As we looked at Joe Biden at the podium last night, the big seventy fifth anniversary emblem right in front of him. This is a big moment for the Alliance, and there was more at play than just Joe Biden's acuity.
And we're going to get into a lot of this now.
As we heard from the President last evening, he spoke for roughly one hour fifty nine minutes, and he was asked about what he was hearing about his age, about his status politically here from world leaders at NATO.
Here he is, I'm.
Not handing any my European allies company to say, Joe, don't run. What I hear them say is you've.
Got to win.
I can't let this guy come forward. He'd be disaster. He'd be disaster. I mean, I think he said in one of his rallies, don't hold me to this recently where NATO. I just learned about NATO or something to that effect. Foreign policy has never been his strong point.
Joe Biden, of course making those remarkasity wrapped up the three day NATO summit here in Washington and joining us now as someone who is in town for that summit. The foreign Minister of Poland, Radik Sekorski, is here with us in our Washington, d C. Studio. Minister, welcome back to Bloomberg. It's lovely to have you. I wonder what your perception of Joe Biden was, not just in the press conference last night, but over the course of your
visit to Washington this week. Do you see a man not only capable of leading a country for another four and a half years, but effectively leading the free world.
Look, I'm not interfering in your internal chaffairs. I can tell you that we had a summit with President Biden in March, with our president, our Prime minister.
I was there.
We had I think nineteen minutes of conversation. President Biden was focused, strategic, and quite humorous.
Actually, slip ups happen.
You know, just meeting with the old journalists, and I made a slip up and I didn't correct myself. But we need America to lead, and President Biden is leading the effort on Ukraine, for which we.
Are very grateful.
I just used the wrong name on the air before you came in. I did a slip up, and I do it all the time. We're trying to figure out what counts as a slip and what qualifies as deterioration. And I would ask you, you're not a doctor. We don't have to dwell on your view on that necessarily. But this is a very important moment for the Alliance. We're talking about the potential for enormous change here domestically
politically in the United States. There's a lot of noise around the president, as we already know, which could have been a bit of a distraction, but there's also great uncertainty about the trajectory of politics and a number of European nations, having seen elections in France, having seen a change in leadership in the UK, some are calling this a peak for NATO might not be the same following this moment. How does the Alliance survive the uncertainty globally politically?
Now, well, let's unpick or you just said there's change in the UK. But I am assured by the new government and the Foreign Minister visited me at home in Poland on the third day of his of him holding office that Ukraine will be solid I mean the Britain will be solid on Ukraine, and Prime Minister Starma reaffirmed that in France some people worried that the nationalist side of the.
Politics will take over. That hasn't happened.
Putin is constantly accounting on our divisions and on our inefficiency, and he doesn't understand our psychology, and he doesn't understand that we are in it for the long haul. Look, as you said, I took part in the summit yesterday.
I was I was in pressed at how consistent and powerful and persuasive almost all the leaders of the Alliance were in saying we are in it for the long run until Ukraine is a secure, independent nation, and we have some good decisions out of the summit, and President Biden is the author of these good decisions.
Well, we don't know that he'll be President Biden beyond January four.
Well, that's democracy for.
You, certainly. And even the president of Poland, President Dudah, has told Joe and I that if it does turn out to be a second Donald Trump administration, he can work with Donald Trump. We hear it frequently from other diplomats, such as yourself, a willingness to work with whomever. I guess my question is, do you really believe that Donald Trump will be as willing to work with you? As President Biden.
We keep in touch with the administration and with the alternative administration, as we do with any other democracy have a cohabitation in Poland. The president is from a more Trumpion side of Polish politics, and he's kept in touch with President Trump all along, and we encourage him. I personally, of course, work with the administration, but I talked to President Trump's people and some of the things that they tell me about what they plan to do are interesting.
And creative, not frightening.
Politics is a difficult business. Some of these things are very controversial. We were disappointed that the American supplemental took so long, but eventually the good thing happened. We hope that President Trump will want to be a winner and a winner of getting to a fair piece in Ukraine, which means Ukraine enjoying its liberty.
Do you worry about the idea of redefining Article five, as Donald Trump has suggested based on the level of financial contribution?
Is that a creative idea?
He was right to insist that allies should spend more, and I quickly defended many, even in style, because when predecessors did it politely didn't work. Okay, So the combination of President Trump's and Joe Biden's pressure and the war in Ukraine resulted in the fact that twenty three out of the thirty two allies now spent two percent of GDP on defense. Poland spends four and we're going to
spend five next year. We're number one in Nature, including the United States in proportion, obviously because we we are no longer in eternal post Cold War peace. But to think about so, this is a good thing and that was needed. But an alliance is not a neighborhood security company. Take Iceland, which is a Nature member, which hardly has a defense budget at all, but it has other vital assets, its territory, its ability to refuel.
To bring.
When we rallied around the United States, when countries were spending under two percent, we sent first Poland, one brigade to Afghanistan, another brigades to Iraq. Others did the same. So the level of spending shouldn't be the early oddstick.
Just in our final moment with you. Something else that came out of this summit was the labeling of China as a decisive enabler of Russia. And we also know that Donald Trump has quite hawkish toward China, as is Joe Biden for that matter. And I wonder if to you, whatever the outcome of the election, does it seem that the US is orienting more toward that adversary, leaving Europe to be the one who has to step up defense militarily against the threat of Russia.
Secureencing matters. If we enable Ukraine to win to defend its independence and borders in the next couple of hours, then I think other theaters could become a priority. And actually helping Ukraine win, I believe would also moderate China's behavior. China is respecting our thickest red line, which is not to send arms to Russia, unlike Iran or North Korea. And yes, China could actually bring their vessal put into
heal and tell them to end this war. And we are making these representations to the Chinese leadership, and I hope they act on them.
We've enjoyed staying in touch with you, and I hope that you'll continue to factor us into your plans when you're returned to Washington. Thank you for joining us on this NATO summit week