Former U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis says Americans must unite in response to Russian invasion of Ukraine

Gen. James Mattis, a former U.S. secretary of defense, Tuesday urged Americans to put aside their political differences and present a united front to the world as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine enters its 14th day.

“We gather this afternoon here in Florida at a grim time, a time of peril even as the innocent Ukrainian people find their very existence in doubt,” Mattis told more than 470 people at The Society of the Four Arts as part of its Esther B. O’Keeffe speaker series.

“We are encouraging our adversaries to exploit our division and threaten us abroad,” said Mattis, who received a standing ovation at the close of his talk. “We are hurting ourselves and scaring our allies with some of the political antics that shame us in front of our children. We need to recognize the peril if we do not come back together.”

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MORE COVERAGE OF FOUR ARTS: Works of American Impressionism on display at Four Arts in Palm Beach

Mattis served as the 26th secretary of defense from 2017 to 2019 and was the first member of Donald Trump’s cabinet cleared to take office. Prior to that, he spent 44 years in the Marines, rising from an 18-year-old reservist to the highest rank of four-star general.

Ambassador Bonnie McElveen-Hunter, who served as U.S. ambassador to Finland from 2001 to 2003 introduced Mattis. She invited him to speak at the Four Arts.

“He is a a committed and devout Catholic,” McElveen Hunter said. “During the Iraqi invasion he also prayed with Gen. John Kelly. The warrior monk nickname was earned because of his bachelorhood and his scholarship and lifelong devotion to the study of war. He is also known for his blunt, sometimes provocative speech including his Mattisisms.”

One of those is, “If in order to kill the enemy, you have to kill an innocent, don’t take the shot. Don’t create more enemies than you take out by some immoral act.”

Jim Mattis talks about Ukraine in Palm Beach

Mattis, who returned from a security conference in Munich last week and flew to Palm Beach from his home state of Washington, said he discarded his previously prepared remarks about leadership in crisis, and instead decided to focus on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine.

“Courage and wisdom are needed when we are forced to confront the greatest possible issues,” Mattis said. “We are living in a moment when we must not disguise the ugliness imposed by Putin’s attack and the brutality, he is bringing to us all.

“This earthquake unleashed by Putin’s recently manufactured crisis is one of those weeks when it seems like a decade of change happens in hours,” he said.

Calling Putin “an isolated angry old man menacing the world with his talk of nuclear weapons,” Mattis said the threats cannot be dismissed and are real, but the chances of nuclear weapons being deployed can be reduced and, hopefully, prevented.

Mattis said that so long as western diplomats come together from a position of strength, eventually economics and diplomacy will prevail, but the approach must be firm, measured and strategic.

“We need to put Russia in a box and assure they cannot go further," Mattis said.

“Eventually what I call the bleeding ulcer will bleed some more, and he will turn to the diplomats. We may have to wait until we have a new president in Russia,” Mattis said. “We are going to have to pull together here and try not to let this spread.”

Mattis: Zelenskyy cut from the same cloth as Founding Fathers

Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy is a courageous leader who is cut from the same cloth and displays the same righteous fury as America's nations’ founding fathers, Mattis said.

“What an inspiration Zelenskyy has been. It is such a clear choice between good and evil,” Mattis said. “This exhausted defiant leader reminded the world of our shared human values, the values his valiant people are defending, and noting as he did, that a Russian speaker in Kyiv has more freedom of speech that a Russian speaker in Moscow.”

In Putin’s world view, countries fall into two categories, either a vassal state that will do whatever he tells them, or enemies who live by the United Nation’s charter, Mattis said.

“Putin’s contempt for democracy and his unprovoked assault on a country that was no threat has pressed Russia into a debacle,” Mattis said.

Putin is being proven wrong on every account ─ economically, military and diplomatically, he added.

“He embarked on a costly adventure that has already become a bleeding ulcer on his country’s future,” Mattis said.

Putin wanted a weaker European Union and a fractured North Atlantic Treaty Organization, but instead his actions have strengthened NATO and the EU has implemented economic sanctions against Russia.

The world’s democracies must work together, and no nation alone can secure its borders no matter how many aircraft its navy has, Mattis said.

The words of Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, who said that peace freedom and security cannot be taken for granted, should be heeded, he added.

Mattis commended U.S. and U.K. intelligence and the CIA’s work in sharing what its spies discovered about Russia’s plans to invade Ukraine, setting the foundation for NATO’s unity of purpose.

Putin's control of media has Russians 'hostages to an unacceptable tyrant'

The Russian people, although many of them are brainwashed due to Putin’s hold over the media, must not be forgotten, Mattis said.

“We must keep talking to the Russian people and telling them that we assume they are hostages to an unacceptable tyrant and his coterie of oligarchs and henchmen even as Putin tries to brainwash his people,” he said.

“We have strength no dictator can have if we keep the faith,” Mattis said.

Mattis capped off his military career as head of the U.S. Central Command, where he was in charge of all American forces serving in the Middle East and oversaw operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as parts of Syria, Iran and Yemen.

He is the author of “Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead and co-editor of Warriors & Citizens: American Views of Our Military.”

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This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: James Mattis on Ukraine: America must present united front