NATO says Russian military buildup continues on Ukraine's "Unity Day"
CBSN
Kyiv — Russia said Wednesday that more of its forces were pulling back from Ukraine's borders after military exercises. A day earlier, the U.S. and its NATO allies met Moscow's initial claims of a pullback with intense skepticism, but they made it clear that both sides intend to continue negotiating for a solution to the standoff between East and West, in which Ukraine is caught perilously in the middle.
President Joe Biden said Tuesday that the U.S. had yet to see any proof of Russia's claims that it was pulling some of the estimated 150,000 forces massed around Ukraine's northern, eastern and southern borders back to their bases. A Russian invasion, he said, "remains distinctly possible."
On Wednesday, before meeting U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in Brussels, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said not only was there no evidence of a withdrawal, but "on the contrary, it appears that Russia continues their military build-up."
Ashley White received her earliest combat action badge from the United States Army soon after the first lieutenant arrived in Afghanistan. The silver military award, recognizing soldiers who've been personally engaged by an attacker during conflict, was considered an achievement in and of itself as well as an affirming rite of passage for the newly deployed. White had earned it for using her own body to shield a group of civilian women and children from gunfire that broke out in the midst of her third mission in Kandahar province. All of them survived. She never mentioned the badge to anyone in her battalion.