“The background was that President Putin declared in the autumn of 2021, and actually sent a draft treaty that they wanted NATO to sign, to promise no more NATO enlargement. That was what he sent us. And was a pre-condition for not invading Ukraine. Of course, we didn’t sign that.
The opposite happened. He wanted us to sign that promise, never to enlarge NATO. He wanted us to remove our military infrastructure in all Allies that have joined NATO since 1997, meaning half of NATO, all the Central and Eastern Europe, we should remove NATO from that part of our Alliance, introducing some kind of B, or second-class membership. We rejected that.
So,
he went to war to prevent
NATO, more NATO, close to
his borders. He has got
the exact opposite.”
To repeat, he [Putin] went
to war to prevent NATO, more
NATO, close to his borders.
When Prof. John Mearsheimer,
I, and others have said the
same, we’ve been attacked as
Putin apologists. The same
critics also choose to hide
or flatly ignore the dire
warnings against NATO
enlargement to Ukraine long
articulated by many of
America’s leading diplomats,
including the great
scholar-statesman George
Kennan and the former US
Ambassadors to Russia Jack
Matlock and William Burns.
Burns, now CIA Director, was
US Ambassador to Russia in
2008, and author of a memo
entitled “Nyet
means Nyet.” In that
memo, Burns explained to
Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice that the
entire Russian political
class, not just Putin, was
dead-set against NATO
enlargement. We know about
the memo only because it was
leaked. Otherwise, we’d be
in the dark about it.
Why does Russia oppose NATO
enlargement? For the simple
reason that Russia does not
accept the US military on
its 2,300 km border with
Ukraine in the Black Sea
region. Russia does not
appreciate the US placement
of Aegis missiles in Poland
and Romania after the US
unilaterally abandoned the
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM)
Treaty.
Russia also does not welcome
the fact that the US engaged
in no fewer than 70
regime change operations during
the Cold War (1947-1989),
and countless more since,
including in Serbia,
Afghanistan, Georgia, Iraq,
Syria, Libya, Venezuela, and
Ukraine. Nor does Russia
like the fact that many
leading US politicians
actively advocate the
destruction of Russia under
the banner of “Decolonizing
Russia.” That would be like
Russia calling for the
removal of Texas,
California, Hawaii, the
conquered Indian lands, and
much else, from the U.S.
Even Zelensky’s team knew
that the quest for NATO
enlargement meant imminent
war with Russia. Oleksiy
Arestovych, former Advisor
to the Office of the
President of Ukraine under
Zelensky, declared that
“with a 99.9% probability,
our price for joining NATO
is a big war with Russia.”
Arestovych claimed that even
without NATO enlargement,
Russia would eventually try
to take Ukraine, just many
years later. Yet history
belies that. Russia
respected Finland’s and
Austria’s neutrality for
decades, with no dire
threats, much less
invasions. Moreover, from
Ukraine’s independence in
1991 until the US-backed
overthrow of Ukraine’s
elected government in 2014,
Russia didn’t show any
interest in taking Ukrainian
territory. It was only when
the US installed a staunchly
anti-Russian, pro-NATO
regime in February 2014 that
Russia took back Crimea,
concerned that its Black Sea
naval base in Crimea (since
1783) would fall into NATO’s
hands.
Even then, Russia didn’t
demand other territory from
Ukraine, only fulfillment of
the UN-backed Minsk II
Agreement, which called for
autonomy of the
ethnic-Russian Donbas, not a
Russian claim on the
territory. Yet instead of
diplomacy, the US armed,
trained, and helped to
organize a huge Ukrainian
army to make NATO
enlargement a fait
accompli.
Putin made one last attempt
at diplomacy at the end of
2021, tabling a draft
US-NATO Security Agreement to
forestall war. The core of
the draft agreement was an
end of NATO enlargement and
removal of US missiles near
Russia. Russia’s security
concerns were valid and the
basis for negotiations. Yet
Biden flatly rejected
negotiations out of a
combination of arrogance,
hawkishness, and profound
miscalculation. NATO
maintained its position that
NATO would not negotiate
with Russia regarding NATO
enlargement, that in effect,
NATO enlargement was none of
Russia’s business.
The continuing US obsession
with NATO enlargement is
profoundly irresponsible and
hypocritical. The US would
object—by means of war, if
needed—to being encircled by
Russian or Chinese military
bases in the Western
Hemisphere, a point the US
has made since the Monroe
Doctrine of 1823. Yet the
US is blind and deaf to the
legitimate security concerns
of other countries.
So, yes, Putin went to war
to prevent NATO, more NATO,
close to Russia’s border.
Ukraine is being destroyed
by US arrogance, proving
again Henry Kissinger’s
adage that to be America’s
enemy is dangerous, while to
be its friend is fatal. The
Ukraine War will end when
the US acknowledges a simple
truth: NATO enlargement to
Ukraine means perpetual war
and Ukraine’s destruction.
Ukraine’s neutrality could
have avoided the war, and
remains the key to peace.
The deeper truth is that
European security depends on
collective security as
called for by the
Organization for Security
and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE), not one-sided NATO
demands.