Biden Seeks to Reassure Ukraine as Russia Adds Forces to the Front

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The urgent diplomatic drive to defuse the military standoff in Eastern Europe continued on Friday, even as the Pentagon warned that Russia continued to amass more combat troops near its borders with Ukraine, and as President Biden reiterated the United States’ commitment to respond forcefully to a Russian attack.

In a phone call on Thursday with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, Mr. Biden “reaffirmed the readiness of the United States along with its allies and partners to respond decisively” if Russia launched a military incursion, according to a White House statement. Mr. Biden is considering dispatching several thousand U.S. troops, along with warships and aircraft, to the region, although officials say he has so far ruled out deploying more forces directly to Ukraine.

The Ukrainian leader, whose government has sought to project calm in the face of American warnings that a Russian attack is imminent, said he thanked Mr. Biden for mobilizing allies to deter aggression from Moscow. But he pointed to prospects of a diplomatic resolution, including an agreement this week with Russia to return to a cease-fire in a long-simmering conflict between Ukrainian troops and Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, also signaled an opening for diplomacy, saying on Friday that the United States’ response this week to Russian security demands contained “a kernel of rationality” for a possible compromise on issues such as missile deployments and military exercises.

But the Kremlin has said it is pessimistic about prospects for a broader deal, and the United States has described a primary Russian demand, that NATO halt expansion in Eastern Europe, as a non-starter.

The big unknown in the crisis surrounding Ukraine, one of the most worrisome military standoffs in Eastern Europe since the end of the Cold War, are the intentions of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who has maintained a studied public silence on the issue for more than a month.

While Russian leaders have insisted they have no plans to invade Ukraine, Moscow’s buildup of 130,000 soldiers along Ukraine’s borders has prompted the United States and NATO allies to mobilize troops and military assistance for the former Soviet state.

American and European allies have sought to project a unified front, threatening Moscow with harsh economic sanctions should it attack. But diplomatic efforts have proceeded on multiple tracks, with some leaders quietly pursuing a more conciliatory approach toward Mr. Putin in the hopes of persuading him to draw down his forces.

On Friday morning, President Emmanuel Macron of France spoke by phone with Mr. Putin as part of an effort to de-escalate the crisis.

Mr. Biden and Mr. Putin have not spoken one-on-one since a tense “virtual summit” in early December. The Biden administration called a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Monday, which could make for a face-to-face debate on Ukraine between the United States and Russia.

The White House still believes there is “a distinct possibility” that Russia could launch an invasion in February, said Emily Horne, spokeswoman for the National Security Council, although American officials do not believe Mr. Putin has decided whether to attack.

On Thursday, the Pentagon, which has ordered 8,500 American troops to be on “high alert” for deployment to Eastern Europe, said that Russia had continued over the past 24 hours to build up “credible combat forces” in western Russia and in Belarus, near the borders with Ukraine.

“We still believe there’s time and space for diplomacy,” said the Pentagon spokesman, John Kirby. “But thus far, it has not achieved the kind of results that the international community would like to see.”

In an attempt to lower tensions and avoid miscommunications that could spiral out of control, President Emmanuel Macron of France on Friday morning discussed the growing security crisis in Europe in a phone call with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

France has insisted in recent days on the need to “de-escalate” the crisis to avoid stumbling into a “self-fulfilling” conflict, fueled by misperceptions and exaggerated speech. But it has also stood firmly with its NATO allies in the standoff with Russia, offering, for instance, to send troops to Romania.

Mr. Putin has not commented publicly on the crisis since before Christmas, leaving the West to largely speculate about his intentions as Russia continues to amass forces to the north, east and south of Ukraine.

Mr. Macron, who is facing re-election in April, has long advocated a more conciliatory approach to Russia than the United States or some of his European allies, and he has repeatedly stressed the need to keep dialogue with Moscow firm but open.

He has also insisted that France and the European Union needed to act more independently from the United States on the international stage, and he is eager to spearhead European efforts to fix the continent’s own problems.

But Mr. Macron’s attempts to reset relations with Russia have stumbled and his enthusiasm for a rapprochement with Mr. Putin has waned significantly in recent years — especially after Aleksei A. Navalny, Mr. Putin’s most prominent opponent, was poisoned in an operation later revealed to be orchestrated by the Kremlin.

Friday’s phone call comes after top diplomatic officials from France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia met in Paris on Wednesday for a round of talks under the Normandy Format to discuss the cease-fire agreement that the countries brokered in eastern Ukraine in 2015.

Those talks did not directly address the buildup of Russian troops at the border with Ukraine or the worries of a potential invasion. But French officials said the discussions were an encouraging sign that Russia seemed open to negotiations despite the high-strung tensions and confusion over Mr. Putin’s intentions.

Jean-Yves Le Drian, France’s foreign minister, told RTL radio on Friday that the situation was “very serious, very tense.”

“Now the ball is in Putin’s court,” Mr. Le Drian said, adding that it was up to the Russian president to decide whether he wanted “confrontation or consultation.”

In a positive sign for diplomacy, Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, reiterated on Friday that Moscow could continue talks with the United States on European security. America’s written response to Russia’s demands for security guarantees, Mr. Lavrov said in a radio interview in Moscow, included “a kernel of rationality” on some matters.

While he described the response as more constructive than a similar written response from NATO, the public statements from Russia have ranged from bellicose threats to broad dismissals of what they have called Western hysteria over Ukraine.

Mr. Lavrov’s comments on Friday, while guarded, offered the prospect of room for negotiation on secondary matters related to broader security concerns in Europe.

“Compared to the paper sent by NATO, the American answers are nearly an example of diplomatic nicety,” Mr. Lavrov said. He said that the NATO response was “so ideological” that Russian officials were “a little embarrassed for those who wrote the text.”

Mr. Lavrov had earlier said that the American response, hand-delivered on Wednesday to the Russian Foreign Ministry by the U.S. ambassador to Russia, John J. Sullivan, did not satisfy Russia’s central demands but left room for discussion on secondary matters.

On Friday, Mr. Lavrov said again that the American letter did not answer key questions and described it as vague, like “shadows on a fence,” a Russian idiom meaning to beat around the bush.

“But there is a kernel of rationality, on, as I said, secondary issues,” Mr. Lavrov said. Russia would be ready to discuss a moratorium on deploying short- and medium-range missiles in Europe, something he said President Vladimir V. Putin had earlier proposed.

Russia was also willing to discuss restrictions on military exercises and flights of military aircraft near borders, Mr. Lavrov said, an issue relevant to the buildup of Russian forces near Ukraine’s borders this winter. Russia had also earlier proposed such a restriction, he said.

“All this was rejected for the past two or three years,” Mr. Lavrov said, “and now they are offering to discuss it.”

He did, though, point to earlier comments by Mr. Putin that if diplomacy failed, Russia would turn instead to what Mr. Putin called “military-technical” measures.

Mr. Lavrov said that Russian military leaders would propose an appropriate response, without clarifying what that might be, but also that other branches of government would weigh Moscow’s response if talks failed. He said that such an interagency group of Russian officials was now analyzing the written responses from the United States and NATO.

MARIUPOL, Ukraine — For the people of this industrial port city, located 14 miles from the front line with Russia-backed separatists, the threat of a Russian invasion is nothing new. After eight years of conflict, some city residents are ambivalent about the risk of escalation. Others have already packed emergency bags to evacuate.

“In 2014 when fighting was right next to the city, we packed these things, and were ready to leave,” said Roman Ameliakin, a Mariupol city councilman. “Back then, we didn’t have to. But we don’t know how it will go this time. We’re preparing, just in case.”

Flanked by rebel combatants in the Donbas area and Russia’s forces to the east, and Russian ships to the south, Mariupol is one place where President Vladimir V. Putin’s forces could attack first, or stage a provocation for war.

“It’s quite clear that in the opening phases of a conflict, Mariupol would be subjected to an offensive operation by Russia’s Eighth Army, the main backstop for the separatist forces in the Donbas,” said Michael Kofman of the Center for Naval Analyses, a federally funded research group based in Arlington, Va.

Whether or how Russia will invade is still anyone’s guess. In this video, we examine satellite images and videos posted to social media that show Ukrainians here may have reason to fear. Our findings map out Russia’s military buildup on three sides of the Ukrainian border.

When President Biden held a video call with European leaders about Ukraine this week, it had all the urgency of a Cold War-era crisis, replete with the specter of Russian tanks and troops menacing Eastern Europe. But Mr. Biden expanded the seats on his war council, adding Poland, Italy and the European Union to the familiar lineup of Britain, France and Germany.

The effort to be inclusive was no accident: After complaints from Europeans that they were blindsided by the swift American withdrawal from Afghanistan last summer, and that France was frozen out of a new defense alliance with Australia, Mr. Biden has gone out of its way to involve allies in every step of this crisis.

The United States, European officials say, has acted with energy and some dexterity in orchestrating the response to Russia’s threatening moves. Since mid-November, it has conducted at least 180 senior-level meetings or other contacts with European officials. Some marvel at having their American counterparts on speed dial.

Despite being dragged down at home by domestic problems and being viewed as a transitional figure in some European capitals, Mr. Biden has emerged as the leader of the West’s effort to confront threats from President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

Before delivering a written response to Mr. Putin’s security demands on Ukraine on Wednesday, the administration traded multiple drafts with the Europeans, insisting that every paragraph that affected individual countries be reviewed, word for word, by their leaders, according to American officials.

“The concern here was ‘no surprises,’” said one official who was involved.

The Russians, who demand that the alliance draw down forces in Eastern Europe and pledge that Ukraine will never join NATO, gave a cool reception to the American response on Thursday, saying there was “not much cause for optimism.”

Europeans worry about Mr. Biden’s staying power and the potential return of former President Donald J. Trump, who disparaged the alliance. They remain unsure of the resolve of Washington, for which Ukraine is not an on-the-doorstep crisis as it is for Europe.

Western officials say Mr. Putin is trying to exploit such perceived vulnerabilities, but his aggressive tactics are forcing Europe and the United States together. Mr. Putin has shown little interest in dealing with anyone other than the president of the “other superpower,” so whatever doubts Europeans have about Mr. Biden, he is the fulcrum of the West’s response.

Acting to escalate diplomatic pressure on Russia, the United States has requested an open meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Monday to discuss the massing of Russian military forces on Ukraine’s borders with Russia and Belarus.

The meeting of the council, the most powerful body in the United Nations, will be held one day before Russia is to take over the rotating monthly presidency from Norway, a strong U.S. ally and fellow NATO member.

The American ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said in a statement on Thursday that the United States, in consultation with other unspecified members of the council and with Ukraine, had requested the meeting “to discuss a matter of crucial importance to international peace and security: Russia’s threatening behavior against Ukraine and the buildup of Russian troops on Ukraine’s borders and in Belarus.”

The Security Council members, the ambassador said, “must squarely examine the facts and consider what is at stake for Ukraine, for Russia, for Europe, and for the core obligations and principles of the international order should Russia further invade Ukraine.”

“This is not a moment to wait and see,” she said.

The meeting comes against the backdrop of increasing signs that Russia, seeking to strengthen its sphere of influence, is preparing a military invasion of Ukraine to press its demands that NATO forces pull back from Eastern Europe and that the alliance promise never to admit Ukraine as a member. The outlook for diplomatic efforts aimed at averting a Russian invasion remains unclear.

Any possible action to criticize Russia’s behavior by the Security Council would almost certainly be blocked by Russia, which has veto power as one of its five permanent members, along with Britain, China, France and the United States. But an open debate in the 15-member council, broadcast live on the United Nations website, could potentially expose Russia to embarrassing isolation.

There was no immediate response by Russia’s United Nations mission to the scheduling of the meeting. But Russia has repeatedly criticized the United States and its allies over their portrayal of the Ukraine crisis as Russian malevolence. China, a Russian ally on the council, has called on Western nations to listen to Russia’s concerns.

“The United States cultivates Russophobia among its people and the people of like-minded states, keeps talking about the buildup of Russian troops as almost the root cause of all problems,” the Russian mission said in a statement earlier in the week. “Yet when saying this, the United States forgets to mention that it is Russian forces deployed at the Russian territory. This stands in contrast with American and NATO arms and countless advisers that Ukraine and other states in the vicinity of Russian borders are swarming with.”

Most of the non-permament members of the council would be unlikely to support Russia in a Ukraine debate. Besides Norway, they are: Albania, Brazil, Gabon, Ghana, India, Ireland, Kenya, Mexico and the United Arab Emirates.