President Joe Biden’s pick for ambassador to Ukraine is a battle-tested envoy that veteran U.S. diplomats agree is a prime choice to square up to Russian President Vladimir Putin as he continues his military assault in Ukraine.
After close to three years without an ambassador to Kyiv and months since the outbreak of the war, the white smoke rose over Pennsylvania Avenue last week with Biden announcing his decision to nominate Bridget Brink, the current ambassador to Slovakia. A veteran of the foreign service with deep experience at U.S. outposts in Georgia, Serbia, and Uzbekistan, Brink, if confirmed, will take up her post at a crucial moment for Kyiv as Ukraine attempts to wrest control of its southeastern territory from Russia.
“She knows Putin’s tactics from her Georgia years. She doesn’t have to be told the score,” said Daniel Fried, the former top U.S. diplomat for Europe, wending through Washington by bicycle en route to dinner with the Belarusian opposition leader.
Fried told the Washington Examiner that he got to know Brink when she was a senior U.S. official in Georgia as Putin “squeezed” the country in the run-up to the 2008 war. He recalled how she would quickly give him the outlay upon landing in Tbilisi. “She knew instantly what was going on,” he said.
If confirmed, Brink will become the top interlocutor for the Biden administration with Ukraine’s government at a moment of heightened tension, as officials in Kyiv press for Washington’s maximum support.
After traveling to Ukraine, a pair of Biden’s Cabinet secretaries gave a clearer view of where Washington appears to view the war heading.
Speaking at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the U.S. believes Ukraine can win. And he said that Washington isn’t trying only to crush Russia’s forces in Ukraine.
“We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine,” he told reporters last week.
Former U.S. diplomats agreed that Brink, a former deputy assistant secretary of state at the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, would prove a formidable envoy for Biden’s aims.
“She’s not hitting the ground running. She’s already running,” said Joel Rubin, a former deputy assistant secretary of state during the Obama administration. And she is not a first-time ambassador, meaning she has the experience to get started right away.
“She’s tough, and she’s decisive,” said John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine during the George W. Bush administration. “Those are things you need in this situation.”
“This is like sending a general to the field; this is what you need right now,” Rubin added.
The last official confirmed to the role was Marie Yovanovitch, who was pulled from the role by former President Donald Trump, a decision that featured as part of his impeachment.
Herbst said the Biden administration has still appeared fearful of provoking Kremlin aggression, moving tentatively behind other leaders to provide heavier arms and weapons to Ukraine.
While the visit last weekend by Biden’s military and diplomatic brass was a step in the right direction, Washington had been slow to act compared to its allies, he said.
“How many leaders of governments and leaders of state had to enter Ukraine before we sent Blinken and Austin?” he said.
The hope is that Brink will help shift the U.S. into a higher gear.
In Georgia, Brink was known for her tough handling of corruption and democratic governance issues in the former Soviet state, a former senior U.S. official said.
So vexed were Georgia’s leaders by what they viewed as unfair scrutiny that Brink’s nomination as U.S. ambassador to the country was blocked in 2018, U.S. diplomatic sources told Foreign Policy at the time.
She was posted instead to Slovakia, another former Soviet satellite.
The veteran diplomat is expected to draw bipartisan support back in Washington.
Montana Sen. Steve Daines, the first senator to travel to Ukraine since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, spoke to Brink last week to express his support personally. The two met in Slovakia last month.
A Republican, Daines has strongly urged senators to support Biden’s pick, publicly praising her as an “excellent choice.”
Herbst agreed. “Between her expertise and her personal qualities, she’s a terrific choice,” the former Ukraine ambassador told the Washington Examiner.
Calling her the “perfect choice,” Fried said Brink’s experience lends her a unique outlook on the region.
Brink is a Russian speaker, “but not someone who looks at Ukraine through the prism of Moscow,” explained the former U.S. ambassador to Poland.
“She’s also just a wonderful person,” he added.
And he predicted she would want to be in Kyiv soon. “Knowing her, she will want to be on the ground,” he said.
