I've always hated this horribad take on this...nortex97 said:
The historical ignorance of citing Nato expansionism as a fait accompli of diplomatic victory always strikes me as silly at best. If anything, it's clear evidence of failure, imho, as a provocation leading to the present war of attrition with a weak and now doomed neighbor of Russia:Quote:
For some, the way NATO agreed, in 1994, to welcome former Soviet allies "betrayed a catastrophic failure of imagination," Daniel Treisman, a Russia expert at the University of California, Los Angeles, told me. The Czech Republic, Hungary, and Polandthree former Warsaw Pact members aligned with Moscowjoined in 1999. "The major international challenge of the nineteen-nineties was to integrate Russia securely into the Western world," Treisman said. The West should have generated new financial, commercial, cultural, and political linksand new European security arrangementsto complement NATO. "If we had succeeded in that, the security of Eastern Europe would have taken care of itself," he said. Instead, the West failed to understand how Moscow would perceive NATO's guns edging eastward. Seven other nations, including three former Soviet republics and three more Warsaw Pact countries, became members in 2004. Discussion about adding Ukraine and Georgia, which began in 2008long before either qualified for membershipalso invited Putin "to call our bluff," Treisman said. Four other countries joined between 2009 and 2020. Thirty nations, together, now have nearly four times more military personnel than Russia and also many more tanks, warplanes, and artillery. The Kremlin, however, has a larger arsenal of tactical nuclear weapons near Europe's borders.
Even long-time supporters of U.S. and European security guarantees for Finland and Sweden are concerned about the consequences of the two northern nations joining the alliance. "Over all, Russia certainly loses here. But a weak and humiliated Russia is a dangerous Russia," Anne-Marie Slaughter, a former director of policy planning at the State Department who is now the chief executive of the New America think tank, told me. She cited the history of a "weak and humiliated" Germany between the world wars that opened the way for Hitler's rise to power and aggression across Europe. "Putin may well be able to stay in power for even longer on the strength of 'the foreign enemy' encroaching on Russia's borders," she said.Even Dem-mouthpieces like the New Yorker and CNN once called this out. Empowering the Nuland's of our foreign policy apparatus doesn't make any of us safer, nor Europe. Nato expansion if anything is emblematic of the utter diplomatic and political failure this century to bring Russia into more of an alliance. Serbia and Turkey, as well as India and Brazil, aligning/joining BRICS+ and aligning thus with Russia and China against the US broadly all the moreso, in vastly more significant ways than Finland and Sweden joining Nato.Quote:
The curious irony is that, "for the longest time, Putin himself was at peace with the decision" to enlarge NATO, Gottemoeller, who is now at Stanford University, told me. In 2002, Putin signed the Rome Declaration, which created the NATO-Russia Council and its agenda of joint projects, such as containing nuclear proliferation and preventing drug smuggling from Afghanistan. Putin may exploit the perception of a European enemy because it helps him sustain power, Gottemoeller said. At the same time, she added, "it's not a good long-term prognosisRussia permanently at odds with its European neighbors, members of NATO and the E.U. or not."
To ease the transition, Niinistö, the Finnish President, personally called Putin to explain the decision. "The surprise was that he took it so calmly," Niinisto told CNN. "It seems that there are no immediate problems coming." On Monday, Finland's border with Russia was still quiet. "War in Ukraine has had very minor influences to the traffic," Commander Kimmo Ahvonen, of the Finnish Border Guard, told me. "Border situation has been stable all the time, and coöperation with Russian authorities is working quite normally."
The longer-term reality is a wider and deeper fissure dividing NATO and Russia. Europe is fractured, Alexander Stubb, the former Finnish Prime Minister, told CNN. A new Iron Curtain pits "an aggressive authoritarian, totalitarian revisionist and imperialist Russia" against dozens of European democracies working in tandem to isolate it. "That's the future," he said. Whatever the new sense of security is today in Finland and Sweden, every action generates a reactionand further NATOexpansion may well, too.In Vladivostok, Serbia's US-sanctioned Deputy PM Aleksandar Vulin tells Putin that Serbia under President Vucic will never:
— Jakub Bielamowicz (@KubaBielamowicz) September 4, 2024
• join NATO,
• impose sanctions on Russia,
• participate in any anti-Russian actions or hysteria.
Putin has invited Vucic to the BRICS Summit in Kazan. pic.twitter.com/ZO1rzpR6g8Jeffrey Sachs CIA Coups Around the World
— Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil (@ivan_8848) October 14, 2024
The U.S. is the only country in the world that relies on regime change.
We are the country that makes a living by overthrowing other governments.
And that's not a good vocation for us. pic.twitter.com/HFBE0ypw0j
This is like saying that an abused woman provoked her ex into more abuse because she went to the cops and got a restraining order...Quote:
Instead, the West failed to understand how Moscow would perceive NATO's guns edging eastward.
Those countries wanted to PREVENT Russia from doing what they had done to them for 50 years.
You can turn off signatures, btw