During an online briefing, John Kirby, the Coordinator for Strategic Communications at the National Security Council of the White House, advised Russian leader Vladimir Putin to withdraw his troops from Ukraine if he is concerned about the situation in Russia's Kursk region.
Kirby dismissed Kremlin claims that the West is confronting Russia in the Kursk region as "nonsensical Putin propaganda" that the Russian president has relied on since the war began. He criticized the idea that NATO and the U.S. are surrounding Russia and emphasized that the real conflict is Russia's unlawful invasion of Ukraine, with Ukraine defending itself against this aggression.
"This is simply Russia’s war of conquest against Ukraine, and it has been that way from the beginning," Kirby stated. He also pointed out that the U.S. continues to communicate with Ukrainian counterparts but refrained from commenting on operations in the Kursk region, directing inquiries to the Ukrainian side.
Kirby concluded by saying,
"If Putin doesn’t like what’s happening in the Kursk region, there’s a simple solution—he can just withdraw his troops from Ukraine and stop everything."
