Mike Pompeo on Thursday night accused Joe Biden of having displayed ‘enormous weakness’ in the face of Russian aggression, accusing the president of making a litany of errors and claiming the Russian foreign minister would ‘eat the Secretary of State’s lunch’.
Pompeo, Donald Trump’s Secretary of State, appeared on Sean Hannity’s Fox News to condemn the government’s approach towards Russia.
With tensions between Russia and Ukraine at the highest level in decades, and Biden on Thursday warning that war looked imminent, Pompeo, 58, accused Biden of a succession of failures leading up to this point.
‘We demonstrated weakness with respect to the Russians for the entire 14 months of this administration,’ he said.
Mike Pompeo, 58, appeared on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show on Thursday night
Pompeo told Hannity that Biden had shown incredible weakness in the face of Russian threats
‘We began by giving them a free pass on a nuclear treaty where we extracted nothing.
‘We let them close down gasoline pipelines in the south east of the United States. We did nothing.
‘We let them finish Nord Stream Two – we lifted the Trump sanctions on Nord Stream Two.
‘And then we did the worst thing.
‘We shut down American natural gas and crude oil production – giving Vladimir Putin $93 or $100 a barrel on the crude oil from his country.
‘We put his economy on super warp and we harmed ours and lost jobs here at home.’
Pompeo – who is widely believed to harbor his own presidential ambitions – pointed out that he had been in the room with Putin, and said that the Russian leader would have quickly got the measure of the Biden administration.
A Ukrainian National guard soldier guards a mobile checkpoint together with the Ukrainian Security Service agents and police officers during a joint operation, in Kharkiv, Ukraine on Thursday
Artillery opened fire at multiple points along the frontline between Ukraine and Russia-backed rebels in the country’s east on Thursday, with at least two locations hit with witnesses reporting hearing artillery firing at a third
This handout video grab taken and released by the Russian Defense Ministry on Thursday shows the Grad multiple rocket launcher firing at mock enemy targets during a joint exercises of the armed forces of Russia and Belarus
Helicopters fly in formation over the Osipovichsky training ground, in central Belarus on Thursday during joint training exercises between Russian and Belarusian forces
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited soldiers stationed not far Donetsk, a city controlled by pro-Russian militants, on Thursday as the US warned that Russia’s President Putin might launch a chemical weapons attack before invading Ukraine
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (right) during a visit to the front line not far from pro-Russian militants controlled city of Donetsk on Thursday
US deployments in Europe in January, before Biden ordered more troops to the region as the crisis escalated
Pompeo, also a former CIA chief, pointed out that the first senior Biden official to meet Putin was John Kerry, the climate change czar.
‘I think it sent a real message to Putin and I think we are seeing the results of that today,’ Pompeo said.
Biden and Putin have known each other for decades: the Russian leader, 69, has ruled the country for 22 years, while Biden was chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2001 until becoming vice president in 2009.
Biden has told how, during a 2011 meeting at the Kremlin, the then-vice president looked Putin in his eyes and told him: ‘I’m looking into your eyes, and I don’t think you have a soul.’
Putin replied, according to Biden: ‘We understand one another.’
Yet Pompeo said that Biden underestimated the Russian leader, and had been outfoxed by him.
‘It’s a failure of American foreign policy and the fundamental deterrence that Reagan had, and we had, for our four years,’ said Pompeo.
‘I saw this up close and personal.’
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin chairs a video conference meeting on Thursday
Biden, pictured on Thursday in Ohio, has warned that Putin could attack Ukraine at any time
He said that Putin’s veteran foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, will exploit any weakness in the American strategy.
‘Sergey Lavrov will eat our Secretary of State’s lunch if we don’t demonstrate American resolve and the capacity and willingness to do the right things for our friends,’ Pompeo said.
He argued that the U.S. should have made the most of their ‘cheap, affordable energy’ to shore up their allies, shipping energy to them to avoid them having to rely on Russia.
‘We should be crushing the Russians with this,’ said Pompeo.
He also argued that the Iran nuclear talks, currently taking place in Vienna, undermined any attempt to be tough with Moscow.
The talks are between the E3 European countries – the UK, France and Germany – plus Iran, with China and Russia are also taking part in the talks, and the United States participating indirectly.
‘At the same time we are having this conversation with the Russians in Europe, we are sitting on the same side of the table with the Russians in Vienna, talking about giving the Iranians the very same capacity to ship their product, their crude oil, their natural gas around the world.
‘It’s an enormous sign of weakness.’
Ukraine’s ministry of defense issued images of the damaged building early Thursday, saying it is located in Stanytsia Luhanska and was hit by shells fired by Russian rebels. Pro-Moscow accounts then picked up the same images, but claimed the building is actually on their side of the frontline and was hit by Kiev’s men
Artillery has opened fire in eastern Ukraine – striking a kindergarten located in Stanytsia Luhanska, on the Ukrainian side of the frontline with Russian-backed rebel forces
A partially-destroyed building is seen in the town of Popasna, on the Ukrainian side of the frontline with Russia-backed rebels, after artillery opened fire in the early hours
Damage to Popasna, a town on the border between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed rebels, which Ukraine says was caused by shelling from the rebel side
Pompeo said he thought China and Iran were watching closely, and that significant damage was already done.
‘The Russians have already connected in Ukraine. They took Crimea under the previous Democratic administration.
‘They are making a lot of noise in the Donbass today firing rockets as well.’
He said that Iran’s sanctions had already essentially been lifted ‘by failing to enforce them’, and they were edging closer to having a nuclear weapon.
And the weakness, Pompeo argued, was deeply troubling for Taiwan.
‘Make no mistake, XI Jinping can see this weakness too,’ he said.
‘He saw the debacle in Afghanistan.
‘He’s going to move closer and closer and continue to try to put a stranglehold on Taiwan.
‘That does not bode well for freedom and democracy on that island.
‘American weakness always creates risk for our friends and ultimately for American interests as well.’
From pretext to ground troops: The four steps in a Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to Antony Blinken at the UN
Blinken said he was outlining Russia’s plans during a meeting of the UN Security Council ‘not to start a war but to prevent one’
Secretary of State Antony Blinken used a meeting of the United Nations Security Council to outline how the US believes a Russian invasion of Ukraine would unfold
1) Manufactured pretext – Russia would accuse Ukraine of a violent outrage such as a fabricated terrorist bombing inside Russia, a faked mass grave, a drone strike against civilians or a fake – or even a real – chemical weapons attack.
2) Emergency meetings in Moscow – Blinken said the highest levels of government may ‘theatrically’ convene emergency meetings to address the so-called crisis, before issuing a proclamation that they must defend Russians in Ukraine.
3) Attack – the next stage will come with Russian missiles and bombs dropping on Ukraine, jammed communications, and cyberattacks designed to shut down ‘key Ukrainian institutions.’
4) Ground invasion – Russian tanks and soldiers will advance on key targets that have already been identified and mapped out in detailed plans. Blinken said that would include Ukraine’s capital Kiev.
Blinken offered another chilling line.
‘Conventional attacks are not all that Russia plans to inflict upon the people of Ukraine,’ he said.
‘We have information that indicates Russia will target specific groups of Ukrainians.’
The US has faced repeated questions about the validity of its intelligence. And those seated around the table from Blinken will remember the false claims about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction presented there almost 20 years ago.
‘Let me be clear, I am here today not to start a war but to prevent one,’ said Blinken.
‘Information presented here is validated by what we’ve seen unfolding in plain sight before our eyes for months.’
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