Ukraine
Fig. 1. “Destroyed Russian military vehicles located on the main street Khreshchatyk are seen as part of the celebration of the Independence Day of Ukraine in Kyiv, August 24.” Photograph by Gleb Garanich for Reuters, August 24, 2022,[1] fair use.
I thought this was something that doesn’t happen, that the risk to a U.S. president would be considered too great:
The reporters traveling with [Joe Biden] were allowed to send a pool report to other journalists only after his arrival [in Kyiv] and were not permitted to further describe how he traveled to Kyiv while he was still in the country. An American official, who asked not to be identified, confirmed that after a trans-Atlantic flight to Poland, Mr. Biden crossed the border by train, traveling for nearly 10 hours to Kyiv as other American officials have in recent months because flying into a war zone is unsafe. He was to leave on a similar train trip and then, after crossing the border, head to Warsaw.[2]
Though Western surface-to-air missile systems have bolstered Ukraine’s defensives, the visit marked the rare occasion when a U.S. president has traveled to a conflict zone where the U.S. or its allies did not have control over the airspace. The White House would not go into specifics but said that “basic communication with the Russians occurred to ensure deconfliction” shortly before [Joe] Biden’s visit in an effort to avoid any miscalculation that could bring the two nuclear-armed nations into direct conflict.[3]
Mr. [Joe] Biden’s visit to Kyiv recalled the secret missions flown by Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald J. Trump to Iraq and Afghanistan during the height of the wars in those countries. But bringing a president into Ukraine without the sort of American troop presence that was on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, much less control of the airspace, presented a security challenge of a vastly different magnitude. American warplanes were spotted flying over Poland near the border, but officials said they did not enter Ukrainian airspace.[4]
[Joe] Biden also got a short firsthand taste of the terror that Ukrainians have lived with for close to a year, as air raids sirens howled over the capital just as he and Zelenskyy were exiting the gold-domed St. Michael’s Cathedral, which they visited together. Looking solemn, they continued unperturbed as they laid a wreath and held a moment of silence at the Wall of Remembrance honoring Ukrainian soldiers killed since 2014.[5]
The alarm on Monday morning was triggered by a Russian MIG fighter jet taking off in Belarus, which borders Ukraine to the north. A missile from a MIG fired from Belarus can hit a target in Kyiv in under 20 minutes.[6]
Robyn Dixon and Catherine Belton, “Putin, czar with no empire, needs military victory for his own survival,” Washington Post, February 19, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/02/20/putin-czar-with-no-empire-needs-military-victory-his-own-survival/
Maria Katamadze, “Can Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin challenge Putin?” Deutschewelle, February 19, 2023, https://www.dw.com/en/can-wagner-head-yevgeny-prigozhin-challenge-putin/a-64744266
Missy Ryan et al., “Biden makes surprise visit to Ukraine ahead of Russian invasion anniversary,” Washington Post, February 20, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/02/20/president-biden-kyiv-ukraine-visit-war/
Marc Santora, Peter Baker, and Michael D. Shear, “Biden Visits Kyiv, Ukraine’s Embattled Capital, as Air-Raid Siren Sounds,” New York Times, February 20, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/20/us/politics/biden-ukraine-visit.html
Evan Vucci et al., “Biden in Ukraine ahead of war anniversary: ‘Kyiv stands,’” Associated Press, February 20, 2023, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-zelenskyy-biden-f00af220669457d5ba07127c7e57a27b
- [1]Reuters, “Ukraine puts destroyed Russian tanks on display in Kyiv,” August 25, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/ukraine-puts-destroyed-russian-tanks-on-idUSRTSALV9Q↩
- [2]Marc Santora, Peter Baker, and Michael D. Shear, “Biden Visits Kyiv, Ukraine’s Embattled Capital, as Air-Raid Siren Sounds,” New York Times, February 20, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/20/us/politics/biden-ukraine-visit.html↩
- [3]Evan Vucci et al., “Biden in Ukraine ahead of war anniversary: ‘Kyiv stands,’” Associated Press, February 20, 2023, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-zelenskyy-biden-f00af220669457d5ba07127c7e57a27b↩
- [4]Marc Santora, Peter Baker, and Michael D. Shear, “Biden Visits Kyiv, Ukraine’s Embattled Capital, as Air-Raid Siren Sounds,” New York Times, February 20, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/20/us/politics/biden-ukraine-visit.html↩
- [5]Evan Vucci et al., “Biden in Ukraine ahead of war anniversary: ‘Kyiv stands,’” Associated Press, February 20, 2023, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-zelenskyy-biden-f00af220669457d5ba07127c7e57a27b↩
- [6]Marc Santora, Peter Baker, and Michael D. Shear, “Biden Visits Kyiv, Ukraine’s Embattled Capital, as Air-Raid Siren Sounds,” New York Times, February 20, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/20/us/politics/biden-ukraine-visit.html↩