Ukraine’s Top Diplomat Says Risk of War With Russia Grows
By David Lerman Mar 23, 2014 8:36 AM PT
Ukraine’s foreign minister said the chances of war with Russia are increasing as thousands of Russian troops gather on his country’s border.
“We are ready to respond,” Foreign Minister Andrii Deshchytsia said in an interview broadcast today on ABC-TV’s “This Week” program.
“The Ukraine government is trying to use all the peaceful, diplomatic means and diplomatic means to stop Russians, but the people are also ready to defend their homeland,” he said.
With President Barack Obama scheduled to travel to Europe tomorrow to consult with allies, U.S. intelligence and military officials said Russian troops are massed along virtually the entire Ukrainian border. The number of troops is about double what it was when Moscow’s defense ministry announced that armed forces would hold exercises near Ukraine, the officials said.
As Russian President Vladimir Putin completed the annexation of Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula, Western nations and Russia exchanged economic sanctions, raising concern about an escalation of the crisis.
Senator Kelly Ayotte, a New Hampshire Republican on the Armed Services Committee, called for increasing sanctions on Russia and sending small arms and other military aid to Ukraine.
“What we can do is strengthen NATO’s presence, particularly in the countries surrounding Ukraine, and also provide assistance to the Ukrainian military,” Ayotte said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” program while on a visit to Kiev, Ukraine’s capital.
Sanctions Imposed While there’s no need to consider American troops on the ground in Ukraine, Ayotte said, the U.S. should provide communications equipment, technical assistance and small arms.
Obama has imposed sanctions on 27 Russian officials and four Ukrainians. He has also authorized, though not implemented, potential future penalties on Russian industries, including financial services, energy, metals and mining, defense and engineering.
“I think we need to do more with sanctions, including sanctioning the entire financial sector of the Russian economy, as well as looking at the energy sector,” Ayotte said.
The Senate’s No. 2 Democrat, Richard Durbin of Illinois, said the Senate will take up a Ukraine aid bill tomorrow when it returns to Washington from a week-long recess.
The bill, which includes about $1 billion in loan guarantees, has been held up over partisan fights on a proposed restructuring of the International Monetary Fund and new Internal Revenue Service rules governing political activity by some nonprofit groups.
Sleeping Bags “They do need everything from fuel to tires to sleeping bags to meals,” Durbin said of Ukraine’s military, in a CBS interview. “We’ve got to strengthen them and help them with advice and backing, and it may come to small arms. I’m not ruling that out, keep it on the table.”
Representative Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican who heads the House intelligence committee, said the Obama administration must reassess its thinking about Putin and give up on a reset of U.S.-Russia relations.
Putin “goes to bed at night thinking of Peter the Great and he wakes up thinking of Stalin,” Rogers said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program, in an interview from Tbilisi, Georgia.
“We need to be a little bit tougher with Putin, or he is going to continue to take territory to fulfill what he believes is rightfully Russia.”
Obama Trip
Obama is to travel to the Netherlands tomorrow on the first leg of a six-day trip he will use to mobilize opposition to Russia’s takeover of Crimea. While focusing on diplomatic and economic tools, he has joined European leaders in warning of further consequences if Russia continues its incursion.
“There has to be a concerted international prohibition against Putin going any further than Crimea,” former President Jimmy Carter said in a taped interview that aired on NBC today.
Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee who had called Russia the greatest geopolitical threat to the U.S., accused Obama today of displaying “naivete with regards to Russia” and showing “faulty judgment about Russia’s intentions and objectives.”
“They thought resetting relations with Russia, handing out gifts to Russia, would somehow make Russia change its objectives,” Romney said on CBS. “Well, that certainly wasn’t the case.”
Deshchytsia, Ukraine’s foreign minister, said his country remains “very concerned” about Russian troops along its eastern border.
“We don’t know what Putin has in his mind and what will be his decision,” Deshchytsia said. “That’s why this situation is becoming even more explosive than it used to be a week ago.”
To contact the reporter on this story: David Lerman in Washington at dlerman1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: John Walcott at jwalcott9@bloomberg.net Lawrence Roberts, Anthony Gnoffo
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