at his side. “As friends and allies, we stand united together and forever,” Mr. Obama said. “Our commitment to Poland’s security, as well as the security of our allies in Central and Eastern Europe, is a cornerstone of our own security, and it is sacrosanct,” Mr. Obama told a contingent of 50 American and Polish airmen and service members in an airplane hangar where they serve together. “As friends and as allies, we stand united, together and forever.”
Later he announced that he would ask Congress for $1 billion for a “European reassurance initiative” that would increase the American troop presence in Eastern Europe with additional exercises and training, and would send American Navy ships more often to the Baltic and Black seas. The plan would position more equipment in Europe for quicker military responses and dispatch American experts to augment the allies’ capabilities. It would also provide aid to Ukraine and two other former Soviet republics, Georgia and Moldova,. To make sure his message was lost on no one, Mr. Obama posed for pictures in front of American F-16 warplanes and greeted the American airmen stationed here. But the security program he announced will require congressional approval, so it meant no immediate assistance for Poland or other allies. Mr. Obama offered none of the short-term reinforcements much less the permanent base sought by Warsaw, and some leading Polish figures expressed disappointment.
It was not clear whether Mr. Obama’s announcement would satisfy leaders in the region, who have so far been unimpressed by the relatively small forces the United States has sent in recent months. Mr. Obama has dispatched about 600 paratroopers to Poland and other allies in the region and rotated more aircraft and support personnel through the area. “President Obama’s declaration has left us a bit hungry,” said Joachim Brudzinski, president of the executive committee of Poland’s largest opposition party, Law and Justice. “It lacks specifics. It doesn’t answer this very important for us question: What does it mean in relation to the presence of U.S. troops in Poland?”
Anxious about the threat from Moscow, Polish leaders have been pressing for a more robust deployment, and even creation of a permanent base on their territory. NATO reached an agreement with Russia after the Cold War ended, promising to refrain from deploying substantial forces in Eastern Europe, but Polish officials have argued that Russia effectively abrogated that agreement by annexing Crimea. Krzysztof Kubiak, a foreign policy expert from the Institute of Security and International Affairs at the University of Lower Silesia in Wroclaw, said Mr. Obama’s announcement was just “a smokescreen” because after two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States military is drained and its public ready to pull back.
“For the first time since the Second World War, one European country has taken a province by force from another European country,” Radoslaw Sikorski, the Polish foreign minister, said in a telephone interview before Mr. Obama’s arrival. “America, we hope, has ways of reassuring us that we haven’t even thought about. There are major bases in Britain, in Spain, in Portugal, in Greece, in Italy. Why not here?” “The only way for Americans to prove their full commitment to Poland’s and this region’s safety is to move one of their large military installations from one of the old NATO members to Poland,” he said.
Joined by Secretary of State John Kerry, Mr. Obama met on Tuesday with Mr. Komorowski and Prime Minister Donald Tusk, reaffirming repeatedly what he called America’s “rock solid commitment” to Polish security. He also met with the leaders of Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia, all of whom traveled here to hear a similar message. Mr. Obama arrived at a tense time in the region. Although Russia has been pulling troops back from the border with Ukraine, violence has continued to erupt in the eastern part of Ukraine as pro-Russian separatists wage a low-grade insurgency against the government in Kiev. Mr. Obama used the visit to insist that Russia stop the flow of militants and weapons across the border and use its influence to press the separatists to stand down.
On Wednesday, Mr. Obama is scheduled to meet for the first time with Petro O. Poroshenko, the president-elect of Ukraine, whose inauguration is set for Saturday. Mr. Obama hopes to reinforce American support for the new government in Kiev as it tries to stabilize a rocky economy and quell a violent pro-Russian insurgency in the eastern part of the country, where there was fresh fighting on Tuesday. Yet he also offered an olive branch of sorts. While repeating that “further Russian provocation will be met with further costs for Russia, including, if necessary, additional sanctions,” Mr. Obama held out the possibility of restoring relations if Moscow were to defuse the crisis.
Later on Wednesday, Mr. Obama plans to address a public rally marking the 25th anniversary of elections in Poland that led to the end of Communist rule. The fresh confrontation with Russia, coming at a time when this part of Europe is commemorating the end of the Cold War and Soviet domination, lent symbolic potency to the event. “If in fact we can see some responsible behavior by the Russians over the next several months, then I think it is possible for us to try to rebuild some of the trust that’s been shattered during this past year,” he said. “But I think it is fair to say that rebuilding that trust will take quite some time. And in the meantime we are going to be prepared for any contingencies that may come up.”
Then Mr. Obama plans to fly to Brussels to meet with leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada and Japan in a Group of 7 format. That meeting was originally supposed to be a Group of 8 summit in Sochi, Russia, hosted by President Vladimir V. Putin, but Russia was suspended from the group following its annexation of Crimea. Mr. Obama expects to encounter Mr. Putin for the first time since the showdown over Ukraine began. They will both travel to France this week for ceremonies marking the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings. The leaders of France, Germany and Britain have all scheduled separate meetings with Mr. Putin. Mr. Obama has no such discussion arranged, but he will be at the same lunch at Normandy on Friday where they presumably will run into each other. “I’m sure I’ll see him,” Mr. Obama said. “He’s going to be there.”
From Brussels, Mr. Obama is to travel to France for meetings in Paris and a ceremony in Normandy marking the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Mr. Putin plans to attend the Normandy ceremony as well, setting up his first encounter with Mr. Obama since the Ukraine crisis erupted. The president’s main goal here in Warsaw was to reassure NATO allies that once were in the Soviet orbit that they could count on American support. In multiple public and private settings, he repeated his commitment to Article 5 of the NATO charter stating that an attack on any member was an attack on all.
Because Article 5 of the NATO charter obligates the United States and other alliance members to come to the defense of any member that is attacked, American and Western European officials doubt that Mr. Putin would use military force or the threat of it against a NATO ally like Poland, the way he has with nonmembers like Ukraine or Georgia, which was invaded by Russian forces in 2008 after a skirmish in a breakaway republic. Joined by Secretary of State John Kerry, Mr. Obama sat down not just with Polish leaders, but also with counterparts from Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia, all of whom traveled here hoping for American assistance.
Still, the nervousness was palpable in Warsaw as Mr. Obama arrived. “Russia is testing the strength of the international system set up by the United States after World War II,” Mr. Sikorski said. “She tested it in Georgia, which was an implied ally of the United States. She has now tested it in Ukraine. And I don’t think we can discount the possibility that she will test it again. And therefore our security guarantees have be credible, which is to say physically enforceable.” Polish leaders welcomed Mr. Obama warmly and expressed appreciation for the proposed security program, which is called the “European reassurance initiative.” President Bronislaw Komorowski said, “We are on the same page fully,” and Prime Minister Donald Tusk praised the “very speedy and also very effective reaction of the United States to the Ukrainian crisis.”
Russia objected strongly when the former Warsaw Pact nations of Central and Eastern Europe sought to join the NATO alliance in the 1990s, saying that Western troops on their soil would be a threat to Russia. In the 1997 agreement, NATO said it did not intend “additional permanent stationing of substantial combat forces” in Eastern Europe, while Russia agreed to refrain “from the threat or use of force” that would violate the “sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence” of its neighbors. Yet they also expressed polite anticipation that the latest initiative was not all Mr. Obama would do. Mr. Tusk said he took from Mr. Obama’s comments that this was “just another step and that this is not the end” of American help. Mr. Komorowski pressed for “the development of additional NATO infrastructure that is a prerequisite for the possible effective reception of the reinforcement forces.”
The American airmen whom Mr. Obama visited in the hangar at Okecie Airport are here as part of a full-time United States Air Force detachment stationed in Poland in November 2012. Since then, American F-16 jets and C-130 transport aircraft have rotated into the country temporarily for training exercises, and the United States added additional rotations after the crisis in Ukraine heated up. Polish officials had hoped for something more tangible. In an interview before Mr. Obama’s arrival, Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski argued for a permanent American military base. “There are major bases in Britain, in Spain, in Portugal, in Greece, in Italy,” he said. “Why not here?”
“Poles and Americans stand shoulder to shoulder for freedom,” Mr. Obama told the troops in the hangar. “And we’re so grateful to all of you for your service.” NATO and Russia signed an agreement in 1997 in which the Western alliance said it did not intend “additional permanent stationing of substantial combat forces” in Eastern Europe. But Polish officials argued that Russia had effectively abrogated the agreement because it violated another provision barring “the threat or use of force” intended to violate the “sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence” of its neighbors.
“Russia is testing the strength of the international system set up by the United States after World War II,” Mr. Sikorski said. “She tested it in Georgia, which was an implied ally of the United States. She has now tested it in Ukraine. And I don’t think we can discount the possibility that she will test it again. And therefore our security guarantees have to be credible, which is to say physically enforceable.”
Several Polish analysts said Mr. Obama’s plan did not meet that criteria. “The name is nice — a ‘reassurance plan’ — but $1 billion is not enough to reassure both Poland and the entire region,” said Zbigniew Lewicki, professor of American studies at the University of Warsaw.
But Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the NATO secretary general, said Mr. Obama’s promise of a heftier American footprint in Europe was welcome. “The United States has reacted swiftly after Russia’s illegal military actions in Ukraine,” Mr. Rasmussen said at a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels.