It all started waaaaay back in 1992.
- 1992, NATO Secretary-General Manfred Wörner paid an official visit to Kyiv, and on 8 July 1992, President Leonid Kravchuk visited NATO Headquarters in Brussels.
Oh, and then since there was a rush to get Ukraine into NATO, Ukraine joined on that day?
No.
- February 1994, Ukraine was the first post-Soviet country to conclude a framework agreement with NATO in the framework of the Partnership for Peace initiative.
Two freaking years later? What the hell? I thought NATO was in a hurry? So, joining the PPI meant Ukraine was in NATO, right?
No.
- Then in 2008, Ukraine applied to integrate with a NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP).
2008?!! Are you freaking kidding me? 16 years have passed! I thought NATO was in a rush? Russia said so, and they never lie! That’s what they say, anyway. If I had a kid in 1992, when first contact was established, he’d be studying for his college entrance exams! He’s gone from infancy nearly to adult. Anyway, joining MAP means they’re in NATO, right?
No, joining NATO is a process, and it must be followed.
- Plans for NATO membership were shelved by Ukraine following the 2010 presidential election in which Viktor Yanukovych, who preferred to keep the country non-aligned, was elected president.
Ha! A Russian victory. And that’s why Ukraine didn’t join NATO.
No.
Huh?
- However, following the Russian military invasion in Ukraine and parliamentary elections in October 2014, the new government made joining NATO a priority.
Ooh, no surprise anyone would want to join NATO after that. So, then Ukraine joined NATO the next day, right? I mean, the US didn’t have to “push Ukraine in joining” anymore after that, right?
No.
- On 21 February 2019, the Constitution of Ukraine was amended, the norms on the strategic course of Ukraine for membership in the European Union and NATO are enshrined in the preamble of the Basic Law, three articles and transitional provisions.
Five years later? Why is NATO dragging their damned feet? They were supposed to be pushing Ukraine into joining NATO, not holding Ukraine back!
That’s what I’m explaining to you. Even after Russia invaded in February 2022, Ukraine is still not in NATO. If NATO were truly in a hurry, Ukraine would have been in NATO in 1992. Yet, here were are 30 years later, and the “huge rush” that Russia describes still hasn’t happened…and your kid who was born on the day of first contact, has finished college, got a law degree, opened his own legal firm, and is buying you a new house!
Suppose Canada, Cuba and The Bahamas formed a military alliance with North Korea
The stated aim is to provide defense against aggression by The United States, the biggest military power on the planet, which enforces its political hegemony around the globe and has a record of forcing regime change in other nations. Doesn’t matter about the politics or democracy in each nation or anything like that, or whether we see it as true or false
The alliance, the North Korea Treaty Organization, states that is purely defensive and would never strike first
Soon, North Korean ballistIc missiles begin to appear just outside The US borders, with a short flight time to US cities. The New Alliance conducts military exercises just inside its own borders
Now then, at what point does The United States become concerned? At what point does it begin acting to neutralize this threat to its citizens?
The NKTO has not made any hostile move except for a few reconnaissance flights just outside the border, it vows never to strike first. It’s political leader though call The US, the Axis of Evil and state it will never be allowed to terrorize other nations like Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, The Balkans, etc, unopposed. And why shouldn’t NKTO exist, don’t sovereign nations have an absolute right to conclude treaties for mutual defense
In fact, we know exactly when the tipping point would occur because Kennedy took the World right to the brink of a nuclear conflict to prevent missiles being based on Cuba
Now, let’s turn it about and consider what Russia sees. NATO says it is their global adversary. It comes steadily closer to the Russian borders, assimilating nation after nation, stationing military units and weapons conducting exercises
Russia sees this as their Cuban Missile Crisis and have reached the point of action. That’s very bad and totally unnecessary to invade another nation because politicians cannot compromise, reach agreements and stop geopolitical posturing
The West tends to hand wave this away. It never bombs or invades other nations. Well read up on Operation Allied Force, the NATO bombing campaign in former Yugoslavia, because it thought the area might be destabilized
What if all the Arab Nations formed an alliance and stopped exports of oil or passage through the Suez Canal. Aren’t they sovereign nations with a right to decide what happens on their own territory. I guarantee you, Western bombs would soon be falling to restore the “American World Order”
We have gotten so used to thinking WE are the good guys, the defenders, the noble guarantors of democracy (even when other nations want nothing to do with those ideals), that we cannot imagine how we look to The Other Side, with our powerful military, or what the underlying fundamental truth of our various geopolitical blocs is
Is this important? Well yes, because the stability of the World Order actually falls into discrete Spheres of Influence. The West has one, Russian has one, China has one, etc. That’s how the World is, whether we like it or not. Each of those three blocs, for example, has the ability to begin war so devastating that all of civilized society will come to an end and we will live in some post-apocalyptic scenario where people struggle to survive and the strong prey upon the weak
So what happens when you begin to disturb the Sphere of Influence of a nuclear armed superpower, surrounding it on every border with your own forces so that your OWN Sphere of Influence grows as large as possible, so your hegemony is dominant?
China, for example has spent trillions, literally buying Africa, it props up governments there, stations its military there, owns mineral rights there. In Zimbabwe, for example, the Presidential Guard is led by a regular Chinese Army battalion. What if The West began forcing regime change to force China out?
The border lines of these Spheres of Influence are the greatest threat to the continued existence of our World today. World War Two, the greatest conflict there has ever been, was precipitated when Germany and Japan began trying to force their spheres of influence wider. Now, we have “Progressed” to the point where we could wipe out most life on the planet
The United Nations was supposed to be just the organization to calm all this down, to ensure all nations get along in fraternal friendship. But just as The League of Nations proved toothless against the Spheres of Influence of the Axis, so The United Nations cannot counter the hegemony of these Blocs
Whether The West, NATO, Russia, the former Soviet Union, the former Warsaw Pact, China, we have to got to stop our military jostling each other and creating overt threats to each other’s existence
We have to move instead to a model of mutual economic blocs where trade and not military dominance is the driving force
If we don’t then sooner or later, someone will make a mistake
So, is the aspiration of Ukraine to join NATO a bad thing? From our side, no, it strengthens us against a possible enemy, adds another arrow to our military quiver and reinforces our dominance in the area. From the Russian side, yes, it raises the perceived threat level and will continue until they have no friendly borders and every surrounding nation is arrayed militarily against them
Unfortunately, it has led to the use of force, and instead of each side recognizing what has happened, restoring Ukraine’s borders, under a guarantee of neutrality, with UN peacekeepers to prevent further violence, each side has gone for the proxy war situation, flooding Ukraine with weapons on both sides, primarily to see how they fare against The Other Guy
If common sense does not find its way into the heads of all leaders something much worse is just over the horizon