May 28th, 2022 by WCBC Radio

President Joe Biden told Naval Academy graduates Friday that they will be “representatives and defenders of our democracy,” as free societies are under threat from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to China’s maritime expansion.

Delivering a commencement address to more than 1,000 newly commissioned ensigns and second lieutenants at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, Biden said the Western response to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “brutal” war in Ukraine shows the world is aligning not on geography, “but in terms of values.”

He called the invasion, “A direct assault on the fundamental tenets of rules-based international order,” adding, “that’s the world you’re graduating into.”

“The actions taken by Putin were an attempt, to use my phrase, to Finland-ize all of Europe, to make it all neutral,” Biden said. “Instead, he NATO-ized all of Europe.”