Biden promises support for Ukraine as he punches back at Putin for blaming the U.S. for war

President Joe Biden responded to Vladimir Putin on Tuesday night, criticizing his claim that the United States wanted to “destroy Russia” and saying that the war in Ukraine was the work of the Russian president.

He dismissed Putin as a dictator he was destined to lose when he delivered a speech in Warsaw, Poland, to mark the anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine and rally support for the fight against Russia.

“The United States and the nations of Europe do not seek to control or destroy Russia,” Biden said to cheers on the grounds of the Royal Castle in Warsaw.

‘The West was not conspiring to attack Russia, as Putin said today and millions of Russian citizens just want to live in peace with their neighbors, they are not the enemy.

This war was never a necessity. It’s a tragedy.

He delivered his speech a day after making a surprise visit to the Ukrainian capital Kiev and hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a long-delayed state of the nation address.

The result was a showdown that could stem from the height of the Cold War when East and West delivered dueling speeches. Putin accused Washington of unleashing the war, before Biden responded.

The sense of occasion was only heightened by the size of the crowd waiting for Biden in the chilly gloom of the Polish night. The Warsaw mayor’s office claimed it had 30,000 troops.

He accused the Russian leader of war crimes on a colossal scale. But after the dark days of a year ago, it sometimes sounded like a victory rally.

“A year ago, the world was preparing for the fall of kyiv,” Biden told the packed crowd. ‘Well, I’ve just come back from a visit to Kyiv, and I can report that Kyiv remains strong.

‘kyiv stands proud, stands tall and most importantly stands free.’

After Putin’s state of the nation address, this amounted to a state of kyiv address.

The speech offered an opportunity to address one of Biden’s key ideological themes: that authoritarian regimes are fragile in the face of democracy.

“Autocrats only understand one word no, no, no,” he said.

‘No, you will not take my country. No, you will not take away my freedom.

‘No, you will not take my future.

And I will repeat tonight what I said last year, in the same place. A dictator bent on rebuilding an empire will never be able to assuage the people’s love of freedom.

Brutality will never crush the will of the free.

‘And Ukraine… Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia, never.’

His speech reflected how much the region has changed since Biden visited just under a year ago. So Kyiv seemed to be on the brink of disaster, as Russian troops advanced in a lightning assault.

The city is now safe enough for a sitting US president to visit, allowing for a highly visual show of support.

However, on Tuesday night he warned of “hard and very bitter days, victories and tragedies” ahead, but vowed that the United States would not waver in its support for Ukraine.

“There must be no doubt that our support for Ukraine will not waver, NATO will not split. And we won’t get tired,’ she said.

‘President Putin’s yearning, thirst for land and power will fail.’

Coldplay’s ‘Sky full of Stars’ was played at the end of the speech, and Biden posed for pictures with his supporters waving Ukrainian and Polish flags.

“Stay strong,” he told the crowd as he left.

He met with Polish President Andrzej Duda at the presidential palace, where he once again expounded on the United States’ dedication to European security and to Ukraine.

“We have to have security in Europe,” he said. ‘It’s that basic, that simple, that consistent.’

He spoke about his visit to Poland last year, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine.

“A year later, I would say that NATO is stronger than ever,” he said. “As I told President Zelensky while we were speaking in kyiv yesterday, I can proudly say that our support for Ukraine remains unwavering.”

Biden arrived in Warsaw late Monday night, after making the 10-hour train journey from kyiv.

There he delighted locals by announcing a new round of arms deliveries, reaffirming the US commitment to its support for Ukraine and holding an outdoor walk to honor the country’s fallen soldiers.

Officials said Biden only signed for the ride after a security briefing in the Oval Office on Friday.

“I thought it was critical that there be no question, no question at all, about the United States’ support for Ukraine in the war,” Biden said as he sat down for a chat with soon-to-arrive President Volodomyr Zelensky.

“The Ukrainian people have stepped up in a way that few people have in the past.”

Duda introduced Biden ahead of his speech on Tuesday, describing how he had made a “spectacular” gesture with his visit.

“He set foot on Ukrainian soil, where the war is raging,” the Polish president said. ‘He showed that a free world and its leader fear nothing.

‘It showed that Ukraine is not alone.’

The visit angered Russia. And Putin used a long-planned speech to accuse the West of sowing war and instability.

“It is they who have started the war,” he told an audience of lawmakers. “And we are using force to put an end to it.”

Flanked by four Russian tricolors, Putin said the United States and its allies were sowing chaos and war.

“The people of Ukraine have become hostages to the kyiv regime and its Western overlords, who have effectively occupied this country in the political, military and economic sense,” he said.

And he used the occasion to say he was suspending Russia’s participation in the New START Treaty, the last major arms control treaty between Moscow and Washington.