Joe Biden said “isolation was not the answer 80 years ago, and is not the answer today,” in a thinly-veiled attack on Donald Trump during a D-Day commemoration speech.
Speaking at the Normandy American Cemetery, on a bluff above Omaha beach, Mr Biden said that “the autocrats of the world are watching closely to see what happens in Ukraine,” drawing a comparison with the Nazi occupation of France in the 1940s.
“The men who fought here became heroes, not because they were the strongest, toughest or fiercest, although they were, but because they were given an audacious mission,” he said.
“They knew that things are worth fighting and dying for…here we proved the forces of liberty are stronger than the forces of conquest.”
The US president used much of his speech to make coded criticisms of his political rivals, including Trump, who have called for American support for Ukraine to be reduced.
“Isolationism was not the answer 80 years ago, and is not the answer today,” he said.
“We know the dark forces that these heroes fought against 80 years ago – they never go away.”
The apparent politicisation of the commemoration speech is likely to enrage Mr Biden’s detractors back home – and comes after Emmanuel Macron was criticised for doing the same ahead of Sunday’s European elections.
The head of France’s socialist party earlier this week accused the French president of “requisitioning” D-Day, after he scheduled a speech for the eve of voting in France designed to position himself as the “true heir to Charles de Gaulle”.
Both Mr Biden and Trump have sought to position themselves as the bigger supporter of veterans in the run-up to November’s election, with Mr Biden adding in his speech: “Ukrainians are fighting with extraordinary courage, suffering great losses, but never backing down.
“They have inflicted on the Russian aggression tremendous losses. We will not walk away. Because if we do, Ukraine will be subjugated.”
Trump has said that he would end the war in Ukraine “in one day”, in a plan that most observers assume would involve territorial concessions to Russia. He has also said he believes the US’s financial and military contributions to Kyiv have been too high.
The ceremony was Mr Biden’s first official event of the D-Day 80 anniversary, which has seen as many as 25 world leaders descend on the five beaches used in the landings on June 6, 1944. The commemorations are widely expected to be the last significant milestone that can be celebrated by D-Day veterans themselves – most of whom are at least 95 years old.
King Charles III paid tribute to “those who did not flinch when the moment came” and participated in Operation Overlord – a strategic breakthrough that ultimately brought about the end of Nazi occupation of France.
Mr Biden gave a crowd of hundreds of veterans, their families and officials dramatic description of the wait that Allies forces underwent on the beaches of Britain, as they held out for the order to invade by Dwight D Eisenhower, then Supreme Allied Commander.
“Winston Churchill would call what happened here ‘the greatest, most complicated operation ever’,” he said.
“It was estimated that 80 per cent of them would be killed within hours…but they were brave.”
“It’s the highest honour to be able to salute you, here in Normandy, once more. All of you. God love you,” he added.
Mr Macron began the service by giving a speech that highlighted the contributions of specific veterans present on stage, before presenting them with the Legion of Honour medal, France’s highest decoration.
Mr Biden gave the former servicemen challenge coins – an American mark of respect.
Lloyd Austin, the US defence secretary, said he was “humbled” by the presence of “victors of D-Day”.
“Whenever a veteran of D-Day is gathered to his maker, in the fullness of time after a long life of liberty and freedom, he wins a final victory over Hitler,” he said.
“On behalf of the United States Department of Defence, I am here to give thanks, inadequate as that word may be.
“Eighty years later, we thank the young Americans who took to the beaches, who helped liberate France, and who helped free this continent from Nazi tyranny.”
He added: “You saved the world. We must only defend it.”
Mr Biden is visiting France for four days and will, on Friday, speak from Pointe du Hoc – where German fortifications were positioned above Omaha beach to cut down Allied troops.
In a conscious emulation of a visit to the same spot by Ronald Reagan in 1984, he will refer to the courage of the troops in another rallying cry for present-day Americans to reject isolationism and fight authoritarianism.
On Saturday, he will attend a state dinner in Paris before flying to Italy for next week’s G7 summit.
The leaders will then meet again for a Nato leaders’ meeting in Washington on July 9.
