Avlon: Biden's Putin Gaffe Says Quiet Part Out Loud

Mar 28, 2022 • CNN's John Avlon and Bianna Golodryga say President Biden's improvised comment that Russian President Vladimir Putin should be removed from office was a gaffe, but it was not a call for regime change in Russia nor a redefinition of US policy.

Biden: ‘Butcher’ Putin Cannot Be Allowed to Stay in Power

THE OBSERVER: West must prepare for a long fight ahead, President says, as Russian missiles hit Lviv in act of defiance

US president Joe Biden makes an historic speech in Warsaw on Saturday as Russian missiles rained down on Lviv, 40 miles from the Polish border Photograph: Radek Pietruszka/EPA
Joe Biden condemned Vladimir Putin as a “butcher” who could no longer stay in power in a historic speech in Poland as Russian missiles rained down on Ukraine’s most pro-western city, just 40 miles from the Polish border.

With explosions erupting across neighbouring Lviv, in a clear act of defiance from the Kremlin, Biden told an audience in Warsaw that the west must steel itself “for a long fight ahead”.

In what seemed to be a dramatic shift in US policy to back regime change in Moscow, Biden also appeared to urge those around the Russian president to oust him from the Kremlin. “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power,” Biden said in his most belligerent speech since the war began a month ago.

US officials later said that Biden had been talking about the need for Putin to lose power over Ukrainian territory and in the wider region.

The American leader said Putin was “bent on violence”. Addressing the Russian president directly, Biden said: “Don’t even think about moving on to one single inch of Nato territory.” » | Daniel Boffey in Lviv, Shaun Walker in Kyiv and Philip Oltermann in Berlin | Saturday, March 26, 2022

Related.

President Biden Delivers Remarks on the United Efforts to Support the People of Ukraine

March 26, 2022 • President Biden delivers remarks on the united efforts of the free world to support the people of Ukraine, hold Russia accountable for its brutal war, and defend a future that is rooted in democratic principles. Warsaw, Poland

A truly inspiring and moving speech! – Mark

Der Krieg und die Flamme der Freiheit: Im Zeichen des Kriegs in der Ukraine hat Joe Biden seinen ersten Besuch in Polen absolviert. Überraschend kamen auch zwei Minister aus der Ukraine zu dem Treffen. Wladimir Putin nennt der US-Präsident einen „Schlächter“. »

Warsaw 1939

Views on YouTube: 1,579,746

Polish First Lady Passes Over Trump's Handshake

During a visit to Warsaw on July 6, President Trump was left hanging when Poland's first lady Agata Kornhauser-Duda appeared to pass over his first offer for a handshake and turned to his wife Melania instead.

Embraced by Far-Right Gov't in Poland, Trump Claims Future of Western Civilization Is at Stake

In a major speech in Poland, President Donald Trump said Western civilization is at stake, as he warned about the threats of "terrorism and extremism." He was cheered on by supporters of Poland’s right-wing government, who were bused in to the speech. Meanwhile, Trump is facing criticism after becoming the first U.S. president in decades to skip visiting the Warsaw ghetto uprising monument. We speak with Polish-Nigerian journalist Remi Adekoya, a regular contributor to The Guardian and the former political editor of the Warsaw Business Journal.

President Trump Delivers Speech in Warsaw

US President Donald Trump delivers speech in Krasinskich Square, Warsaw, Poland.

EU Flag Burned as Tens of Thousands Join Warsaw Nationalist Demo

THE TELEGRAPH: Organisers said that up to 50,000 were on the march which marked the anniversary of Poland's independence after the First World War

Tens of thousands of protesters poured into Warsaw's streets on Wednesday for a demonstration organised by the far right, marching under the slogan "Poland for the Polish" and burning an EU flag.

Police said 25,000 people joined the march, which marked the anniversary of Poland's return to independence after the First World War, while organisers put the numbers at 50,000.

"God, honour, homeland," chanted the protesters as they marched under a sea of red-and-white Polish flags.

Demonstrators trampled and burned a European Union flag at one point, while a banner added to the anti-EU theme with the slogan "EU macht frei" ("Work [?] makes you free" in German), a reference to the slogan over the gates at Auschwitz.

"Yesterday it was Moscow, today it's Brussels which takes away our freedom," chanted one group of protesters. Other banners read "Great Catholic Poland" and "Stop Islamisation". » | AFP | Thursday, November 12, 2015

Poland: Thousands of Nationalists Rally against Refugees in Warsaw

Thousand of far-right activists marched through Warsaw in protest against the country accepting refugees, Saturday. The footage shows protesters chanting and holding banner reading "Poles against immigrants."

Islam Strikes in Warsaw

Barack Obama Gym Session: US President's Workout Secretly Filmed in Poland

President Barack Obama secretly filmed lifting weights at Warsaw gym during visit to commemorate Polish democracy

Read the Telegraph article here | Andrew Marszal | Thursday, June 05, 2014

Obama Condemns Russian 'Aggression' in Ukraine

Mr Obama said Poland's experience of democracy was a beacon for Ukraine

BBC: US President Barack Obama has condemned Russian "aggression" in Ukraine.

Speaking in Warsaw to mark 25 years since the fall of communism in Poland, he hailed Polish democracy as a beacon for neighbouring Ukraine.

"How can we allow the dark tactics of the 20th Century to define the 21st?" he said.

Earlier Mr Obama met Ukraine President-elect Petro Poroshenko, and pledged support for plans to restore peace to the country.

Mr Obama called Mr Poroshenko a "wise selection" to lead Ukraine, and said the nation could become a vibrant, thriving democracy if the world community stood behind it. (+ video) » | Wednesday, June 04, 2014

Euro 2012: Antisemitic Echoes That Threaten Celebration of Football
THE GUARDIAN: Michael Goldfarb discovers an ugly xenophobia rooted in the catastrophic destruction visited on Poland and Ukraine by totalitarian regimes

Euro 2012 was supposed to be an unalloyed celebration of not just football, but also the renaissance of Poland and Ukraine, the two nations that suffered most in the conflict between the twin poles of 20th-century totalitarianism: Nazism and Soviet communism.

But a darkness still pervades both countries. On a recent visit to Poland and Ukraine, I couldn't help but be struck by it. In Warsaw, which I had visited briefly 17 years ago, I was amazed at how much the past drapes itself around the city's prosperous facade [sic].

There are massive, agonised monuments everywhere: to the dead of the Warsaw Uprising, to the fallen and murdered in the east, the martyrs of Katyn. Every step a tourist takes seems to be guiding him on a tour of Polish suffering

In Lviv in western Ukraine, a place I had never visited before, I found the darkness in people's souls. The city survived the worst of the war. Its perfectly preserved medieval heart is wrapped in a ribbon of Austro-Hungarian imperial boulevards and architecture.

But conversation after conversation with people from all walks of life reveal them looking backwards into the bleak times. Perhaps that's to be expected given the catastrophic destruction visited on the two countries, but it has led many to a world-view that is a perversion of the golden rule: do unto others as others have done unto you. » | Michael Goldfarb | Saturday, June 02, 2012

Germany's WWII Occupation of Poland: 'When We Finish, Nobody Is Left Alive'

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Germany's occupation of Poland is one of the darkest chapters of World War II. Some 6 million people, almost 18 percent of the Polish population, were killed during the Nazi reign of terror that saw mass executions, forced evictions and enslavement.

Adolf Hitler left no doubt about his goal before he ordered the invasion of Poland. Addressing generals and commanders at a reception he gave at his Berchtesgaden retreat on August 22, 1939, Hitler said he was not interested "in reaching a specific line or a new border." He wanted "the destruction of the enemy."

On September 1, 1939, German soldiers marched across the border into neighboring Poland. The vastly superior Wehrmacht forces advanced so quickly that the Polish government was forced to flee to Romania just 16 days later. On September 27, the defenders of the Polish capital, Warsaw, gave up. Nine days later, the last remaining Polish troops laid down their weapons.

Thus begun a nightmarish occupation that would last more than five years. In Poland, the Nazis had more time than in any other occupied country to implement their policies against people they classified as "racially inferior."

The task of implementing Hitler's plan fell to Hans Frank, a 39-year-old lawyer, Nazi Party member and brutal champion of the Nazis' vision of racial purity. Frank was named "Governor-General" of a large chunk of Poland, an area of about 95,000 square kilometers (36,680sq mi), with approximately 10 million inhabitants. This was the western part of Poland that had been annexed by the German Reich, while the eastern half of the country was occupied by the Red Army in accordance with the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, the 1939 non-aggression treaty between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. » | Michael Sontheimer | Friday, May 27, 2011

SPIEGEL ONLINE PHOTO GALLERY: The Horrific German Occupation of Poland »

Related Topics:

German-Polish Relations »

The Holocaust »

Deux jours de funérailles grandioses en Pologne
Des milliers de bougies ont été déposées devant le château du Wawel à Cracovie, où seront inhumés, dimanche, le président Lech Kaczynski et son épouse Maria. Photo : Le Figaro
LE FIGARO: L'enterrement du très russophobe Lech Kaczynski pourrait mettre fin à des siècles d'incompréhension avec la Russie.

Des funérailles grandioses telles que la Pologne n'en avait pas connu depuis la mort de Jean-Paul II. Et un casse-tête inouï pour l'ambassadeur de Pologne à Paris, Tomasz Orlowski, chargé de remplacer au pied levé le chef du protocole, Mariusz Kazana, victime du crash de Smolensk.

Quatre-vingts délégations étrangères, de nombreux rois et chefs d'État, l'élite de l'État polonais, les plus hauts dignitaires de l'Église sont attendus dimanche à Cracovie pour les obsèques du président Lech Kaczynski et de son épouse, Maria. Si toutefois le nuage de cendres islandaises, qui a entraîné hier la fermeture de l'aéroport, daigne s'éloigner du ciel polonais. Un défi de plus en plus cauchemardesque pour l'ambassadeur Orlowski. Dans quel ordre placer les délégations ? Passe encore pour les têtes couronnées, Juan Carlos d'Espagne, le prince Charles ou Harald de Norvège. Mais pour les présidents ? La règle donne la priorité à l'ancienneté. Mais alors, quel affront pour Barack Obama ! À moins de se retrancher sur l'ordre alphabétique. Mais comment imaginer que le représentant de la Russie, Dmitri Medvedev, soit précédé par celui de la Géorgie, Mikhaïl Saakachvili ? D'autant, souligne un diplomate, que «depuis une semaine, les Russes se comportent de manière exemplaire». >>> Par Arielle Thedrel | Vendredi 16 Avril 2010

Lech Kaczynski reposera aux côtés des rois de Pologne
Des manifestants devant le Palais de la Culture et de la Science à Varsovie, mercredi. Photo : Le Figaro
LE FIGARO: L'inhumation du chef de l'État dans la cathédrale de Wawel, à Cracovie, suscite la polémique.

D’envoyée spéciale du Figaro à Varsovie

À Varsovie, le temps de l'émotion vient de céder la place à celui de la polémique. L'annonce du lieu des funérailles du président Lech Kaczynski soulève une tempête de protestations. Ne lui fait-on pas trop d'honneurs en l'enterrant dans la cathédrale du château de Wawel, à Cracovie, où reposent une quinzaine de rois polonais et une pléiade de gloires républicaines comme le maréchal Kosciuszko, le poète Adam Mickiewicz, le maréchal Jozef Pilsudski ou encore le général Sikorski, chef du gouvernement polonais en exil à Londres pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale? Et l'on remarque, au pas­sage, un nouveau télescopage de l'histoire: Sikorski a trouvé la mort dans un accident d'avion. Le crash, qui se produisit en juillet 1943, aurait été dû à un sabotage commandité par Staline, qui détestait Sikorski. Rien à voir, bien sûr, avec ce qui est arrivé à Lech Kaczynski.

Le président défunt et son épouse reposeront donc aux côtés du maréchal Pilsudski. Lech Kaczynski révérait le père de l'indépendance polonaise, un démocrate mais à tendance autoritaire. Lui et son frère jumeau, Jaroslaw, en avaient fait l'icône de leur parti Droit et Justice (PIS).

C'est le cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, archevêque de Cracovie, qui a annoncé mardi la nouvelle. Mgr Dziwisz était le secrétaire particulier de Jean-Paul II. À ce titre, il jouit en Pologne d'un prestige considérable. Dans la soirée, quelques centaines de Cracoviens ne s'en sont pas moins rassemblés devant l'archevêché pour dénoncer cette décision. Lech Kaczynski «est-il digne de nos rois?» demandaient les manifestants. Un nouveau rassemblement était prévu mercredi soir à Cracovie. Calcul politique >>> Par Arielle Thedrel | Jeudi 15 Avril 2010

WAWEL CASTLE HOMEPAGE: Wawel Royal Castle

WIKI: Wawel Castle

Nation Falls Silent as Grieving Poles Mark the Passing of Lech Kaczynski
TIMES ONLINE: Lech Kaczynski, the late President of Poland, returned home yesterday to a country struck dumb with grief and confusion.

The air crash that wiped out the head of state, the chief of the general staff, the chairman of the security services, the central bank governor and Solidarity heroes has left Poland reeling, unsteady and uncertain.

As the red and white Polish flag on the President’s casket flapped in the wind, the honour guard at Warsaw airport struck up the National Anthem. The president’s ashen-faced twin brother Jaroslaw, the Prime Minister, Donald Tusk, and parliamentarians fortunate enough not to have been on the doomed presidential plane, moved their lips to the words of the anthem: Poland has yet to perish/As long as we still live/That which foreign force has seized/We at sabre point shall retrieve.

Then, the casket made its way in a hearse through the streets of the silent capital. Tens of thousands lined the route, rushing in front of the police escort to place carnations on the road, snatching off their hats, dropping to their knees.

The only noise: the revving of hundreds of civilian motorbike riders, waving the national flag, who had decided spontaneously to follow the cortege, like seagulls in the wake of a ferryboat.

“It’s a group trauma,” said a catering entrepreneur, Kaja Burakiewicz, “we’re still struggling to understand.” >>> Roger Boyes, Warsaw | Monday, April 12, 2010

Though Liberals Moan and Lefties Sneer, We’ll Stop the Red Flag Flying Here
Che Guevara and red flags at a May Day parade by the Polish Communist Party in Warsaw six years ago. The proposed law will ban any display of communist symbols appearing ever again. Photo: Times Online
TIMES ONLINE: Down come the cheesy Che Guevara posters in student bedsits across the land. Off come the T-shirts wittily emblazoned with a hammer and sickle.

Twenty years after Eastern Europe toppled statues of Lenin, the Polish Government is about to finish the job by making it all but impossible to wave the red flag — even in jest.

Up to two years in jail await anyone glorifying communism according to an amendment to Article 256 of the Polish criminal code — the race-hate article — which is likely to come into force next year. The ban outlaws “the production, distribution, sale or possession ... in print, recordings or other means of fascist, communist or other symbols of totalitarianism”. So if you planned to sing the Internationale while marching down the centre of Warsaw to the old communist headquarters — now housing financial services companies — forget it.

The revised Bill has already passed the Polish Senate. President Kaczynski has to sign it into law by Monday and no one in Warsaw seriously believes that he will hesitate.

His twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, head of the opposition Law and Justice party, has made his view clear: “No symbol of communism has a right to exist in Poland because these are symbols of a genocidal system that should be compared to Nazism.” >>> Roger Boyes | Friday, November 27, 2009

Fear of New Mid East ‘Cold War’ as Syria Strengthens Military Alliance with Russia
TIMESONLINE: Syria raised the prospect yesterday of having Russian missiles on its soil, sparking fears of a new Cold War in the Middle East. President Assad said as he arrived in Moscow to clinch a series of military agreements: “We are ready to co-operate with Russia in any project that can strengthen its security.”

The Syrian leader told Russian newspapers: “I think Russia really has to think of the response it will make when it finds itself closed in a circle.”

Mr Assad said that he would be discussing the deployment of Russian missiles on his territory. The Syrians are also interested in buying Russian weapons.

In return Moscow is expected to propose a revival of its Cold War era naval base at the Syrian port of Tartus, which would give the Russian Navy its first foothold in the Mediterranean for two decades. Damascus and Moscow were close allies during the Cold War but the Kremlin’s influence in the region waned after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Yesterday’s rapprochement raised the possibility that Moscow intends to re-create a global anti-Western alliance with former Soviet bloc allies.

Many in Israel fear that the Middle East could once again become a theatre for the two great powers to exert their spheres of influence, militarily and politically. And with Israel and the US providing military backing to Georgia, Russia appears set to respond in kind by supporting Syria. Fear of New Mid East 'Cold War' as Syria Strengthens Military Alliance with Russia >>> By Kevin O’Flynn in Moscow and James Hider, Middle East Correspondent | August 21, 2008

SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL:
Poland Risks Serious Confrontation with Russia: The Cold War is returning to Poland. Warsaw wants to further tighten ties with Washington and it has used the US missile defense system to do so -- against massive opposition from Moscow. In return, the Poles will now be given Patriot missiles to protect themselves >>> By Jan Puhl | August 20, 2008

NZZ Online:
Israel warnt Moskau vor Waffenlieferungen: Syriens Präsident Asad zu Besuch in Russland >>> | 20. August 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (US) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (US) >>>

Kuwait: Envoy's Son Behind Jewish Abduction
The son of the Kuwaiti ambassador has been charged with briefly abducting three Jewish teenagers at a hotel and claiming he had a bomb, press reports said Tuesday.



The 23-year-old son of Ambassador Khaled Al-Shaibani, identified only as Mohammad A., was charged with holding the teenagers against their will, Warsaw police spokesman Anna Kedzierzowska told AP.



Al-Shibani was too intoxicated to undergo questioning on Monday, but he spoke with authorities and confessed on Tuesday morning, police said.

He faces a suspended sentence of 10 months to three years. He will be released pending his court hearing, which has not yet been scheduled.



The Kuwaiti Embassy confirmed the suspect was the ambassador's son, but declined further comment.

Police on Monday stormed the room in the Warsaw Holiday Inn to free the three Brazilian Jews, who were taking part in a Holocaust memorial event.



Al-Shibani had said he had explosives, but none were found in the operation. The hotel was evacuated and searched. [Kuwait Envoy's Son Behind Jewish Abduction] | May 6, 2008

Hat tip: Jihad Watch

The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback – USA)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardcover – USA)