US troops arrive in Poland as officials suggest Russian ‘invasion’ of Ukraine ‘could happen at any time’

Moscow roundly rejects US security assessments as ‘madness and scaremongering’

Hundreds of US airborne infantry troops have landed in Poland following Joe Biden’s order to bolster the region with US military over mounting concerns of an imminent Russian assault in neighbouring Ukraine.

US service members from the 82nd Airborne Division out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina were deployed following the Biden administration order to strategically deploy 3,000 US troops to Germany, Poland and Romania to support Nato’s eastern flank.

Their arrival on 6 February follows grim security assessments briefed to members of Congress and European partners within the last week that suggest Russian President Vladimir Putin has amassed 70 per cent of combat forces to launch an assault. A more-extreme scenario considered by government officials would include a siege of Kiev and the forced removal of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, triggering a refugee crisis as millions flee.

The Biden administration has also accused Moscow of plans to stage a false-flag event against Russian-speaking people by Ukrainian forces as a pretext to mount an assault.

Russian officials have roundly rejected such assessments, while a senior Russian diplomat characterised the latest US warnings as alarmist and highly unlikely.

“Madness and scaremongering continues,” Russia’s deputy ambassador to the United Nations Dmitry Polyanskiy said on Sunday. “What if we would say that US could seize London in a week and cause 300K civilian deaths? All this based on our intelligence sources that we won’t disclose. Would it feel right for Americans and [Brits]? It’s as wrong for Russians and Ukrainians.”

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told reporters this week that the influx of US forces “is designed to deter aggression and enhance our defensive capabilities and frontline allied states and we expect them.”

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday that “we’re in the window where something could happen,” adding that a “military escalation and invasion could happen at any time.”

“We believe the Russians have put in place the capabilities to mount a significant military operation into Ukraine, and we have been working hard to prepare a response,” he said. “President Biden has rallied our allies, he’s reinforced and reassured our partners on the eastern flank, he’s provided material support to the Ukrainians, and he’s offered the Russians a diplomatic path if that’s what they choose instead. Either way, we are ready, our allies are ready and we’re trying to help the Ukrainian people get ready as well.”

US officials also are showing concerns over military exercises between Russia and Belarus to begin this week, as recently released satellite images from a US-based technology company appear to show Russian military staged across the region, including near Ukraine.

The growing tension follows weeks of stalled diplomatic negotiations and international scrutiny along Russia’s border with Ukraine, where Russia has amassed more than 100,000 troops and military equipment.

Negotiations have thus far yielded more promises to continue negotiations, as a budding war of words develops between the White House and Russian officials, though all sides have sought to diffuse the situation.

In the formal US response to Russian demands that Nato bar Ukraine from the international alliance and pull back its forces from Eastern Europe, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said last month that the US made no concessions, reiterating “what we said publicly for many weeks, and in a sense for many years: that we will uphold the principles of Nato’s open door, and that’s ... a commitment that we’re bound to.”

Russia has also demanded that the US remove nuclear weapons from Europe and withdraw troops and weapons from former Soviet bloc countries that joined Nato after 1997. Such demands have been dismissed by officials as “non-starters” in their ongoing negotiations.

President Biden has also suggested the US could levy personal sanctions against President Putin, a challenge that Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed as “destructive”.

Russia, meanwhile, has threatened to cut off its natural gas supply to Europe if sanctions are imposed, landing a potentially consequential blow to the continent and negotiations.