Ukraine-NATO 101 for Presidential candidates
The US promised to not expand NATO; Russia finally fought back
While I have written about this NATO subject many times before over the last three decades, I am now doing it yet again so as to serve as a more direct reference object in terms of the argument at hand. If you are running for US President in 2024, you need to read and understand this. It is about what caused the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, which many people seem to believe started magically in February 2022 out of thin air.
February 2022? Nothing could be more inaccurate. Here is my history lesson.
1823: The Monroe Doctrine
The story begins in 1823. James Monroe was President of The United States. He was the youngest and the last of the Founders to become US President. In 1823 he articulated what became called The Monroe Doctrine. In brief, it said that the US would not tolerate any other major power in its hemisphere.
1898: The US invades and occupies Puerto Rico
The US enforced this in 1898 when it invaded and occupied Puerto Rico and what became known as The US Virgin Islands. Those occupations remain to this day, 2023 -- 125 years later. The Spanish colonial empire was ousted from the lands nearby the US. Instead, Puerto Rico was made into a “possession” of the US, a status which remains today. The US has faced no memorable international sanctions from this longstanding invade-and-occupy policy in its hemisphere.
1962: The Cuba missile crisis
The next major test came in October 1962. The USSR, aka “The Soviet Union” had cut a deal with Cuba to station nuclear missiles in Cuba. This was discovered as a result of US spy planes taking photos that were presented to President Kennedy.
The US informed the USSR and Cuba that these missiles needed to be removed immediately, and that it would impose a blockade as a first step. If the Soviet ships tried to break the blockade, the US would bomb those ships and perhaps the missiles in Cuba too.
At this point, the world stood at the edge of nuclear annihilation. The Cubans would have ordered a missile attack on the US if the US started conventional bombings. The Soviets would have launched a nuclear attack on the US too, from other places. It would have been the end of most of the world as we knew it.
Fortunately the leader in The Kremlin backed down. In exchange for a secret side-deal, to be executed much later, in which NATO removed missiles from Turkey, the USSR would remove its missiles from Cuba. Nuclear annihilation averted.
1989: The Berlin Wall falls
One day it was there, with nobody predicting its demise. A few short hours later, it was gone and there was no looking back. I’m talking about The Berlin Wall, and the date was November 9, 1989. The whole world as we had known it since at least 1961 changed that evening. It may have been the most consequential moment of a century.
Within weeks, it was becoming clear that West Germany and East Germany were likely going to merge into a single Germany. This would be completed within a year. But what about the conflicting military alliances?
West Germany was part of NATO, and East Germany was part of The Warsaw Pact, led by the USSR. There would be no unification without one of these two parties yielding.
Even though the USSR still existed, there was little doubt as to who was the stronger partner in an upcoming negotiation. It was West Germany and NATO. After all, this meant that communism had lost its major battleground and was in retreat.
1990: The US promises to not expand NATO to the East
US Secretary of State Jim Baker was dispatched to Moscow to meet with Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze. The meeting took place on February 9, 1990, and here is the transcript: https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/document/16116-document-05-memorandum-conversation-between
As you can see on page six, in the second paragraph, here is what the US promised the leadership in Moscow -- in the words of the US leadership: “We understand the need for assurances to the countries in the East. If we maintain a presence in a Germany that is a part of NATO, there would be no extension of NATO’s jurisdiction for forces of NATO one inch to the east.”
That is as clear as it gets. Germany reunifies inside NATO, and in exchange the US promises that NATO will never be expanded “one inch to the east.”
Later in 1990, East and West Germany did indeed unify. The Warsaw Pact retreated 100% peacefully, fulfilling its end of the bargain struck on February 9, 1990.
So far, so good. The Cold War was almost over, with a major de-escalation under the belt.
But was the US going to uphold its end of the bargain? It is at this point later in the 1990s that the 2022 Ukraine war really begins.
1991: The USSR falls, is replaced by a smaller Russia
On December 25, 1991, The USSR suddenly and without warning announced that it was abolishing itself. Talk about a positive surprise! After 74 years of the US and the West fighting communist imperialism, it was suddenly over. It was the second and final sudden surrender, with the November 9, 1989, fall of The Berlin Wall having been the first.
At this moment in time, US President George Bush should simply have announced that NATO’s mission had come to an abrupt but most positive and successful end: The peaceful victory in The Cold War. NATO should have been abolished, effective immediately.
Not abolishing NATO shortly after December 25, 1991, was the first mistake -- but the situation could still have been rescued.
1997-1999: The US breaks its promise
Contrary to all sane advice from Senior US foreign policy experts and luminaries, the US conveniently “forgot” about its promise from February 9, 1990, to never expand NATO to the East. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic were added in the late 1990s.
How did the US get away with such a flagrant breach of one of its most fundamental national security promises? The answer is that Russia had fallen into a great economic depression from the end of 1991 until the late 1990s. Russia was an economic basketcase in the 1990s, flat on its back. With this economic collapse came an inability to withstand an expansionist United States, which basically grabbed as much terrain as it wanted, Russia being down and out for the count.
To illustrate the extent to which Russia showed weakness around the mid-1990s, according to Wikipedia Bill Clinton claimed in an interview many years later that on a 1995 visit to Washington, Yeltsin was found on Pennsylvania Avenue, drunk, in his underwear and trying to hail a taxi cab in order to find pizza. Small wonder the most aggressive foreign policy hawks in Washington DC concluded that this was the time to take advantage of a weak Russia.
2000: Putin assumes power, reaches out to the US for friendship
On New Year’s Eve 1999, Russian leader Boris Yeltsin abruptly resigned and handed over power to Vladimir Putin. At this point, Russia tried really hard to be America’s friend. It helped the US after 9/11 and even asked to become part of NATO, if only to make an important point.
Russia had surrendered communism, and was not exporting communism anywhere. One can debate how free and how capitalist Russia really had become around year 2000, but things surely had gone dramatically in only the positive direction since 1991, and there were many other countries that had bigger ideological beef with the US at this time. The purpose of NATO had been to stop communist imperialism, and the objective had been met at the end of 1991, with no signs of relapse in the several years that followed.
2004: NATO kicks Russia in the teeth again
In the early 2000s, NATO led by the US responded to the victory and cooperation in Russia by kicking Russia in the teeth yet again, for the second time in half a decade: It expanded NATO to seven more countries, six of whom were bordering either Russia or its predecessor country the USSR: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
This was as if Mexico had joined The Warsaw Pact a few years earlier, and now Canada did too. How was Russia going to respond to this deceitful provocation?
2007: Putin finally loses his patience
Russia had bent over backwards since the late 1990s, tried to double down on friendship with the US, and been kicked in the teeth a second time in the early 2000s. Now, Putin had had enough. He gave a speech in Munich in 2007 finally protesting these US-led NATO provocations.
2009-2020: More NATO expansion
Yet, despite Putin’s 2007 protestations against the US-led NATO provocations, Russia continued to turn the other cheek. This sign of weakness from Moscow was rewarded by even more NATO expansion from 2009 to 2020: Albania, Croatia, Montenegro and North Macedonia.
2021: Enough is enough, here is the ultimatum
After all of this abuse, which started after the mid-1990s, Russia sensed that the US was going for the big one: Ukraine. In response, Russia sent the US an ultimatum in December 2021: Don’t even think about making Ukraine part of NATO, either on paper or in practice -- or else. In other words, you had better promise -- in a most credible way -- that NATO membership for Ukraine must never happen, or we will have to go Medieval.
2022: According to the US, history began in 2022
Here is where much of the US foreign policy establishment claims history began. “Russia invaded Ukraine.” Sure, but that’s not really the most relevant part of the story, is it? It would be like saying that the US bombed Cuba in 1962 (It was averted) without mentioning that the USSR stationed missiles there, as the major provocation.
The solution: The US must make good on its promise
When one party breaks a contract and spits in the other party’s face, the violating party must make the other party whole and beg for forgiveness. In this case, the US broke its promise to not expand NATO to the east (of Germany).
As a result, in order to end the war in Ukraine and avert the otherwise almost inevitable escalation to full World War Three, the US must do two things:
Rescind all NATO expansion that took place after 1990.
Apologize to Russia for the US breach of agreement.
I know this would be a bitter pill to swallow for the clueless hordes of historically illiterate people who run things in Washington DC these days, but it must be done. The next US President must reverse course.
The next US President must reverse course.
the next US President is going to be same President as the US has now...........the Deep State is going to make sure that......that happens........so hence nothing is going to change.......