Biden Seeks to Press Putin on Ukraine Without Sparking Wider War

(Bloomberg) -- The steady drumbeat of retaliatory actions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine comes with some U.S. signaling that it doesn't want the crisis to spiral out of control.

The U.S. and European allies have led efforts to sanction Russian banks, target politically connected oligarchs, bolster Ukraine's defenses and rally international opinion against President Vladimir Putin's war. But the Biden administration has also held off in responding to what it sees as overt provocations from Moscow meant to inflame tensions further.

In the days after Putin announced on national television that Russia's nuclear arsenal was on a “special regime of high-alert combat duty,” U.S. officials repeatedly said they saw little to justify a response. And the Biden administration went a step further Wednesday, postponing a Minuteman-III intercontinental ballistic missile test planned for this week.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the delay “in an effort to demonstrate that we have no intention in engaging in any actions that could be misunderstood or misconstrued,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said.

Similarly, the administration has avoided potentially provocative rhetoric such as talking about regime change in Russia and has hesitated at times to confirm details of weapons shipments to Ukraine, such as its delivery of Stinger anti-aircraft missiles.

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Several U.S. officials who spoke to Bloomberg News on the condition of anonymity said the approach reflected the Biden administration's desire to inflict economic pain on Putin while avoiding unnecessary risks with a nuclear-armed adversary. The caution was particularly important, the people said, as Putin faces increasing international isolation, as well as military setbacks in Ukraine.

‘Release Valve'

“There has to be some kind of release valve here, some prospect of an off-ramp,” said Richard Fontaine, chief executive officer of the Center for a New American Security who was an adviser to late Republican Senator John McCain.

Although Russian officials have called moves by the U.S. and its allies to bolster Ukraine a provocation, Biden and his top aides have repeatedly emphasized that NATO is a defensive alliance, and that no U.S. or NATO troops would be deployed inside Ukraine's territory.

“Our forces are not engaged and will not engage in the conflict with Russian forces in Ukraine,” Biden said Tuesday in his State of the Union speech, while calling for unity with the Ukrainian people.

As Russian forces press down on Kyiv and other key Ukrainian cities, the U.S. military has sought to establish new channels for talking to its Russian counterparts. Kirby said Monday that the Pentagon is exploring options for a “deconfliction mechanism” with Russia, a strategy it has used in other places where Russian and Western forces are in close proximity, such as Syria.

A plan to avoid unintended conflicts will be important as Ukraine's air space is contested, Kirby said, because “some of that air space butts right up against NATO territory.” Russia has cited NATO's eastward expansion as one of its chief grievances and demanded that the alliance to pull back from former Soviet bloc countries.

The U.S. needs “to do everything in our power to show President Putin there is a way off on this, accommodations can be made to your security interests, but you can't do it at the point of a gun barrel,” William Cohen, a former senator and U.S. defense secretary, told Bloomberg Television on Tuesday.

Long Table

From the Biden administration's perspective, the need for caution is intensified by concerns over the way that Putin appears to be making decisions. According to one official, a major concern of the administration is that Putin is seen as increasingly surrounded by an insular inner circle and isn't receiving dissenting opinions.

Images of the Russian leader sitting at the end of a long table, physically removed from his advisers or visiting dignitaries -- a result of Covid-19 precautions -- are in many ways a metaphor for the problem, the person said.

To avoid looking consumed by the Ukraine conflict, the U.S. administration has attempted to demonstrate some normalcy in pursuing its broader foreign policy strategy, which is focused on shifting toward Asia.

Blinken's decision to go forward with plans to visit Australia in mid-February, despite surging Russia-Ukraine tensions, was driven in part by this concern, according to the U.S. officials, as was Biden's decision to push ahead with an upcoming summit with leaders from Southeast Asian nations in Washington.

Although Biden has mostly won rare bipartisan support for his approach to Ukraine in recent weeks, his decision to postpone the intercontinental ballistic missile test drew some scorn.

U.S. Senator James Inhofe, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, criticized the move in a tweet, saying, “Deterrence is about projecting strength and resolve -- not sacrificing readiness for hollow gestures.”

But the administration said that diplomacy was its priority, even as that gets more difficult with Russian forces progressing farther into Ukraine.

“We believe that in times of crisis, we believe that lines of communication are in some ways even more important,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told a briefing Monday. “So we have continued to engage the Russian Federation.”

It's not clear if Putin or his top aides are getting the message -- and it shows little sign of deterring his offensive in Ukraine -- but its a strategy the administration is committed to for now.

“We are in a very dangerous point in our relationship with Putin,” Cohen said. “It's hard to predict how he will react.”