The White House, the State Department, and National Security Council Communications Director John Kirby spent March 20 and 21 snarling, whining and pontificating about Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Moscow. There were many variations on one basic theme—that Xi isn’t serious about bringing peace to Ukraine, he should be honest and tell Vladimir Putin to withdraw from Ukraine if he really wants to be constructive, and, as Secretary of State Tony Blinken put it, was only in Moscow to provide political cover for Putin, who’s been discredited because of the arrest warrant issued for him by the (quite discredited) International Criminal Court.
In two separate briefings, March 20 and 21, John Kirby was quite beside himself, intent on disabusing anyone of the idea that Putin and Xi had seriously discussed a peace proposal for Ukraine. Everyone knows that Russia is the culprit, violating international law and the UN Charter, he ranted, going on to repeat the litany of Russia’s alleged crimes—bombing hospitals, launching Iranian drones into civilian infrastructure, deporting Ukrainian kids, putting them in “filtration camps,” and on and on.
If China wants to play a constructive role, he lectured, it should get Russia to cease all this and get out of Ukraine. How could Putin call Xi “impartial” and “constructive” on Ukraine? Xi “flew all the way to Moscow,” but he didn’t meet or call Zelenskyy, and just “keeps parroting the Russian propaganda that this is somehow a war of the West on Russia.” Putin is isolated, he has no friends, he’s losing in Ukraine, “blowing inventory and manpower,” suffering massive losses, Kirby insisted.
