https://nypost.com/2022/10/07/biden-fre ... -off-ramp/old salt wrote: ↑Fri Oct 07, 2022 9:30 pmShe excludes the possibility of a negotiated settlement.CU88 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 07, 2022 3:31 pmNot sure how you saw from that video clip, all I saw was her saying that the war ends if Russia leaves Ukraine. You have seem to issues.old salt wrote: ↑Fri Oct 07, 2022 2:23 pmShe's happy to let the Ukrainians do the fighting & dying, while the US picks up the tab & expends our critical weapons inventory, while she scurries under the US nuclear umbrella.CU88 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 07, 2022 10:41 am Finnish prime minister Sanna Marin was asked about a potential off-ramp for Russia to end the war in Ukraine. Her reply:
https://twitter.com/RikhardHusu/status/ ... 6709590017
She nailed it.
“I’m trying to figure out what is Putin’s off ramp?” Biden continued. “Where does he find a way out? Where does he find himself in a position that he does not not only lose face but lose significant power within Russia?”
Biden has made several remarks criticized as “too weak” during the Russia-Ukraine crisis.
When asked about Biden’s remark, Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin gave a simple rebuttal.
“The way out of this conflict is for Russia to leave Ukraine. That is the way out of the conflict,” Marin told reporters Friday in a snap-back widely circulated on social media.
Rather than walk it back, as the White House has had to do with several Biden remarks the past few months, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre deflected a reporter’s question about the “off ramp” remark during a brief gaggle aboard Air Force One on Friday.
A reporter said to Jean-Pierre, “[Biden] talked about the fact that you’re trying to figure out what Putin’s off-ramp is or something that would allow him to save face. Is there any concession being discussed between the US and allies that would be acceptable to make sure that this conflict deescalates?”
Jean-Pierre answered without directly addressing possible concessions.
“You’ve heard us say this before: there’s only one country that is responsible for this war, only one country, and that’s Russia. And they started this conflict and Mr. Putin has the ability to stop this conflict today,” Biden’s spokeswoman said.
Although Biden has presided over the distribution of massive amounts of US financial and military aid to Ukraine, he also has repeatedly irked Ukraine advocates with rhetorical missteps.
Biden said in June that Ukraine might have to cede land to Russia in a “negotiated settlement” and that “I’m not going to tell them what they should and shouldn’t do” — after European leaders including then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson demanded a full Russian withdrawal.
Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24 about a month after Biden said at a White House press conference that the US would respond differently if Russia launched a “minor incursion” into the country, as opposed to a full-scale war, a comment which horrified Ukrainian leaders.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky publicly responded to Biden that “there are no minor incursions.” And a Ukrainian official told CNN, “This remark potentially gives the green light to Putin to enter Ukraine at his pleasure. Putin senses weakness.”
Biden sought to walk back the minor incursion remark by saying that Putin “has no misunderstanding” about the “severe” economic sanctions that would follow a Russian invasion of Ukraine. He said he wanted to clarify, “If any, any assembled Russian units move across the Ukrainian border, that is an invasion.”
Biden also upset Ukrainian officials in January by allegedly telling Zelensky to brace for a “sack” of Kyiv. White House National Security Council spokesperson Emily Horne described the report as “completely false.” But Zelensky later said he rejected a US offer to fly him to safety. The Ukrainian president said he replied, “The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride.”