Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) urged Biden to reconsider his pledge to not send U.S. troops to fight in Ukraine. Coons, who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said that “Putin will only stop when we stop him” and warned Ukraine could turn into “the next Syria” without increased U.S. involvement.
“We are in a very dangerous moment where it is important that on a bipartisan and measured way we in Congress and the administration come to a common position about when we are willing to go the next step and to send not just arms but troops to the aid in defense of Ukraine,” Coons said in a statement Sunday. “If the answer is never then we are inviting another level of escalation in brutality by Putin.”
During an interview with Face The Nation on CBS news, Coons was pressed on his suggestion to deploy U.S. troops to Ukraine. “Are you arguing that President Biden was wrong when he said he would not send troops to Ukraine? Are you asking him to set a red line?” CBS News host Margaret Brennan asked.
Coons, a strong Biden ally, did not answer the question directly. “Those of us in Congress who have a critical role in setting foreign policy and in advising the president in terms of his decisions at commander in chief, need to look clearly at the level of brutality,” Coons said of the war in Ukraine.
The senator stated that if Putin is allowed to, “just continue to massacre civilians, to commit war crimes throughout Ukraine without NATO, without the West coming more forcefully to his aid”, the country would turn into the next Syria.
“The American people cannot turn away from this tragedy in Ukraine. I think the history of the 21st century turns on how fiercely we defend freedom in Ukraine and that Putin will only stop when we stop him,” Coons concluded. Brennan did not follow up on his suggestion to send troops to Ukraine and instead opted to end the interview.
