The White House denied it was going on until the last moment. When Joe Biden had flown to Europe hours earlier on Sunday, the president’s press office was still circulating a plan for the day when the US boss was still sitting happily in the White House and would not fly to Poland until Monday night. But the president’s surprise trip to Kiev to commemorate the anniversary of the war had been planned in the strictest secrecy for months.
“Only a handful of people” from the intelligence community, the Pentagon, the White House and other departments involved with the president’s security were involved in planning the trip, Deputy White House National Security Advisor Jon Finer said Monday. after Biden had completed his already whirlwind six-hour visit and was outside of Ukraine. “The president was fully briefed on every step of the plan and any potential complications,” added Finer, one of the few insiders on the trip.
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It was Biden himself who made the final travel decision that same Friday, just 48 hours before departure, after a confidential meeting in the Oval Office with members of his national security team, some of whom were on the phone. According to his advisers, he was determined to take the possible risk to send a message of unwavering support to Ukrainian citizens, devastated by a year of war, and to Russian President Vladimir Putin “for as long as necessary”.
The preparations, according to White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, were particularly complicated, even more so than those of other presidents such as Barack Obama or George W. Bush to travel to conflict zones such as Iraq or Afghanistan. In these countries, the US military controlled the national infrastructure, which simplified operations. “Contrary to previous visits, the United States does not appear to have a military presence on the ground,” he said, and his embassy in Kyiv is very lightly staffed.
The operation, in coordination with the Ukrainian government, “required an operational and logistical security effort by professionals from across the United States government to take on something dangerous and bring it to a manageable level of risk,” White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan explained. one of the very few officials who accompanied Biden on his visit.
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As recently as Friday, the White House publicly insisted that no trip to Ukraine was planned. “No,” said National Security Council spokesman John Kirby when asked about the possibility at a press conference. Officially, the President had not scheduled his departure until the night of Monday 20th, in order to land in Warsaw early Tuesday, the only declared leg of his journey.
But on Sunday at 4:15 a.m. (10:15 a.m. Spanish Peninsula time), the presidential plane Air Force One took off from Andrews Air Base on the outskirts of Washington. On board, apart from Biden, was only a small group of senior officials: his Deputy Chief of Staff, Jen O’Malley Dillon; Jake Sullivan and Annie Tomasini, Oval Office Operations Director. Next to them two journalists. Both had to hand in their cell phones pending the public announcement of the President’s arrival in Kiev.
The White House alerted Moscow to the trip, albeit just a few hours before departure to “avoid conflict,” Sullivan revealed. The senior official declined to specify the Russian response or the exact content of the US embassy due to the “sensitive nature” of these communications.
Biden landed in Poland and from there traveled by train to Kiev, a 10-hour journey already made famous by other international leaders who have traveled to the country’s wartime capital, including France’s Emmanuel Macron and Britain’s Boris Johnson. He arrived at 8am Monday morning wearing a blue suit and tie in the light blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag. “It’s good to be back in Kyiv,” he smiled as he greeted the US Ambassador to the Ukrainian capital, Bridget Brink, who had come to greet him.
He immediately went to the Presidential Palace, where he was received by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife Olena. “I think it’s important that there is no question, absolutely no question, about America’s support for Ukraine in this war,” Biden said. At 2 p.m., six hours after his arrival, the White House confirmed that he had left Ukraine.
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