At last year’s NATO summit in Lithuania, allies agreed to defer Ukraine’s membership bid, at least temporarily, in favor of loosely defined “security agreements” between Kyiv and individual member-states.
But as Kyiv’s battlefield situation deteriorates, the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO—in the not-too-distant future—appears to be back on the table.
“NATO is treading an exquisite balance between sustaining Ukrainian defense while seeking to de-escalate the conflict and minimize the risk of direct conflict with Russia,” Andrew Corbett, a lecturer at the Defense Studies Department at King’s College London, told The Epoch Times.
“This is, ultimately, incoherent, since it simply prolongs Ukraine’s agony,” Corbett said.
Last month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presented White House officials with a long-awaited “victory plan” for defeating Russia.
Details have not been publicly disclosed, but Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy’s top advisor, has said the plan calls for Ukraine’s expedited accession to NATO, among other things.
According to Mehmet Seyfettin Erol, a Turkish political analyst, such a request “does not seem to be very realistic under current circumstances.”
“Even before the war, when conditions were more favorable, this demand was not realized due to disagreements among NATO member states and uncertainties in Ukrainian politics,” Erol told The Epoch Times.
At a 2008 summit in Bucharest, NATO allies agreed—in principle—that Ukraine would eventually join the alliance.
But Kyiv didn’t formally apply for membership until late 2022—roughly six months after Russia launched its initial invasion of eastern Ukraine.
Two years later, Ukraine still hasn’t been invited to join, despite full-throated support for Kyiv’s war effort on the part of most NATO members.
Allies Divided
In July, at a landmark NATO summit held in Washington, the alliance’s 32 current members repeated the mantra that “Ukraine’s future is in NATO.”“We will continue to support it [Ukraine] on its irreversible path to full Euro-Atlantic integration, including NATO membership,” they said in a joint declaration.
But in a replay of last year’s Lithuania summit, members also said Ukraine would be invited to join only when “allies agree and conditions are met.”
NATO’s Brussels-based leadership, meanwhile, has made no secret of its wish to see Ukraine join the alliance.
After replacing Jens Stoltenberg as NATO chief early this month, Mark Rutte, Holland’s former prime minister, traveled to Kyiv.
“And will continue on this path until you [Ukraine] become a member of our alliance,” he added.
But despite the new secretary-general’s optimism, a handful of allies still voice reservations.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, president of NATO member Turkey, recently said that the issue of Ukraine’s NATO accession was not one “to be rushed.”
“When we are making decisions [about accepting new members], we always take into consideration the stance of other NATO member states,” Erdogan said.
Before joining the Western alliance, prospective new members must first obtain the approval of all existing NATO members.
Robert Fico, prime minister of NATO member Slovakia, has been more forthright in his opposition to the notion of Ukraine joining the alliance.
In recent comments, Fico pledged to veto Kyiv’s membership bid for as long as he remained in office.
Since assuming office last year, Fico has been an outspoken critic of unqualified Western support for Ukraine and has called for negotiations with Russia.
He further asserted that Ukraine’s accession to NATO, especially at the current juncture, “would be a good basis for a third world war.”
Peter Szijjarto, foreign minister of NATO member Hungary, recently voiced similar sentiments.
According to a foreign office statement given to multiple media outlets, speaking at a press event in Budapest on Oct. 8, he warned that Ukraine’s accession to NATO—while it remained at war with Russia—risked sparking a wider conflict.
“Anyone with common sense who thinks this through does not want to create this danger,” Szijjarto said.
“So the Hungarian position is clear,” he added. “There is no possibility for Ukraine to join NATO.”
‘Declaration of War’
Fears of escalation derive largely from Article 5 of NATO’s charter, which obliges alliance members to come to each other’s defense if any come under external attack.Were Ukraine to join the alliance now, some allies fear they will become de facto participants—by virtue of Article 5—in the ongoing conflict with Russia.
“NATO members don’t want to provoke a further reaction from Russia,” Erol, the founder and president of the Ankara Center for Crisis and Policy Studies, said.
He added that Russian President Vladimir Putin has “made it clear that Moscow would regard Ukraine’s membership in NATO as a declaration of war.”
From the outset, Russia has said its “special military operation” in Ukraine was a “natural response” to NATO’s slow but steady eastward expansion over the past three decades.
According to Moscow, NATO has inched ever closer to Russia’s borders—despite earlier pledges not to do so—since the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991.
In June, Putin restated Moscow’s conditions for ending the conflict in Ukraine.
Along with the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from all territories claimed by Russia, these conditions included guarantees that Ukraine would forever remain outside the NATO umbrella.
Corbett downplayed concerns that Ukraine’s admission to NATO would inevitably lead to a global war.
“Article 5 is not as simple as the oft-quoted ‘attack on one is an attack on all,’” he said. “For a state to join NATO, existing members must all agree.”
“And with the political leanings of some of those states right now, including the possibility of a Trump presidency [in the United States], that seems vanishingly unlikely,” Corbett asserted.
“States actually engaged in a war cannot join [the alliance] anyway,” he added. “So the possibility of NATO being drawn into war with Russia—by immediate admission of Ukraine—is similarly unlikely.”
In previous remarks, U.S. officials have clarified Washington’s stance in this regard, saying Ukraine’s entry to NATO would only occur once the war was over.
“We have made clear for some time that, ultimately, that’s a process that moves forward at the end of this conflict,” a State Department spokesman said in April.
Land for NATO Membership?
A proposed “land for NATO” arrangement—in which Russia would retain de facto control of the territory its forces already hold—has been discussed amongst commentators and in diplomatic circles on and off for the last couple of years. The idea, sometimes called the West Germany model, was ruled out in July by then-Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg.Under the suggestion Ukraine would simultaneous be allowed into NATO—despite Moscow’s vehement opposition to such a move.
Corbett believes this idea has little chance of success, given Kyiv’s stated disinclination to make territorial concessions.
Those advocating for such an arrangement, he said, “seem to forget that Ukraine is a sovereign state with its own agency.”
“Even on the promise of NATO membership ... I don’t believe Zelenskyy would abandon those regions of his state to Russia,” Corbett asserted.
What’s more, he added, such a move “risks simply giving Russia the opportunity to regroup and reinforce before starting again at a time convenient to Russia.”
This weekend, Western leaders, including President Joe Biden, had been slated to meet in Ramstein, Germany, where Zelenskyy was expected to unveil his plan for victory.
At the last minute, however, Biden bowed out of the meeting, citing weather emergencies in the southern United States.
Soon afterward, the entire event, which had been meant to highlight the West’s continued support for Ukraine, was indefinitely postponed.
“We’re still working through exactly how the Ramstein engagement may play out,” a White House spokeswoman said on Oct. 8. “Our commitment to Ukraine was a big piece of this, and that is unwavering.”
After the meeting’s abrupt cancellation, the fate of Zelenskyy’s “victory plan” now appears increasingly uncertain.
“There is a serious lack of confidence in Zelenskyy’s plan,” Erol said. “The Ukrainian army is now caught between promises [of victory against Russia] and the realities on the ground.”
According to Corbett, Zelenskyy’s plan “is as much a tool to influence Western support—at the leadership and public levels—as it is a viable military plan to achieve battlefield success.”
“It’s very easy to talk of ‘victory’ when the terms of that victory are not defined,” he added. “And I’d suggest that those terms are quite fluid right now.”
