What did Biden and Putin speak at their virtual summit?
This is what we know 2:10
Editor's Note:
Frida Ghitis, a former CNN producer and correspondent, is a world affairs columnist.
She is a frequent CNN opinion writer, a contributing columnist for The Washington Post, and a columnist for the World Politics Review.
The opinions expressed in this article are his.
You can find more opinion pieces at CNNe.com/opinion
(CNN) -
Is Russian President Vladimir Putin going to launch an invasion of neighboring Ukraine?
The huge movements of Russian troops and military equipment towards the shared border have raised the alarm among Ukrainians and their Western friends.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called it "hysteria" and the Kremlin denies any invasion plans, but the words of Russian officials have long since lost credibility.
After all, it was Putin who turned
gaslighting
(manipulation to make others believe that what they think is crazy) into a political weapon.
In a video call with Putin on Tuesday, the White House said President Joe Biden warned the Russian president that any escalation would be met with "strong economic and other measures" by the United States and its allies.
The White House noted that Biden reiterated, as he has many times, his support for Ukraine's territorial integrity, and said the two presidents agreed that their teams continue their discussions.
There will be a "bloody massacre" if Russia invades us, warns Ukraine's defense minister
Russian denials aside, the West is concerned enough about Putin's intentions that Biden and Russia's president are holding an urgent virtual meeting on Tuesday as experts warn of the growing risks of a new war.
Putin's actions and intentions may be deliberately shrouded in a fog, but his record is clear.
If allowed to advance its goals without serious consequences, it will continue to escalate its foreign policy of harassment and intimidation.
In 2014, describing them as "little green men" dressed in unmarked military uniforms deployed to Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, Putin denied they were his forces, until Russia seized control of the territory and annexed it.
What did Biden and Putin speak at their virtual summit?
This is what we know 2:10
Anyone who has paid attention to how Russia stole that strategic peninsula from a sovereign country knows how much weight to give now to the Kremlin's words.
As US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken noted, "We have seen this manual."
This time, the US-led Western alliance wants to stop Russia before its "little green men" cross Ukraine's borders with all their heavy weaponry.
No one knows for sure if Putin will give the order to invade.
But US and NATO officials are extremely concerned.
US intelligence believes Russia has a plan for an operation involving up to 175,000 troops, more than half already on site, along with heavy artillery and armor.
According to Ukraine's defense minister, Russian troops could cross into Ukraine next month.
Part of Moscow's playbook includes creating a justification for an attack, and that part of the strategy is already moving forward.
When Russia attacked Ukraine in the past, capturing Crimea and supporting pro-Russian separatists in Donbas, the region of Ukraine adjacent to Russia, the Kremlin claimed it was doing so to defend ethnic Russians living under Ukrainian rule.
Putin is already making the case for a future assault.
An elaborate information operation, among other propaganda points, paints the Ukrainian leaders as puppets of the West.
Why would Putin risk provoking NATO, going to war against Ukraine or, even if he decides to call off the alleged military offensive, walking to the edge of such a dangerous cliff?
Putin has several goals.
Moscote: Russia does not want NATO to protect Ukraine 2:28
Above all, the Kremlin wants to destabilize Ukraine and prevent it from exercising its rights as an independent nation to build its own future.
Ukraine is moving closer to the West;
it wants to join NATO and is a fledgling democracy, in stark contrast to Russia.
The existence of Ukraine as a democracy alongside Russia, where Putin has become an increasingly repressive autocrat, worries the Kremlin.
Putin wants to secure what in the days of the Cold War were accepted as spheres of influence, with the aim of keeping the countries that used to be part of the Soviet Union under Moscow's rule.
He has gone so far as to say that Russians and Ukrainians are "one people," a statement that carries dire omens and one that many Ukrainians vehemently reject.
Ukraine's tactic is not just a push against Ukraine, it is also a push against the West.
As his troops pile up near Ukraine, Putin is also trying to paint his concerns about Ukraine as defensive.
He argues that he distrusts not only Ukraine's leaders, but also his NATO friends, arguing that NATO's expansion to the Russian border would be a threat to Russian security.
Putin is making totally unsustainable demands on the West, exposing what he describes as his "red lines."
More specifically, Putin demands that NATO ensure that it will not expand eastward, closer to Russia's borders.
Biden said this weekend that he would not agree with any red lines.
Imagine NATO saying today that it will ban not just Ukraine, but any country close to Russia (Finland, Sweden, Georgia?) From joining it now or in the future.
Putin has other demands: he complains about the anti-missile defense systems in Poland, for example.
Russia also, by the way, has missiles capable of hitting major European cities.
Having watched Russia's behavior in recent years, its neighbors have good reason to seek protection.
If Putin's goal was to drive Ukraine away from the West, there is no sign that is happening.
The United States is reaffirming its "steadfast commitment" to Ukraine's "sovereignty and territorial integrity", in the words repeated by Blinken.
How far would the US go to protect Ukraine from Russia 2:08
While Putin threatens the West with a military rally along the Ukrainian border, he is also trying to achieve other goals.
It is proving once again that Russia can cause trouble for the former Soviet republics, its former satellites in Eastern and Western Europe, where it has already been willing to squeeze the fuel supply during the cold winter months.
(Putin claims that the gas shortage is not Russia's doing, but not everyone is convinced.)
However, an invasion is now potentially much more expensive than the swift Crimean operation.
During more than half a decade of fighting, Ukrainian troops have been hardened in battle.
Few expect NATO to go to war with Russia, but NATO is not impartial.
Ukraine's hardened soldiers now have much better weaponry, provided by the West.
A Russian invasion would provoke strong resistance.
The casualties on both sides could be huge.
Additionally, Russia could be hit by tougher Western sanctions.
The Biden administration is already designing sanctions that would inflict "significant and severe economic damage on the Russian economy," according to a US official.
If Putin acts, the Russian people may simply experience another terrible war, with young soldiers returning home in body bags and the economy limping from the cost of war and sanctions.
Furthermore, the move to Ukraine has the potential to create precisely the opposite result of what Putin claims he wants now.
By invading, it would reaffirm the threat that Russia poses to its neighbors.
An invasion would not only bring Ukraine and the West closer together, but make the rest of the people living in Russia's neighborhood yearn for closer ties with the United States, Europe, and NATO, just as the Soviet invasions did to the countries of Russia. Eastern Europe when everyone rushed to join NATO as soon as they freed themselves from the clutches of Moscow.
