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Biden Seeks to Reassure Allies
The U.S. government has been at pains to reassure NATO allies following a recent video conference between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Joe Biden over tensions around Ukraine.
Allies have reportedly been spooked over Biden’s comments following the call, when he said he would consider Russia’s concerns over NATO and convene high-level multilateral talks to find out “whether or not we can work out any accommodation as it relates to bringing down the temperature along the eastern front.”
On Thursday evening, Biden spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as well as the leaders of nine Eastern European NATO members, known as the Bucharest Nine, to allay concerns that the United States and Russia were carving out a separate approach to NATO and Ukraine.
For Ivo Daalder, a former U.S. Ambassador to NATO under President Barack Obama and now the president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the hasty calls may have had more to do with clarifying Biden’s comments than any shift in White House policy.
“I think they’re walking it back for a reason. I don’t think they wanted to imply in any way that either his or his administration’s policy is appeasement or to try to give in to Russia on either the historical or geopolitical narrative,” Daalder said.
If Biden is trying to deescalate tensions in their neighborhood, then why are Eastern European NATO members so concerned? It’s partially down to the nature of the discussions, Lauren Speranza, director of Transatlantic Defense and Security at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) told Foreign Policy, with Eastern members feeling left out of talks that could directly affect them.
Then there are more existential worries, like whether the U.S. would allow Russia to exercise a de facto veto over future NATO expansion and in an even broader sense, whether the United States is focused on the region in any long-term capacity, especially considering the Biden administration’s attention on Asia.
“Part of the concern from Eastern allies is that they don’t want the U.S. to capitulate to Russian demands in order to quiet that issue so they can go elsewhere and neglect European security concerns,” Speranza said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday reiterated his public position on Ukraine’s relationship with NATO. “We are concerned over the prospects of Ukraine’s possible accession to NATO, as it will definitely result in the deployment of military contingents, bases and weapons posing a threat to us,” Putin said, citing concerns over missile defense systems already in place in Poland and Romania.
“We have every reason to believe that the same will happen if Ukraine joins NATO, but on the Ukrainian soil. How can we not think about it, it would be a criminal omission from our side: witnessing impotently what happens.”
Ukraine’s status as a NATO member-in-waiting is a headache that could have been avoided were it not for the George W. Bush administration’s 2008 push for both Ukraine and Georgia to be promised future membership, an approach France and Germany opposed.
The compromise, a vague declaration of future Ukrainian and Georgian membership in NATO did more than anger Russia; it largely stopped NATO expansion in its tracks. “We broke a very successful policy of slowly bringing in countries when they were ready and when NATO was ready. Now NATO’s no longer ready and Ukraine and Georgia has become a sore in the alliance,” Daalder said.
With the anxieties of allies somewhat tamped down, Biden has further diplomatic hurdles to surmount, starting with prospective talks with Russia, likely alongside NATO members France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom. Olga Oliker, the director for Europe and Central Asia at the International Crisis Group, told Foreign Policy about the steps now needed to reduce tensions— a combination of deterrence, deescalation and diplomacy (outlined in detail in a new report).
Those steps could range from making commitments on limiting the number of conventional military forces present in the region or scaling back actions considered provocative, like naval exercises in the Black Sea. “You can tone that down without having to say the other side is right,” Oliker said.