Remarks by President Obama, His Majesty King Philippe, and Prime Minister di Rupo of Belgium at Flanders Field Cemetery

Waregem, Belgium

11:17 A.M. CET

HIS MAJESTY KING PHILIPPE:  Mr. President, we are deeply moved to stand here with you amidst the graves of brave American soldiers who gave their lives for our freedom.  We remember and honor all those who took part in the First World War and who were killed or maimed, and those who, even if they survived, were often scarred forever by the dreadful experience.  We will always be grateful for the sacrifice.

The United States of America fought side-by-side with Belgium and other European nations.  As President Woodrow Wilson said, “There is a price which is too great to pay for peace, and that price can be put in one word.  One cannot pay the price of self-respect.”

For Belgium, this was true when my great-grandfather, King Albert I, led our country in its rejection of the Kaiser’s ultimatum, and defended Belgium’s status of neutrality.  The horrors of the trench warfare, including the use of chemical weapons for the first time ever in world history, the deaths of so many soldiers -- all this was the acid bath in which many of the old beliefs were dissolved.

The First World War led to many changes in all our countries.  Many reforms were introduced in the following years. However, the so-called “war to end all wars” was followed by an even more brutal one, which engulfed most of the world and which, moreover, saw the heartrending atrocity of the Holocaust.

Our countries have learned the hard way that national sovereignty quickly reaches its limits when confronted to its heavily armed adversary who do not respect that sovereignty.  Thanks to visionary people, we started on the road of European integration.  It was and remains a rocky road, but we are truly convinced that it is the only one.  Today, international cooperation, both regional and global, is more than ever necessary to roll back the scourge of war and violence with the tragic wake of human suffering.

This year’s ceremonies of remembrance must inspire all peace-loving nations to continue to stand shoulder-to-shoulder to spread the rule of law, human rights, and respect for each other. This is the best bulwark against war.

I know that the United States and Belgium will continue to stand together in this endeavor.

PRIME MINISTER DI RUPO:  President Obama, Your Majesty, ladies and gentlemen:  We are gathered today to remember -- to remember the millions of soldiers and civilians who died during the First World War in Belgium and in the rest of Europe; and here, in Waregem, to especially remember the Americans who lost their lives in our cities and our countryside.

On behalf of Belgium, I will honor their memory and thank them and their families for their terrible sacrifice -- a sacrifice that will remain a part of our history and will always have a place in the heart of the Belgian and American people.  We will never forget.

Mr. President, Your Majesty, the ties between Belgium and the United States of America are very strong.  I have said this before and I’m saying it again today in the presence of President Obama:  We, the Belgian and America peoples, share and cherish the same values of freedom, democracy, and progress.  We have fought long and hard to obtain them, and we must work hard every day to keep them alive.

These values are our most precious gift to our young people and future generation.  Therefore, we have to continue to draw lessons for the terrible war that started 100 years ago.  And above all, we have to prevent new conflicts.  Those who ignore the past are taking the risk to relive it.  Each step to reconcile difference is a step away from war.  Each step to open up our hearts and minds is a step toward peace.

Mr. President, Your Majesty, ladies and gentlemen, the American sons who fell on our soil are our sons.  I promise you, Mr. President, that we will always keep their memory alive.  At the same time, we will never forget our Second World War liberators.  They, as well, were examples of courage.  We are determined to ensure (inaudible) of peace, democracy and human rights.  We are determined to ensure the integrity of frontiers and the respect of international law.  Here next to these graves, we make a solemn commitment to continue our efforts to promote peace and solidarity amongst people.

Mr. President, Your Majesty, the guns fell silent a long time ago, as did the voices of the fallen soldiers.  But their example will always continue to inspire us.   

PRESIDENT OBAMA:  Your Majesty King Philippe, Prime Minister Di Rupo, I'm honored to be here today.  Thank you for welcoming me to this sacred place.  To the staff of Flanders Field Cemetery and the people of Belgium, thank you for your devotion, watching over those who rest here and preserving these hallowed grounds for all of us who live in their debt.

As His Majesty and the Prime Minister mentioned, we just spent some quiet moments among the final resting places of young men who fell nearly a century ago.  And it is impossible not to be awed by the profound sacrifice they made so that we might stand here today.  In this place, we remember the courage of “Brave Little Belgium.”  Here, we visited the grave of a young Polish immigrant to America who just a few hours into his very first battle gave his life for his adopted country.  And here, we saw the headstones of two men from Brooklyn, New York, who lay as they fought -- side-by-side. 

Here, we also see that no soldier -- and no nation -- sacrificed alone.  I’m told that this is one of more than 100 cemeteries tucked into the quiet corners of this beautiful countryside.  It’s estimated that beneath about 50 square miles there rest hundreds of thousands of men -- Belgian and American, French and Canadian, British and Australian, and so many others.

We talked about how many of the Americans who fought on Belgian soil during the Great War did so under the command of His Majesty’s great-grandfather, King Albert.  And while they didn’t always share a common heritage or even a common language, the soldiers who manned the trenches were united by something larger -- a willingness to fight, and die, for the freedom that we enjoy as their heirs.

Long after those guns fell silent, this bond has endured.  Belgians and Americans have stood shoulder-to-shoulder with our European allies in World War II and through a long Cold War, then from Afghanistan to Libya.  And today, Belgium is one of our closest partners in the world -- a strong and capable ally.  And thanks to the extraordinary alliance between our two nations, we know a level of peace and prosperity that those who fought here could scarcely have imagined. 

And so before visiting the cemetery, His Majesty, the Prime Minister and I were able to spend some time together.  I was very grateful for the opportunity.  It was a chance to reaffirm our commitment to keep as strong as they’ve ever been the bonds between our nations -- a determination that I know is shared by the American and Belgian people.

Here today, I’d also note that the lessons of that war speak to us still.  Our nations are part of the international effort to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons -- the same kinds of weapons that were used to such devastating effect on these very fields.  We thought we had banished their use to history, and our efforts send a powerful message that these weapons have no place in a civilized world.  This is one of the ways that we can honor those who fell here.  

And so this visit, this hallowed ground, reminds us that we must never, ever take our progress for granted.  We must commit perennially to peace, which binds us across oceans.

In 1915, a Canadian doctor named John McCrae sat in the back of an ambulance not far from here, and wrote a poem about the heavy sacrifice he had seen.  They became some of the most cherished and well-known words from that war.  And they ended with a plea:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

What is lesser known is that three years after he wrote those words -- and thousands of miles away -- an American schoolteacher named Moina Michael read McCrae’s poem.  And she was so moved that she wrote a response:

Oh! you who sleep in “Flanders Fields,”

Sleep sweet -- to rise anew!

We caught the torch you threw

And holding high, we keep the Faith

With All who died.

Your Majesty, Mr. Prime Minister, thank you again.  What I’ve seen at Flanders Field will stay with me always.  To all who sleep here, we can say we caught the torch, we kept the faith, and Americans and Belgians will always stand together for freedom, for dignity, and for the triumph of the human spirit. 

May God bless you.  May God bless the memory of all who rest beneath these fields.  And may God bless the peoples of both our nations.

END
11:31 A.M. CET

Statement by the Press Secretary on H.R. 3771

On Tuesday, March 25, 2014, the President signed into law:

H.R. 3771, the “Philippines Charitable Giving Assistance Act,” which allows taxpayers to accelerate the income tax benefits for certain charitable cash contributions made before April 15, 2014, for the relief of victims in areas affected by Typhoon Haiyan.

Press Gaggle by Senior Administration Officials en route Brussels, Belgium, 3/25/2014

Aboard Air Force One
En Route Brussels, Belgium 

9:05 P.M. CET

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  I can give you a readout of the two bilats and then I can give you a quick preview of the speech tomorrow, because I know people are interested in that.  So with that, I'll turn it over to my colleague and boss here.

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Hey, everybody.  I'm going to give you a brief readout of, in the first instance, the bilateral with Mohammed Bin Zayed, the Crown Prince of UAE, and then the trilateral with the President of Korea and the Prime Minister of Japan.

The first meeting with Mohammed Bin Zayed was very warm and cordial.  It was an opportunity for the two leaders who have spoken a number of times on the phone of late to actually have the opportunity to, in person, discuss developments in the region, to reaffirm the strategic significance and importance of our bilateral relationship and the United States’ vital role in the Gulf region.

The Crown Prince made absolutely clear that our strategic interests are aligned, as did the President of the United States, and that even when we may on occasion have tactical differences, that, in fact, whether we're talking about Egypt or Iran or Syria or any of the pressing issues of the day in the region, fundamentally we have shared interests and shared objectives, and we're cooperating every day on a full range of issues -- the economic agenda, the security agenda, the energy agenda, and to promote the counterterrorism agenda, to promote greater peace and stability in the region.

It was also an opportunity for the President, on the eve of his travels to the Gulf, to hear directly from a valued partner of the United States about the situation there and to have the opportunity to share perspectives on what would be the most fruitful in terms of his visit down in Saudi Arabia.

So, all in all, a very valuable and worthwhile exchange.

On the trilateral with President Park and Prime Minister Abe, as you heard in their opening statements, the tone was very constructive, very roll-up-the-sleeves and collaborative, and that tone endured throughout the meeting itself.  There was not in any shape or fashion a discordant note.  Indeed, all three reaffirmed the critical value of the alliance between the United States and the Republic of Korea, the United States and Japan, and the centrality of our trilateral cooperation on matters of regional security, as well as matters of diplomacy.

The bulk of the meeting was about North Korea but also other regional security concerns, and all emphasized the value that they place on strengthening and deepening trilateral cooperation, whether in the diplomatic sphere or the security sphere.

And we're confident that this is an opportunity to strengthen and deepen these ties, and we look forward to the defense ministers meeting in trilateral format in the near term, and we will continue to concert our diplomacy as it relates not only to North Korea but to a variety of shared challenges in the region.

I'm happy to take a couple questions on this, and then I'll turn it to my colleague for other issues.

Q    Did they make any reference to the recent strains between them and how they might try to get past that?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  No, they didn’t refer to any strains.  They referred to the importance they attach to working together and presenting to one another and to the world the value they attach on their relationships.

Q    Did the President attempt to at least tell them to get beyond whatever strains there are so that they could focus on the task at hand, North Korea and so on?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  It wasn’t necessary.  They came with that spirit and that was the spirit of the entire meeting, and I think all felt that it was productive and a very worthwhile and mutually affirming engagement.

Q    On the UAE meeting, you said that he shared perspectives on what would be most fruitful for the President to do and say in Saudi Arabia.  What kinds of things did he suggest?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Well, I'm not going to get into the private conversations between the leaders, but I think obviously the countries in the Gulf place particular importance on Saudi Arabia as a political and spiritual leader of the region, and they’re very much appreciative of the fact that the President will travel to Saudi Arabia and have the opportunity to spend in-depth time with the King of Saudi Arabia.  And so the discussion was about the value that all of the leaders of the region attach to that.

Q    Was the Kazakhstan meeting just mostly nuclear security, or did they talk about Ukraine?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  The Kazakhstan meeting was brief but wide-ranging.  It included the obvious issues of the day, but also the nuclear security agenda and other issues on the bilateral agenda.

Q    Just something from the summit earlier -- we saw reports that they had done a scenario involving a dirty bomb.  Can you talk about that at all? 

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  One of the sessions was focused on a scenario in which the leaders had to respond to the prospect of a radiological weapon.  This was to reinforce the necessity of the elimination of nuclear materials and the security of those nuclear materials, which is at the centerpiece of the summit’s agenda, and to make people wrestle with the types of challenges that we’d be faced with if we don't complete the work of the summit process, which is in securing these materials around the world.

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Any more on those two bilats?  Otherwise I'm going to turn it over to my colleague.

Q    In the UAE meeting, when they discussed the upcoming visit to Saudi Arabia, to what extent did energy issues play a role in the agenda?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Touched upon but not central. 

Q    And dealing with the Syrian rebels in terms of arming them or providing other types of assistance?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Obviously, Syria was on the agenda, and the importance of our bilateral as well as regional cooperation to deal with the threat that Assad’s continued atrocities pose to all of us but also dealing with the extremist threat were on the agenda.

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Do you want a speech preview real quick?

Q    Yes.

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Okay, so tomorrow throughout the course of the day the President is going to meet with two of our principal European institutional partners.  With the EU he can discuss the continued effort to impose costs on Russia but also support the people of Ukraine, including the economic assistance package that we are going to be a part of.  And with NATO he will discuss specific steps that we are taking to reinforce and reassure the security of our Eastern European allies. 

The speech itself is an opportunity for him to step back and look at the current events in Ukraine in a broader context. Standing at the heart of Europe in Brussels, the center of the European project, he will be able to speak about the importance of European security, the importance of not just the danger to the people of Ukraine but the danger to the international system that Europe and the United States have invested so much in that is a consequence of Russia’s actions.  But he’ll also be able to speak more broadly about why the alliance between the United States and Europe is so important to European security but also to the progress of democracy and the sustainment of international law around the world.

So, essentially, taking this moment of crisis in Europe to reinforce the importance of a Europe that is whole, free, and at peace both to the people of the United States and Europe, but also to the world -- because ultimately this has been an anchor of the international system that we've spent decades to build, and it's that international system that has been put at risk by Russia’s recent actions.

Q    First of all, are you on the record on the speech, or was that on background?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  We'll do the whole thing on background.

Q    In the President’s remarks today he juxtaposed the superpower of the U.S. with the weakness of Russia, calling it a regional power.  Is that a juxtaposition that we'll see as explicitly in his remarks tomorrow?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Yes, I think essentially the point the President is making is that Russia doesn’t -- as we’ve said, Russia does not lead a bloc of nations or a global ideology as the Soviet Union did; that their actions threaten their neighboring states, but the reason that those have such broader consequences is that those actions also undermine the international system more generally.

So I think it's a necessary context that this not be seen as a Cold War in the sense that Russia is not a separate pole analogous to the Soviet Union.  They are, as the President said, a power exerting themselves in the region.  But again, the reason we take that so seriously is both because of our commitment to the security of Europe and the ability of the people of Ukraine to make their own decisions, but also because it undermines the international system when there is such flagrant violations of international law.

Q    Does giving Russia that kind of attention in effect elevate its status as bigger than just a regional power?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Well, again, he’s not going to spend his entire speech on this topic, in fact, precisely because he’s going to discuss the broader necessity of the United States and Europe working together and continuing the project that we began in the 20th century to build the type of international system that guarantees the rights of individuals as well as the rights of nations.  And so really what we're talking about is how does the international system respond to violations of international law.  That applies to Russia; that could apply in other instances.  That applies to Iran not meeting its nuclear obligations.  That applies to Syria massacring its people.  So, fundamentally, this is about the international system that we have invested in, that we lead, together with our allies.

Q    Is NATO ready for this task, or does it need bolstering?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  NATO is ready.  There’s no question that NATO is prepared to defend any ally against any aggression.  And we've actually done planning to assure that every NATO member state assures that they have an Article 5 contingency plan, that their security can be provided for.  However, to reassure them, we do think we should take additional steps.  We've already deployed Baltic air policing -- additional planes over the Baltic countries.  We've deployed an aviation detachment to Poland.  We are looking at doing more things like that. 

In his discussions with the Secretary General tomorrow, we'll be discussing very specifically what more can be done in terms of signaling concrete reassurance to our Eastern European allies.

Q    Do you expect an announcement out of the meeting in that regard?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  I expect them to certainly share ideas about what the United States might do to provide that reassurance and what other countries in NATO may do going forward.  I don't want to get ahead of the meeting itself, but they’ll certainly be discussing specific ideas.

Q    How will the President develop his argument on NATO tomorrow?  And have you guys been under pressure from allies to make the security guarantee absolutely clear?  And is there any real fear that Putin would actually do what he’s done in Ukraine, in a NATO country?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  We believe that our allies know that the security guarantee is real, in part because we've done Article 5 contingency planning since we came to office.  They’ve also appreciated the reassurance we've already provided. I think what they want to see is a tangible manifestation of support.  That's why the planes over the Baltics are so important.  That's why the additional presence in Poland is important.  Those are the types of steps that we want to continue to take so that there’s a visible guarantor of their security.  That's the type of thing they’ll be discussing. 

But we -- look, NATO is completely unrivaled in terms of its military power.  In terms of Russia’s threats, again, we are prepared to defend our NATO allies against any aggression.  We have not seen any indication that Russia is looking to escalate this, but that doesn’t mean we're not going to be prepared for any contingency.

END
9:19 P.M. CET