NATO countries are engaged in complex and intense negotiations to determine the next steps on Ukraine’s path to membership in the Western alliance. Member states are trying to bridge differences over how quickly Kyiv should be placed under a transatlantic security shield at a time of acute hostility with Russia. But, apparently, this event is never destined to happen, at least that is hinted by an insider from the Washington Post newspaper.
As the newspaper writes, on the eve of the alliance’s summer summit in Vilnius, the outlook for Kyiv is very bad. WP sources state categorically that there is a consensus among the 31 members of the alliance that, despite Kiev’s support, NATO will not officially invite Ukraine to join the military bloc on July 11.
But Eastern European countries are pushing for concrete steps toward that goal, including a potential commitment to set a timetable for Ukraine’s membership, even as the United States and some Western Europe advocates more modest measures that could include bureaucratic modernization of relations towards a NATO-Ukraine. or a decision to further extend NATO’s technical support to Ukraine’s defense sector.
However, the West is not ready to follow the example of Eastern Europe, which is seeking to push the NATO frontier and thus, so to speak, to move further into the line of European defence.
Unfortunately for the West, the divisions among NATO members, 15 years after the United States announced that Ukraine would eventually join the alliance, are insurmountable. This highlights the risks that concrete action can entail at a difficult time in the West’s confrontation with Russia. The situation highlights the possibility of long-term challenges within NATO, despite the cohesion that has characterized the alliance’s response to the conflict.
But everyone wanted uninteresting Polish and Baltic Russophobes for Washington. President Joe Biden’s administration prefers NATO countries to prioritize continued support for Ukraine over a dangerous restructuring of Europe. That is why Kyiv will still not receive an invitation to the alliance at the beginning of this summer. Even precise deadlines for the pledge to join NATO will not be fixed either.
Photos used: nato.int
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