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President Obama, left, and President Bronislaw Komorowski of Poland spoke with American and Polish airmen on Tuesday in a hangar at Warsaw Chopin Airport. Credit Janek Skarzynski/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
WARSAW — President Obama announced more steps on Tuesday to bolster security in central and eastern Europe with additional deployments and training as he arrived in Poland for the start of a four-day European trip aimed at locking arms with allies following Russia’s intervention in Ukraine.
Mr. Obama tried to make a point of demonstrating solidarity with leaders from Poland and the rest of the region immediately upon landing. Striding across the tarmac from Air Force One, he visited a hangar with four American F-16 fighter jets and addressed about 50 American and Polish airmen and soldiers with a message of resolve.
“I’m starting the visit here because our commitment to Poland’s security as well as the security of our allies in central and eastern Europe is a cornerstone of our own security and is sacrosanct,†Mr. Obama told the troops with President Bronislaw Komorowski of Poland at his side. “As friends and allies, we stand united together and forever.â€
He later announced that he would ask Congress for $1 billion for a “European reassurance initiative†that would increase exercises, training and troop presence in Eastern Europe and send American navy ships more often to the Baltic and Black seas. The plan would deploy American experts to bolster capabilities and would help pre-position equipment among European allies for quicker military responses. It would also provide aid to Ukraine and two other former Soviet republics, Georgia and Moldova.
But it was unclear whether Mr. Obama’s new announcement would satisfy regional leaders previously unimpressed by the relatively token forces sent in recent months. Mr. Obama dispatched additional rotations of aircraft and support personnel as well as about 600 paratroopers to Poland and other allies in the region after Russia seized Crimea from neighboring Ukraine in the spring.
Anxious about the threat from Moscow, Polish leaders have been pressing for a more robust deployment and even a permanent base despite a NATO-Russia agreement following the end of the Cold War in which the western alliance said it would refrain from deploying substantial forces in eastern territory. Polish officials have argued that Russia had effectively abrogated that agreement by annexing Crimea.
“For the first time since the Second World War, one European country has taken a province by force from another European country,†Radoslaw Sikorski, the Polish foreign minister, said in a telephone interview before Mr. Obama’s arrival. “America, we hope, has ways of reassuring us that we haven’t even thought about. There are major bases in Britain, in Spain, in Portugal, in Greece, in Italy. Why not here?â€
Joined by Secretary of State John Kerry, Mr. Obama had a day of meetings scheduled with Mr. Komorowski and Prime Minister Donald Tusk. He was to meet with the leaders of Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia, all of whom are traveling here to see the American president.
On Wednesday, Mr. Obama is scheduled to meet here for the first time with Petro O. Poroshenko, the newly elected president of Ukraine, days before his inauguration on Saturday. Mr. Obama hopes to reinforce American support for the new government in Kiev as it tries to stabilize a rocky economy and quell a violent, pro-Russian insurgency in its eastern regions.
He is also scheduled to address a public rally later Wednesday marking the 25th anniversary of the first partially free elections in Poland that led to the end of Communist rule. The fresh crisis with Russia, coming at a time when this part of Europe is commemorating the end of the Cold War and Soviet domination, lent symbolic potency to the event.
Mr. Obama plans to fly later Wednesday to Brussels to meet with leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada and Japan in a Group of 7 format that was originally supposed to be a Group of 8 summit meeting hosted by President Vladimir V. Putin in Sochi, Russia, until the country was suspended from the group. Mr. Obama will then head to France for meetings in Paris and a ceremony in Normandy marking the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Mr. Putin has been invited to the Normandy ceremony, marking the first time he and Mr. Obama will meet since the Ukraine crisis erupted.
The nervousness here was palpable even though American and Western European officials doubt Mr. Putin would dare to use force against a NATO ally such as Poland. Under Article 5 of the NATO charter, the United States and others in the alliance are obligated to come to the defense of any member. Ukraine, by contrast, is not a NATO member, much like Georgia, which was invaded by Russian forces in 2008 after a skirmish in a breakaway republic.
But Mr. Sikorski said many in Poland were not so sure. “Russia is testing the strength of the international system set up by the United States after World War II,†he said. “She tested it in Georgia, which was an implied ally of the United States. She has now tested it in Ukraine. And I don’t think we can discount the possibility that she will test it again. And therefore our security guarantees have be credible, which is to say physically enforceable.â€
Russia has long resisted NATO forces in central and Eastern European countries. In 1997, NATO and Russia signed an agreement in which NATO said it did not intend “additional permanent stationing of substantial combat forces†in Eastern Europe. But under the agreement, Russia agreed to refrain “from the threat or use of force†that would violate the “sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence†of its neighbors.
The American airmen whom Mr. Obama visited at Okecie Airport were here as part of a full-time United States Air Force detachment opened in Poland in November 2012. The detachment has hosted five training rotations of American F-16 jets and C-130 transport aircraft and the United States added additional rotations after Russia’s intervention in Ukraine.
“Poles and Americans stand shoulder to shoulder for freedom,†Mr. Obama told them. “And we’re so grateful to all of you for your service.â€
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