Joe Biden has told the BBC that pressure from the Trump administration on Ukraine to give up territory to Russia is “modern-day appeasement” in an exclusive interview, his first since leaving the White House.
Speaking in Delaware on Monday, he said Russian President Vladimir Putin believed Ukraine was part of Russia and “anybody that thinks he’s going to stop” if some territory is conceded as part of a peace deal “is just foolish”.
Biden, who spoke as Allied nations mark the 80th anniversary of VE Day this week, said he was concerned about US-Europe relations breaking down under President Donald Trump, which he said “would change the modern history of the world”.
In a wide-ranging interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Biden was challenged on his own record on Ukraine as well as his decision to end his 2024 re-election bid late in the race after a stumbling debate performance stoked concerns over his fitness and plunged the Democratic Party into crisis.
Biden dropped out less than four months before the November election, and when pushed on whether he should have left sooner and allowed more time for a replacement to be chosen, he said: “I don’t think it would have mattered. We left at a time when we had a good candidate.”
“Things moved so quickly that it made it difficult to walk away. And it was a hard decision,” he said. “I think it was the right decision. I think that… it was just a difficult decision.”
Asked about the current administration’s treatment of US allies, the former president condemned Trump’s calls for the US to take back the Panama Canal, to acquire Greenland and to make Canada the 51st state.
“What the hell’s going on here? What president ever talks like that? That’s not who we are,” he said. “We’re about freedom, democracy, opportunity, not about confiscation.”
On Ukraine, Biden was challenged on whether he gave enough support to Kyiv to ensure they could win the war as opposed to just resist Russia’s full-scale invasion. During three years of fighting, his White House shifted its position on the use of US-supplied weapons and lifted some restrictions over time.
“We gave them everything they needed to provide for their independence, and we were prepared to respond, more aggressively, if Putin moved again,” he said.
Biden was also asked about comments from the Trump administration suggesting Kyiv must give up some territory in order to secure a peace deal that would put an end to fighting.
US Vice-President JD Vance recently laid out the US vision for a peace plan in Ukraine, saying it would “freeze the territorial lines… close to where they are today”.
He said Ukraine and Russia “are both going to have to give up some of the territory they currently own”. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has echoed that message, saying a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is “unrealistic”.
“It is modern-day appeasement,” Biden said on Monday, a reference to the policy of former British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who sought in the late 1930s to appease Adolf Hitler’s demands in a failed attempt to avoid a catastrophic all-out war in Europe.
He also expressed concern that “Europe is going to lose confidence in the certainty of America and the leadership of America”.
The continent’s leaders, he added, were “wondering, well, what do I do now?… Can I rely on the United States? Are they going to be there?”
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