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Biden Makes Surprise Trip to Ukraine as War Nears One-Year Mark; Biden Announces Another $500 Million in Aid During Surprise Kyiv Trip; Biden Lays Wreath in Kyiv to Honor Fallen Ukrainian Soldiers. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired February 20, 2023 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour. I'm Jim Sciutto.

This Monday morning, an unprecedented visit to a war zone, President Biden made a surprise trip to Kyiv in a significant show support for Ukraine entering an active war zone without a large U.S. military presence.

Without that military presence, it's, of course, different from other presidential visits to Afghanistan, Iraq, for instance. Air raid sirens you hear there sounding as Biden is walking side by side with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

It is the first trip to the country since the Russian invaded. We're coming on the one year anniversary in just a few days. CNN has learned that Biden the final decision just on Friday to make this visit to Kyiv. Ukrainian president had invited him prior. Officials say the U.S. informed Russia about the visits hours ahead of his arrival there, that intended to de-conflict, to make sure that Russia would not fire on Kyiv as the U.S. president was there.

During a news conference earlier this morning, President Biden announced a new round of sanctions against Russia, as well as another $500 million in military assistance to Ukraine, including weapons. The Ukrainian president says Biden's trip leaves, Ukraine, quote, closer to victory. He called it the most important visit in the history of U.S.-Ukraine relations.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: Freedom is priceless. It is worth fighting for, for as long as it takes, and that is how long we are going to be with you, Mr. President, for as long as it takes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: As long as it takes.

CNN Anchor Kaitlan Collins, she is in Warsaw, Poland, CNN Chief International Correspondent Clarissa Ward, she's in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Kaitlan, first to you. We now know that the Biden administration deliberately messaged Russia hours before this visit to de-conflict and, in fact, to ensure the president's safety there. This is quite a decision by the U.S. president to visit the war zone. Tell us how it came about.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF CORRESPONDENT: Yes, they did alert the Russians that the president was going to be in Ukraine. That is because, of course, there are many Russian forces on the ground, they did not want there to be any safety issues there with President Biden's trip. But, overall, it was a risk for President Biden to go to Ukraine. It's reason he has not gone so far in the nearly almost a year that this invasion has been under way.

But what his national security adviser told reporters that, essentially, the message that they were able to send with this visit was worth the risk that President Biden took to go there, because they wanted to show U.S. solidarity with Ukraine, not a celebration, they said, of U.S. support of Ukraine but an affirmation of it, and that that U.S. support is still there, and as President Biden said, as long as it takes. Of course, that's a big question of how long they do believe it's going to take, what that could look like in the meanwhile, and big questions still remain about what else the U.S. may send to Ukraine to help them to fight this war, as they have been doing so far.

But in the visit, in and of itself, President Biden went. He was strolling through the sunshine with President Zelenskyy, as you were hearing those air raid sirens going off in the background. But a notable moment to see President Biden there as he was announcing that half a billion dollars in aid that the U.S. is sending to Ukraine, that is half a billion that includes other types of weaponry that the U.S. has sent in the past. It did not include anything new from o what we have seen and heard from the reports of what President Biden said while he was there on the ground, none of those F-16 fighter jets, like the longer range missiles that Ukraine has been seeking, saying that they need them to help them fight this battle.

But, really, it was the trip in and of itself that the White House says is notable. The fact that they did weigh the security risk, they have been planning it for months, and President Biden made the final call last Friday as he was huddled with aides in the Oval Office to actually make that trip and then, of course, later boarded Air Force One at about 4:00 in the morning in Washington on Sunday before heading to Kyiv and then eventually heading here to Warsaw.

It is a ten-hour train drive from the border with Poland. Jim, as you well know, and Clarissa well knows, it's a very long drive, a very long drive and trip for the president to make. But it is one that they felt was worth making this close to the anniversary.

SCIUTTO: No question. Clarissa, you are in the square where Biden and Zelenskyy met and walked this morning. Tell us about some of the symbolism of where they went, where they visited, and just how Ukrainians are responding to this remarkable visit. [10:05:00]

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jim. We have been seeing Ukrainians coming out all afternoon as soon as they'd heard that President Biden had been here. They were pouring into the square behind me, St. Michael's Square and St. Michael's Church, that you can see, actually, it's probably on that of, sorry, for you, to take photographs, to look at the wreath that was laid with the American flag on it.

For them, for ordinary people here and, frankly, the leadership as well, this was a big deal. This was something that they had hoped for, for a long time. We know that President Zelenskyy had invited President Biden a number of times to come and visit. And he said himself today, as the two presidents were meeting, he said, with this conversation, Ukraine is one step closer to victory.

And I think that really speaks to the effect or at least the anticipated effect that this visit will have had on morale. It has been a tough winter here, Jim. The fighting in the east is grim, some of the highest rates of the Ukrainian casualties, much higher on the Russian side, but still very high Ukrainian casualty rates as well. People have been living often in the cold without power, without running water, because of Russia's ruthless campaign, targeting the infrastructure.

And so to see the president of the United States come on this unannounced trip at this very tense moment and make this hugely symbolic tour of St. Michael's I think really spoke to people, it gave them a morale boost, and it made them feel that Ukraine can win this war with one major caveat, of course, which President Zelenskyy also mentioned himself, which was the discussion of heavier weaponry, long range artillery, fighter jets.

In the short-term, the focus right now is on getting Ukraine more ammunition, which President Biden did say will be forthcoming. That has been a huge issue for the Ukrainians. It's actually, according CNN's reporting as well, an issue for NATO and the U.S. in terms of the volume of ammunition that they require and the ability to produce it at that kind of that pace. So, definitely, a significant moment here, and definitely a day that I think people will be talking about for quite some time.

Extremely heavy security. We were up here as it was happening. We were visited multiple times by soldiers who told us we could not be near this balcony, we could not be near this window, we could not have our camera pointing out in this direction. At one stage, they were using lasers to point in the faces of some other journalists who had tried to peak out of their windows as well to see what was going on.

We ended pretty much crouching on the floor in the distance to get a decent view, because it is a wide open space. And you imagine for the security services just how difficult it was even with that foray at de-confliction, speaking to the Russians, to make sure that President Biden would be able to get in and out fairly quickly and also without any incident. SCIUTTO: They would not want to be taking any chances on what was already quite a chance to take to visit a capital in a war. Kaitlan Collins in Poland, Clarissa Ward there in Kyiv, thanks so much to both of you.

Here now to discuss, CNN Presidential Historian Doug Brinkley, retired Army Brigadier General Peter Zwack, and CNN Law Enforcement Analyst Jonathan Wackrow, he used to be in the Secret Service himself. Thanks to all of you.

Doug Brinkley, I want to speak to you as our resident historian here. Place this in the context and the pantheon of presidential visits to war zones. Presidents have visited Iraq and Afghanistan in recent years, but those were U.S. wars. This is a Ukrainian war, no U.S. military presence on the ground. How significant?

DOUG BRINKLEY, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: It is extremely significant. The United States has went (ph) in more to the Ukraine than ever before. I go back to history and think about Roosevelt and Churchill when FDR had to sneak off in the dead of night, even had a body double at one point, to first meet Winston Churchill off the coast of Newfoundland. And then, of course, you had all those World War 22 the meetings between Churchill.

It's worth mentioning Churchill because Zelenskyy has been called the Churchill of our generation. And Biden going there today, I think it is going to be a moment for the history books. It is like when John F. Kennedy went to Berlin in 1961 and gave a speech at the height of the cold war. Ukraine is the new Berlin. It's the rally point for NATO and the western allies and I think Biden did something really heroic.

SCIUTTO: Yes, a new frontier between east and the west.

Jonathan Wackrow, you served in the U.S. Secret Service. Tell me what would have -- I mean, I would not want to be in charge of the president's security on a visit like this. Tell us what would have gone into keeping him safe on a visit to a war zone.

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, Jim, good morning. This trip is really unprecedented. And the fact that the -- presidents in the past have gone to war zones, have gone to hostile environments, but the planning and the execution for this specific trip is really unique.

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It really deviates from the standard model that the Secret Service has applied in terms of their advanced planning.

And what I mean by that is that is in the past, when we've seen some of those trips that Brinkley just brought up, we see a reliance on U.S. military support, specifically U.S. military support on the ground, and we didn't have that. So, what does the Secret Service have to do? They have to go back to the basics. They have to conduct a detailed threat assessment to understand, one, what are the threats and vulnerabilities that they face, then prioritize those and then manage them, right? This is not going to eliminate any risk, this is about risk management.

So, how do they do it? They have to rely on U.S. intelligence and the diplomatic service to understand who can they trust on the ground, because, again, we don't have U.S. military counterparts. And at the end of the day, Jim, they are thinking of three things, what to do within tactical, a medical and a relocation situation for the president of the United States when you are not tethered to U.S. military assets.

SCIUTTO: And we did hear part of a small team, there was a medical team in case of that eventuality.

Brigadier General Peter Zwack, you have commanded troops in a wartime. This is a very difficult point in the war between Russia and Ukraine. The losses on that eastern front are just horrific for both sides, frankly. What does it mean, in your view, for Ukrainian soldiers fighting this war right now to see the U.S. president come visit?

BRIG. GEN. PETER ZWACK (RET.), U.S. ARMY: It is enormous. If I could just quickly add on to my colleague's statement about Churchill and that era, President Biden's visit harkens back to Edward R. Murrow's statement, this is London during the blitz, the air-raid sirens going on in the background and it is surreal to see the president there with similar circumstances in a beleaguered wartime capital.

The war, itself, it is going to be -- continue to be -- it's grinding out. While the Russians have mass, they don't have quality. But as the old line, quantity has a certain quality of its own. The Ukrainians are putting up a great fight. The Russians, I believe, Jim, there is brittleness in this mass and within the population, as resolved as they are. And this visit just adds to the determination and the will for the Ukrainians to fight that matters and adds in immense ways to the fight on the front, which is hard.

SCIUTTO: Doug Brinkley, this is already, in effect, a proxy war, really, between the west and Russia given the amount of weaponry that the U.S. and its NATO allies are sending to Ukraine. We learned over the weekend from Secretary Blinken that the U.S. is seeing indications that China might make a move it has not yet in this war, and that is to provide lethal assistance to Russia.

Historically, what would the significance of that be, particularly for the war going forward, lengthening the war, perhaps?

BRINKLEY: Well, I think very well it could lengthen the war and probably would if China really, in an overt, embraced Russia's war into Ukraine. I worry about there is no exit strategy here for Putin. I mean, hi lifeline is to China. If he doesn't get that, he is sort of stuck. And there doesn't seem to be track to diplomacy. For a while, there was a thought that maybe Turkey would come in and then be able to do something. So, we are in for a long haul. And if China enters, we're really dealing with a kind of a global cold war of unprecedented dimensions and grave dangers.

SCIUTTO: Yes, a multi-superpower proxy war. So, just quickly, General Zwack, before we go, as often happens, one category of weapons, new category of weapons goes to Ukraine, the most recent one being tanks, something that Ukraine had wanted for a year, now they're there. And these are advanced Leopard German-made. And the focus immediately goes to the next category of weapons, the new one, F-16s. I mean, is that phenomenon overdone? Are F-16s -- when I speak to U.S. military officials, they are skeptical that is actually what Ukraine needs right now.

ZWACK: I think that the F-16s certainly would be a significant addition, though it will take time to train air crew. The Ukrainian Air Force has done remarkably well, but it is tired with its worn-out MIG-29s. F-16s, their and missiles will add a lot. And at this point, the Russians have been so vicious in their aggression, anything along that type, including long range missiles, I think are completely justified.

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No, I think that they won't be, per se, a game-changer, but it makes it a whole lot harder for Russians to get too close with their cruise missiles and other capabilities. And the F-16s also have a very good ground attack capability.

SCIUTTO: We will be watching closely. Brigadier General Peter Zwack, Doug Brinkley, Jonathan Wackrow, thanks to all three of you.

Still ahead, we will hear from a member of the National Security Council about exactly how this presidential trip came about.

Plus, the war in Ukraine has created just an unimaginable World War 2 scale, refugee crisis. A new documentary shares the stories of some of the thousands of Ukrainians, particularly children whose lives have been torn apart by this. The filmmaker will join us.

Plus, Ohio residents say they have had symptoms ever since the toxic train derailment near their homes. They are now going to get some medical help. We are live in East Palestine, Ohio.

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SCIUTTO: Sending a sitting U.S. president to a war zone is a significant, difficult decision. We are learning more about the tremendous planning that went into his surprise trip Kyiv this morning.

Let's go back to CNN Anchor Kaitlan Collins. She is in Warsaw, Poland. Kaitlan, I understand you're standing by with a member of the National Security Council staff involved in that planning. We'd like to hear more.

COLLINS: Yes, Jim. We have been talking about all of the details of secret planning that has to go into a meeting with such risks as this one, and so that is obvious. We have got Amanda Sloat here, who is a special assistant to President Biden and also the senior director for Europe at the National Security Council.

You were on the ground here, obviously, this trip has happened. The president is on the way. This is a hard decision for any president to make because there is such risk that goes into this. What were the top concerns that you and your team were considering planning this trip for President Biden?

AMANDA SLOAT, SENIOR DIRECTOR FOR EUROPE, NSC: I think the top concern obviously is security. President Biden, I think, has been very clear that he's long wanted to go to Ukraine. Ukraine has had a very special place in his heart, including from back when he was vice president. He has been very actively involved in Ukraine over the last two years, including welcoming President Zelenskyy twice to the White House twice, multiple phone calls. And so I think he felt especially ahead of the one year anniversary that it was symbolically important for him to make the trip to Ukraine, to stand side by side with President Zelenskyy and present U.S. support, sustained support for Ukraine.

And so I think the team obviously was taking a very close look at all of the security risks involved and the president ultimately decided it was a calculated risk and one that he was prepared to take.

COLLINS: Yes. And he only had a few hours on the ground with President Zelenskyy. So, obviously, you want to make sure that you have your -- basically, your through lines, your top points. And what was the main thing he wanted to discuss with President Zelenskyy? What did they talk about?

SLOAT: So, I think it was an opportunity for them to follow-up on the discussion they had in Washington in December for the president to get an update from President Zelenskyy on where Ukraine was in terms of the military planning on the ground, to discuss the needs that Ukraine had in terms of security assistance, to talk about the assistance that we have that's forthcoming, as well as to talk about their needs on the economic support side, the energy assistance side and the whole breadth of the relationship. And as the president has said, nothing beats face-to-face engagement, and so he wanted to have that opportunity to do that with President Zelenskyy today.

COLLINS: And so he announced a half a billion in new assistance. You talked about forthcoming assistance. He mentioned some of the things that are included in that. He did not say F-16 fighter jets or the longer range missiles that we know Zelenskyy wants. Are those included in this package?

SLOAT: So, the package that we're going to be announcing very shortly today is to provide Ukraine with the capabilities that it needs in terms of its near term fights. So, that's expected to be artillery ammunition and continued support for their air defense.

COLLINS: One idea that was floated recently by the Ukrainian foreign minister was if there's not a decision made on the F-16 fighter jets yet, countries that do have them or have the fighter jets that Ukraine wants, not just the F-16s, should train Ukrainians on them now in case they do decide to send them, so there's not that lag time, basically. Is that an idea that the White House would take into consideration?

SLOAT: I mean, I think we've seen some countries in the last week or two announce their own plans to start trainings on pilots. I think we have been focused on providing the near term capabilities that the Ukrainians need in terms of their ground offensive. I know the two presidents today have the opportunity to exchange perspectives on security assistance, so I don't have anything further to announce today. But understand they had a good discussion about that in Kyiv.

COLLINS: So, Zelenskyy did bring up that idea?

SLOAT: My understanding is he did. I think that the Ukrainians have been very clear both publicly and privately about what they see as additional security assistance that they need. And so I think this meeting was a good opportunity for President Zelenskyy to convey his requests and for the president to share his perspectives on security assistance as well. But like I said today, we're making the announcement shortly about additional security assistance that we'll provide then and we'll continue to provide in the weeks and months ahead.

COLLINS: The U.S. notified the Kremlin before Biden arrived. How did they respond? What did they say?

SLOAT: So, we did send a notification to the Russians several hours before the president left primarily for de-confliction purposes. And I think to protect channels, I'm not going to get into more details about what the Russians said, but, yes, I can confirm that we did notify.

COLLINS: Do you expect President Putin to change the speech that he's slated to give tomorrow because Biden has taken this step on to Ukraine?

SLOAT: I'm not going to try and get into the mind of President Putin. We'll see what he says. President Biden, of course, is going to be here tomorrow. Hopefully, the weather will be less cold than it is today to make his speech.

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And I think it will also be historic. It will be almost a year since he was here last time. It will be an opportunity for him to speak to the people of Poland, to the people Europe, to Ukraine, of course, next door, as well as to the American people about our continued robust support for Ukraine as well as our rock solid commitment to the security to our NATO alliance.

COLLINS: We are in Poland and this is a big aspect of this trip that he is taking, and, really, the war overall and their support for Ukraine has kind of changed the way that Poland was viewed before this invasion happened. How does it affect President Duda's relationship with President Biden? What is that like now?

SLOAT: I think relations between the United States and Poland are extremely strong. The president, of course, was here a year ago, met with President Duda. He is going to be having a bilateral meeting with him tomorrow. He will have the opportunity to see other Polish officials while he is here. And to your point, Poland has really stepped up. They have been providing a large amount of secure assistance themselves, they have significantly increased their own defense spending. Poland serves as a hub for a lot of the transit of security and humanitarian assistance that we're providing to Ukraine. And of course, we did a major energy deal with Poland in the last several weeks as well, so really strengthening our bilateral ties on both the defense side as well as the energy side.

COLLINS: Yes. And we have seen that defense spending boosted here.

Amanda Slota, thank you so much for joining us. I know there was a lot of planning behind the scenes on this trip, so thanks for sharing some of that with us.

And, Jim, you heard her say that, yes, President Zelenskyy did bring up the F-16 fighter jets, not a surprise exactly, because, of course, that is something he has been talking about so much that Ukraine would like.

SCIUTTO: That is new, moving on to the next weapon system. Kaitlan Collins, and thanks as well to Amanda Sloat for joining us.

Coming up Ohio residents who say they have had symptoms now ever since a toxic train derailment near their homes will get medical help and soon. We are going to be live from East Palestine, and that is coming up.

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