UKRAINE IN THE BALANCE

Biden's foreign policy win was Zelensky's loss

- SIMON SHUSTER

WHEN RUSSIA INVADED UKRAINE NEARLY THREE YEARS ago, President Joe Biden set three objectives for the U.S response. Ukraine's victory was never among them. The phrase the White House used to describe its mission at the time-supporting Ukraine "for as long as it takes"-was intentionally vague. It also raised the question: As long as it takes to do what? "We were deliberately not talking about the territorial parameters," says Eric Green, who served on Biden's National Security Council at the time, overseeing Russia policy. The U.S., in other words, made no promise to help Ukraine recover all of the land Russia had occupied, and certainly not the vast territories in eastern Ukraine and the Crimean Peninsula taken in 2014. The reason was simple, Green says: in the White House's view, doing so was beyond Ukraine's ability, even with robust help from the West. "That was not going to be a success story ultimately.

The more important objective was for Ukraine to survive as a sovereign, democratic country free to pursue integration with the West."