After weeks of hysterical pronouncements about an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine, culminating in – reports claimed – an embarrassing meltdown by President Joe Biden in a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the Biden administration appears to be backing away from Ukraine and looking for ways to change the subject – such as declaring war on cancer instead of Russia.
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The shift in White House messaging began after last Thursday’s controversial phone call between Biden and Zelensky. The Ukrainian leader emerged from the encounter looking angry and frustrated. Soon Ukrainian officials were telling reporters that Biden ranted hysterically about an imminent Russian invasion that would leave a trail of destruction all the way to Kyiv, while Zelensky pleaded with Biden to “calm down” his rhetoric because he was causing panic in Ukraine.
The White House disputed Ukrainian accounts of the conversation but refused to release transcripts of the call – the exact same demand Biden himself made of President Donald Trump after his own controversial phone call with Ukrainian officials in July 2019.
The Zelensky administration stuck to its position over the ensuing week, insisting it was taking the Russian military buildup on its border seriously and was grateful for international support, but did not believe a devastating invasion could begin at any moment.
Zelensky, in turn, took some heat from American foreign policy experts for publicly chastising Biden and creating a political opportunity that Russia could exploit. Russian officials – including Vladimir Putin, when he broke six weeks of silence on the Ukraine situation on Wednesday – accused Biden of trying to start a war for his own political benefit.
On Wednesday, the White House signaled a shift in messaging by bizarrely claiming the Ukrainians do not understand the meaning of the word “imminent.”
“I used [the word “imminent”] once, I think others have used that once and then we stopped using it because I think it sent a message that we weren’t intending to send, which was that we knew President Putin had made a decision. I would say the vast majority of times I’ve talked about it and said he could invade at any time, that’s true. We still don’t know that he’s made a decision,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki rambled when asked about the dispute between Biden and Zelensky.
In fact, Psaki had warned a Russian invasion of Ukraine was “imminent” at a press briefing only a few days earlier, and went out of her way to tell reporters that she was using the word very deliberately.
Psaki was building from a comment made by U.N. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Tuesday.
“I would not say that we are arguing that it’s imminent, because we are still pursuing a diplomatic solution to give the Russians an off-ramp. Our hope is that this will work, and that Putin will understand that war and confrontation is not the path that he wants to follow, but he wants to take a path of diplomacy,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
On Wednesday, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby confirmed that directives were issued to stop using the word “imminent,” supposedly because it does not translate well into the Ukrainian language.
“Well, I think there were some issues about how that word translates in Ukraine, literally. The bottom line is we believe that, and you’ve heard Secretary Austin say this last week, we believe that he, Putin, has a lot of military capability. He continues to add to his options, and he could execute any number of options pretty much on very short notice. So we’re watching this seriously. We know that he’s got capabilities if he wants to invade again very, very soon, he could do that,” Kirby said.
Kirby took pains to avoid portraying the Biden administration’s messaging shift as a result of Zelensky’s complaints about hysterical overreaction, insisting that the Pentagon is still nervously watching Vladimir Putin “add to his capability, his options.”
For the record, Volodymyr Zelensky speaks English – arguably much better than he speaks Ukrainian – and if nemynuchyy, the Ukrainian word for “imminent,” has any different cultural connotations, they are subtle.
The Biden administration certainly has not been subtle about loudly insisting that Russia could roll across the Ukrainian border at any moment, including some quite specific warnings that Russia would attack in February, as soon as the mud freezes enough to support tank treads. Biden infamously told the entire world he expected Russia to “move in” with a “minor incursion” during his anniversary press conference on January 19.
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