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Obama Honors Moment of Liberation in Normandy Signs of Informal Diplomacy on Ukraine as World Leaders Gather
(about 7 hours later)
COLLEVILLE-SUR-MER, France — At a time of renewed tension harking back to a darker era, the leaders of the United States, Canada, Europe and Russia put aside their differences for a few hours on Friday to honor the moment decades ago when their predecessors joined forces to liberate a continent from tyranny. BÉNOUVILLE, France — As President Obama wrapped up a four-day European trip on Friday, the violent conflict over Ukraine seemed to move toward a new phase of diplomacy, but it remained unclear whether the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, was genuinely willing or able to call off a pro-Russian uprising across his border.
President Obama came together with a parade of kings and queens and prime ministers to mark the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landing that sent young men storming onto the forbidding beaches of northern France amid a hail of fire in perhaps the greatest invasion in human history. Even with the distance of time, the heroism of that day had the power to overshadow, however briefly, the schisms of today. Mr. Putin used a trip to France commemorating the 70th anniversary of D-Day to meet for the first time with his newly elected counterpart in Ukraine, Petro O. Poroshenko, and the two discussed the possibility of a cease-fire in the eastern part of the country. After a ceremonial luncheon in a chateau here, Mr. Putin also held an unscheduled conversation with Mr. Obama in addition to more formal meetings with the leaders of Britain, France and Germany.
“What more powerful manifestation of America’s commitment to human freedom than the sight of wave after wave after wave of young men boarding those boats to liberate people they had never met?” Mr. Obama asked, standing before some of a dwindling corps of survivors on a stage at the American Cemetery and Memorial just above Omaha Beach. “We say it now as if it couldn’t be any other way. But in the annals of history, the world had never seen anything like it.” The blitz of diplomacy may presage a new stage in the crisis, and Mr. Obama left France on Friday evening more optimistic than when he arrived. Mr. Obama used the trip to shore up solidarity with European allies, and American officials said they hoped that despite differences of approach, there was enough resolve to persuade Mr. Putin to change course. They said they wanted to give him a way out of the clash.
The ceremony came as Europe is once again inflamed over the forcible seizing of territory and redrawing of the map. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its widely believed intervention in eastern Ukraine have drawn comparisons to the early moves by Nazi Germany in the years leading up to World War II, and President Vladimir V. Putin has been compared to Adolf Hitler by figures like former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Prince Charles of Britain. “We have an opportunity to test whether” Russia is serious about de-escalating the crisis, said a senior administration official, who insisted on anonymity to discuss the private discussions among the leaders. “The Russians will have to follow through here. In the past, sometimes their words have not led to actions.”
However awkward it promised to be, Mr. Putin was invited here for the commemoration by President François Hollande of France, just as Russian leaders have attended past anniversaries to pay tribute to the indispensable Soviet role in defeating Hitler’s Germany. Mr. Putin did not participate in the Omaha Beach ceremony, but he did attend a private lunch of the various leaders, the first time he and Mr. Obama were in the same place since the confrontation over Ukraine erupted several months ago. The hope among American and European leaders is that the election of Mr. Poroshenko, who is to be inaugurated on Saturday, creates what the official called “a natural point” to seek a peaceful resolution. “There is a window open here,” the official said.
Although they agreed to suspend Russia from the Group of 8 major powers after the annexation of Crimea, Mr. Hollande, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany each scheduled individual meetings with Mr. Putin while he was in France on Thursday and Friday. Mr. Obama, by contrast, refused to meet with Mr. Putin, but aides had not ruled out an unscripted conversation between the two men during the lunch. In fact, the two did hold an “informal conversation,” a White House official said. Whether that proves overly optimistic was not clear. Even as Mr. Putin played the diplomat here, Russian officials continued to use language blaming the Ukrainian government for the crisis. Dmitry S. Peskov, Mr. Putin’s spokesman, confirmed that the Russian president had met with Mr. Poroshenko here for about 15 minutes and talked about stopping the use of violence and force on both sides.
The commemoration of the Normandy invasion also comes at a time when the United States is reaching rather less-satisfying conclusions to two other wars waged over the last dozen years. Just last week, Mr. Obama announced that he would withdraw virtually all forces from Afghanistan by the end of 2016 shortly before leaving office, much as he previously pulled out of Iraq. But neither war came with a definitive moment of triumph like that in Europe decades ago. “They agreed on the need to stop the violence,” Mr. Peskov said in a telephone interview from Moscow. “It was a very brief conversation.”
The president accepted the resignation of his veterans affairs secretary amid a furor over poor treatment of returning service members. And Mr. Obama reached a deal with the Taliban in which he agreed to release five of its imprisoned leaders in exchange for the only American soldier held captive in Afghanistan, a trade that has touched off a roiling debate back home. No specific steps were agreed upon, and the two men did not go into details, Mr. Peskov said. It was not clear whether they had agreed to meet again, he said, adding that he could not go into any more detail at this time. “It is a positive step — a very humble one, but it is positive,” he said.
Mr. Obama addressed none of that in his speech. For historic occasions like the D-Day anniversary, White House aides prefer to keep controversies of the moment out of the president’s speech, so that decades later when their successors look back, it feels rooted in posterity rather than transitory and often forgettable controversies like the release of the soldier, Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. Each side has said the other must take the first step. Moscow has repeatedly said Ukraine needs to halt military operations in the east, while the government in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, accuses the Kremlin of supporting the separatist movements there.
But Mr. Obama did rhetorically link the legendary “greatest generation” to the men and women who are returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan. At one point, he introduced a few of the D-Day survivors in the audience to some of today’s veterans, including Sgt. First Class Cory Remsburg, whom he met at a previous anniversary here five years ago and who was later nearly killed in a blast in Afghanistan. Mr. Peskov said that instead of setting a monthlong deadline for Russia to stop the violence, as Mr. Obama did while in Europe, the United States should do something to influence Kiev to establish a cease-fire and stop violence “within days.”
“This generation, this 9/11 generation of service members, they, too, felt something tug,” the president said. “They answered some call. They said, ‘I’ll go.’ They too chose to serve a cause that’s greater than self, many even after they knew they’d be sent into harm’s way. And for more than a decade, they have endured tour after tour.” “As soon as we stop the bloodshed, stop using force,” he said, citing the use of Ukrainian attack jets and helicopters against civilians, “it will be better for all of us.” He added, “Washington should use its influence to convince Kiev to stop it.”
It was a day of somber pageantry under a sunny, cloudless sky, with honor guards and the playing of the French and American national anthems. Mr. Obama met privately beforehand with seven D-Day veterans, some of them in wheelchairs or with canes, several wearing medals. The French president, François Hollande, first decided to try to bring Mr. Poroshenko and Mr. Putin together when he issued a last-minute invitation to the D-Day commemoration to the newly elected Ukrainian leader, a French official said. Mr. Hollande and other leaders of the Group of 7 industrial nations discussed it while meeting in Brussels, and the French president then raised it with Mr. Putin. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, a key player in Russian relations, joined the conversation with Mr. Poroshenko and Mr. Putin.
Also invited to the lunch were Queen Elizabeth II of Britain, who was a young princess during the war, as well as the kings or queens of Belgium, Denmark, Holland and Norway; the presidents or prime ministers of Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Poland and Slovakia; the grand duke of Luxembourg, and the governor-general of New Zealand. Ms. Merkel met separately with Mr. Putin for about an hour in what Germans described as a “cool” atmosphere, apparently with a brief handshake. A government statement said Ms. Merkel used the meeting to emphasize the need to stabilize the situation in eastern Ukraine — and for Russia to take its share of the responsibility — now that the presidential election has taken place and produced a recognized result.
The D-Day anniversary has become a regular stop on the presidential itinerary, but it was not always that way. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the general who led the invasion, did not consider it a moment to celebrate 10 years later when he was president, and so all he did was issue a simple written statement. As for Mr. Obama, he and Mr. Putin talked for about 15 minutes, aides said, and the American repeated his insistence that Russia curb the flow of arms and fighters into eastern Ukraine and formally recognize the government of Mr. Poroshenko. “It was an informal conversation, not a formal bilateral meeting,” said Benjamin J. Rhodes, Mr. Obama’s deputy national security adviser.
Ronald Reagan was the first to visit on an anniversary and make it an occasion when he showed up in 1984, and his ode to heroism came to be remembered as a singular moment during his presidency. While Reagan recalled the Normandy invasion in the context of the Cold War that followed, Bill Clinton came 10 years later at a moment when the world was grappling with the new order that emerged with the fall of the Soviet empire. The conversation came after an awkward pas de deux between Mr. Obama and Mr. Putin, who initially seemed to be going out of their way not to acknowledge each other’s presence amid the gathering of world leaders here. During the few minutes that they were in the presence of international journalists, Mr. Obama and Mr. Putin did not speak, did not shake hands and in fact seemed eager not to encounter each other, much like divorced parents both invited to a child’s graduation.
George W. Bush followed 10 years after that, on the day after Reagan died, as it happened, and linked the struggles of 1944 to the fresh challenges in Iraq. With the veterans of D-Day increasingly departing the scene, Mr. Obama did not wait for another decade to come, and participated in the 65th anniversary five years ago. Mr. Obama had refused to meet with Mr. Putin during his trip to Europe, even though his French, German and British counterparts all scheduled individual meetings with the Russian leader in France. Still, aides in advance did not rule out the possibility of an informal conversation, much like the one that evidently took place out of the public eye on the sidelines of the ceremonial luncheon.
The first president neither alive during the invasion nor born shortly after the war when memories were fresh, Mr. Obama on Friday found a personal connection through his grandfather, who served under Gen. George S. Patton. And he singled out by name three D-Day veterans in attendance: Wilson Colwell, who jumped with the 101st Airborne at age 16; Harry Kulkowitz, who fudged his age and came ashore at Utah Beach; and Rock Merritt, who became a paratrooper after seeing a recruitment poster asking if he was man enough. The two were first seen together behind the chateau in Bénouville as leaders from around Europe and elsewhere gathered to take a group photograph. Mr. Hollande stood in the middle, with Queen Elizabeth II to his right and Mr. Obama to her right. To Mr. Hollande’s left was Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, and to her left was Mr. Putin.
“Fewer of us have parents and grandparents to tell us about what the veterans of D-Day did here 70 years ago,” Mr. Obama said. “So we have to tell their stories for them.” Thus separated by three people, Mr. Obama and Mr. Putin busied themselves talking with others. Mr. Obama jovially greeted Ms. Merkel, kissing her on both cheeks. After the photograph was taken and the group began wandering into the chateau for lunch, Mr. Obama lingered behind, making sure that Queen Elizabeth, who was moving gingerly, got up the stairs and path all right.
At one point as the crowd moseyed slowly toward the building, Mr. Obama was right behind Mr. Putin, and could have tapped him on the shoulder if he wanted to, but instead focused his attention elsewhere as if not noticing who was there. Inside the chateau, the leaders had lunch around a horseshoe table, seated in the same order as in the photograph, with Mr. Obama and Mr. Putin separated by the same three people.
The two ended up talking only after the lunch was over, an American official said. They began talking across the table as they stood and then remained talking for a while as other leaders filed out of the room.