Joe Biden’s gaffes have ruined months of hard work and undermined the Nato summit, diplomatic sources told The Telegraph.
On stage, Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz defended the president over a slip of the tongue in which he called Volodymyr Zelensky “President Putin”.
The US leader went on to call Kamala Harris “vice-president Trump”.
But roaming the corridors of the summit, aides were more frank in their verdict of the president’s performance. “It was awful,” an official said, describing standing in the crowd as events unfurled.
The consensus amongst diplomats and officials who spoke to The Telegraph, and were granted anonymity to speak more freely, was that it took less than a minute to change the narrative of an entire summit.
The sources realised they would be forced to read about the gaffe on tomorrow’s front pages instead of stories of their successes.
“It’s taken the focus away from what has been a great summit for us,” a diplomat said.
Before the slip-up, officials and diplomats were overjoyed with the outcomes of the meeting, which marked the alliance’s 75th anniversary with a show of unity in defiance of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
President Biden’s allies described it as a “slip of the tongue” that could have happened to any of them delivering a high-profile speech.
There was reason to feel optimistic with the outcome.
The spectres of President Biden’s health, the potential return of Donald Trump and an undiplomatic rant by Mr Zelensky all loomed over the summit.
Until that moment, the US leader had been almost word perfect having spoken in every single session of the meeting.
Nato members believed they had done enough to “Trump-proof” the alliance, announcing that 23 of its 32 states had hit the spending goals of 2 per cent of GDP on defence, with more setting out plans to reach the figure.
And most importantly, Mr Zelensky was leaving Washington satisfied with the levels of support shown by Nato, despite not being handed a formal invitation to the alliance.
“The Americans had put in months of groundwork into preventing another ‘Vilnius moment’,” a second official said, referring to the Ukrainian’s president’s outburst at last year’s summit after being refused an invitation.
There was also a sense of frustration that this moment would dominate questions put to other leaders in their final press conference before heading home.
Sir Keir Starmer was asked no fewer than three times if he thought President Biden was up to the task of running for a second term in the White House.
The Prime Minister said the US leader should be “given credit” for his work at the Nato summit, in defence of his ally.
He would’ve preferred to have been able to boast of his own achievements at the gathering instead of being the receiving end of diplomatically tricky questions.
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