Russia began a bloody blitz of Ukraine on Thursday, riddling cities with air strikes and seizing the Chernobyl nuclear plant, as Western leaders pounded the Kremlin with sanctions and pilloried President Vladimir Putin for launching the largest European invasion since World War II.
Putin’s cruel choice to stage the multifront assault on his country’s democratic neighbor met international condemnation and large demonstrations in New York City, London and Moscow. President Biden, meanwhile, joined Western leaders in ratcheting up economic sanctions on Russia, and pledged to turn Putin into a global outcast.
Explosions were reported before dawn Friday on the outskirts of Kyiv. U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers that Russian forces that entered Ukraine from Belarus were about 20 miles from Ukraine’s capital city, the AP reported. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the Ukrainian capital “could well be under siege.”
In a speech Thursday that carried the verbal trimmings of the Cold War, Biden suggested that Putin’s military aims extend beyond Ukraine to a reconstitution of the Soviet Union. He said the U.S. was responding by cutting off four of Russia’s largest banks from the American financial system.
“Putin’s aggression against Ukraine will end up costing Russia dearly economically and strategically,” Biden said in his remarks from the East Room of the White House. “Putin will be a pariah on the international stage. Any nation that countenances Russia’s naked aggression against Ukraine will be stained by association.”
The president outlined the new penalties as Putin plunged Europe into a dark new chapter, one marked by images of camouflaged Russian tanks rolling through the north of Ukraine and the sounds of explosions rattling the nation’s cities, including the capital Kyiv.
Biden had warned that the onslaught was imminent for days, but Putin’s war nonetheless stunned the globe with its brazenness. At least 137 Ukrainians died on the first day of the invasion, and 376 more were wounded, according to the country’s government.
“Our worst fears have now come true,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain said. “This hideous and barbaric venture of Vladimir Putin must end in failure.”
As Biden ramped up sanctions, he promised that he was attempting to avoid significant disruptions to the global gas market, but asked Americans to buckle up for some economic pain at the pump.
“I know this is hard, and that Americans are already hurting,” the president said. “But this aggression cannot go unanswered. If it did, the consequences for America would be much worse. America stands up to bullies. We stand up for freedom. This is who we are.”
The new economic penalties will strangle Russia’s ability to use American dollars, euros, British pounds, and Japanese yen, Biden said, adding that the U.S. is targeting Russian financial institutions with around $1 trillion in assets.
Despite early tremors on Wall Street and a historic rout for the Russian stock market, the Dow Jones Industrial Average — which climbed across the 20th century’s Cold War — rallied from early losses on Thursday and finished the day in the black.
Ed Moya, a senior market analyst at Oanda, said there is belief on Wall Street that the war in Eastern Europe will not thrust the U.S. economy into a recession.
“There were investors that are pricing in a quick resolution to this Russia-Ukraine conflict,” Moya said. “I still think we’re in for a bumpy ride here.”
The coming geopolitical roller coaster looked plenty bumpy. Biden said he had no plans to talk to Putin and described a “complete rupture” in America’s relationship with the Kremlin.
Biden brushed off a threat from Putin that seemed to suggest he would consider ordering a nuclear strike if he faces interference in his bid to landgrab Ukraine. Biden said he had “no idea” what Putin was threatening.
Analysts have wondered about the mental state of the 69-year-old Russian leader, who has long been considered a rational if ruthless global actor. That perception has fallen under scrutiny as Putin, a former KGB colonel who served in the Soviet Union, has now pushed his nation and the world into a conflict that is expected to deliver devastating effects.
Putin has spent the pandemic almost entirely isolated, and is increasingly advised by a cabinet of hard-liners. As he launched his assault on Ukraine — a 30-year-old sovereign nation — Putin said he sought the country’s demilitarization and “denazification.”
The bizarre language confounded observers, who noted that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is Jewish.
Expressing disgust at Putin’s brutal path, former President Barack Obama issued a statement Thursday saying that the Ukrainians faced punishment for “exercising rights that should be available to all people and nations.”
“This illegal invasion in the heart of Europe also threatens the foundation of the international order,” Obama said in his statement, adding that it also violates “basic principles of human decency.”
Biden has worked for weeks to head off Putin’s plans. He has made clear that he will not send U.S. troops into Ukraine, wary of a direct military confrontation with Russia, a nuclear-armed state with a million-soldier strong army.
But he said Thursday that he had corralled a coalition of allies representing more than half the global economy to strike jointly at the Russian financial system.
The Pentagon, meanwhile, was expected to send 7,000 more troops to Europe. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, said lawmakers hope to supply Ukraine with $600 million in weapons to ward off Russia.
As Europe shuddered at a conflict of the likes unseen this century, Biden expressed confidence that history will look unkindly on the Russian president.
“Putin’s choice to make a totally unjustifiable war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger,” Biden said. “In the contest between democracy and autocracy — between sovereignty and subjugation — make no mistake: Freedom will prevail.”
