Biden: Every centimeter of NATO territory is defended

Created: 03/26/2022, 19:10

US President Joe Biden delivers a speech at the Royal Castle in Warsaw on the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

© Radek Pietruszka/PAP/dpa

During his speech in Warsaw, US President Joe Biden pledged US support to the people of Ukraine.

He warns of Kremlin chief Putin.

Warsaw – US President Joe Biden has warned the Russian head of state in emphatic terms against an attack on NATO territory.

"Don't even think about taking action against an inch of NATO territory," said Biden in Warsaw on Saturday at the end of a two-day visit to Poland.

The United States and its NATO partners have a "sacred obligation" to defend Alliance territory with the combined might of all members, Biden said.

Biden said Putin miscalculated the war of aggression in Ukraine.

NATO and the West are now "more united" than ever before.

Russia wanted fewer NATO soldiers in Eastern Europe, now there are more, he said.

The US armed forces alone now have more than 100,000 soldiers in Europe.

Biden pledged the support of the United States to the people of Ukraine.

"We're with you," Biden said.

Russia is trying to crush democracy at home and is also endangering neighboring countries.

There is no justification for Russia's brutal war of aggression in Ukraine, Biden said.

Biden had previously met in Warsaw with Ukrainian refugees and two government ministers in Kyiv.

"Great Battle Between Democracy and Autocracy"

The world is preparing for a long conflict over the future international order.

It is about a "great battle between democracy and autocracy, between freedom and oppression, between a rule-based order and one that is determined by brute force," said Biden in a speech in Warsaw on Saturday evening.

“We have to be clear: this battle will not be fought in days or in months.

We have to steel ourselves for a long fight.”

Biden condemned Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin's portrayal of Russia as "denazifying" Ukraine.

"That's a lie, that's just plain cynical and also obscene," Biden said.

Biden continued that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was Jewish and that his father's family was a victim of the Holocaust.

"And Putin, like all autocrats, has the gall to think might makes right."

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Biden spoke at Warsaw's Royal Castle a month after Russia's war of aggression began in neighboring Ukraine.

It is considered a symbol of the Polish capital, which was largely destroyed by Nazi Germany in World War II and later rebuilt.

dpa