If the Netherlands cuts back on the Ministry of Defense from the early 1990s, the then minister, Relus ter Beek (Defense, PvdA), publishes a piece about the future armed forces in 1993: The priority memorandum.
The Soviet Union no longer exists. The military threat is gone. “Relus put an end to the core of the army: with heavy equipment to the fight against the Russians,” said Hans Kombrink, then Director General on Defense, later.
Not all officials were comfortable with it. The memorandum also mentions that Ukraine wants to go his “own way”, but “a dominant position of the Russian federation” fears. “Potentially the most dangerous are the problems in the relationship between Russia and Ukraine regarding Crimea.”
They hadn’t seen that badly. So when on Tuesday three coalition parties (PVV, NSC, BBB) voted against large -scale European investments in Defense, you could also think: how often a country – a political culture – can make the same mistake?
After officials cut the tensions between Russia and Ukraine in the heart of Europe in 1993, the cutbacks on Defense continued for another 25 years. And after the same tensions introduced Putin’s attack to Ukraine three years ago, while the US now wanted to withdraw their military support to Ukraine, the political majority in The Hague appears to attach more value to their own public finances – ‘no Eurobonds’ – than the danger itself.
Framework
That is why I induced the archive. The armed forces changes between 1989 (fall of the wall) and 2017 (Rutte III will invest again) into a frame of itself. Expenditure valleys In that period of 2.5 percent of the total economy (GDP) to 1.2 percent. Few countries collect the peace dividend so rigorously.
Minister of Defense Henk Kamp (VVD, 2002-2007) is there if his NATO colleagues in 2006 record the aim of 2 percent of GDP for Defense expenditure per Member State. He will never realize it himself.
And after him, the credit crisis causes Rutte I (2010-2012) to intervene even further. “The chatter,” said the then top official of David van Weel (now Minister of Justice) later. The Netherlands has to repel its tanks. Tom Middendorp, former commander of the armed forces: “The combat force of the army was eroded.”
The Netherlands will get in 2011 a wipe from the pan from the US Minister of Defense Bob Gates. The moderate Republican, which serves under the Democrat Barack Obama, then warns that the US will not continue to pay for allies who neglect their duties.
If Jeanine Hennis (VVD), Minister of Defense in Rutte II (2012-2017), experiences that budget increase is politically hopeless, she will make a daring decision in 2015. She exposes the deficits of Defense in Chamber letters. Units with rickety vans, lack of stocks, no ammunition, outdated software, no money for training, et cetera.
Middendorp later tells me: “You can count that Putin has enjoyed those letters.”
Putin has little to complain about the political climate here. Well before his appointment as President in 2000, then VVD leader Frits Bolkestein draws attention to the Russian discomfort about NATO expansion with former Eastern Bloc countries. “A provocation of Russia that will not have any useful effect,” he writes in 1996 NRC. Putin will make this discomfort, especially with regard to Ukraine, endlessly later.
Gas contracts
Nevertheless, optimism about Putin is initially great in The Hague. Queen Beatrix, on a state visit in 2001, speaks in agreement with his “strengthening the rule of law.” The Balkenende cabinets (2002-2010) Vlassen for companies such as Shell (then half Dutch) and Gasunie on Russian oil and (especially) gas contracts.
Nevertheless, the AIVD is already reporting around Putin’s narrow contacts with old compasses in the intelligence world. Messages about violations of human rights are in circulation. Critical books about him appear.
The Hague does not want to see it. Foreign minister Maxime Verhagen (CDA, 2007-2010), the House writes in 2008 that Putin „from the outset [heeft] worked on […] The integrity of the Russian state. “
The Russian Embassy presents a prize every year, the Royals, and the Prime Ministers Jan Peter Balkenende (2002-2010) and Mark Rutte (2010-2024) will receive this in 2010 and 2012 for their “exceptional personal contribution to the development of the relationship between the Russian and Dutch State”.
The Hague is an island of diligent Putin friendliness. In 2011, the CDA will receive the entire Chamber in a request for action on a Russian human rights violation. Foreign Minister Uri Rosenthal (VVD, 2010-2012) writes back that he refuses this. Internally, an official reports the minister: “That Russia is likely to be inadmissible pressure […] And you will not mention countermeasures. “
Rosentes successor Frans Timmermans (PvdA, 2012-2014) also feels nothing for one-sided action in this area, it appears a month before the Russian intake of Crimea in 2014: otherwise the Netherlands will be “victim of the entire gram on the Russian side”.
After the Russian annexation of Crimea and military interference in Eastern Ukraine, from March 2014, Geert Wilders urges his group not to be too critical of Russia, unveiled De Telegraaf later. And if the European Commission wants to borrow Ukraine 11 billion euros for reconstruction, the Dutch government hesitates. Wilders says what Putin likes to hear: “Nobody understands that we have anti -social cuts here And in the meantime paying 11 billion to Ukraine. “
‘Dutch interest first’
Summer 2014, the EU sets serious sanctions against Putin. The period before the Netherlands is mainly on the brakes. The country is just out of a recession. An official advice to Timmermans, March 19, 2014: “Sanctions can negatively influence the early economic growth (0.75 percent this year).” A committed top official later tells me: “The approach was: the Dutch interest first, not the European legal order.”
Ukraine will not receive military support at the NATO summit in Wales, September that year. Also not from the Netherlands, although the MH17 drama that comes from Russian military operations in Eastern Ukraine. Mart de Kruif, then commander of the army, later calls it ‘pure appeasement“.
Thierry Baudet presents In 2015 a Nondescript EU association agreement with Ukraine as a new provocation of Russia. He begs according to No -style The initiators of a referendum on this: Can I participate? “You need a kind of Mussolini!”
In the run -up to the referendum, Baudet has contact with “a Russian that works for Putin,” said Appverkeer Zembla reveals. Again the Netherlands chooses Putin’s side: the voter rejects the treaty, the pro-Russian Baudet will be a member of the House in 2017. “Russia is on our side,” says Wilders in 2017 EW, If he announces his visit to Moscow at the beginning of 2018.
Rutte III (2017-2021) notices that investing in Defense does not bring an immediate recovery. The new minister Ank Bijleveld (CDA) informed the House in 2020 that the Netherlands still “in a shared sixteenth place with Albania” in terms of NATO expenditure ” stands.
The chefs of the four armed forces indicate an interview in 2021 Fidelity. They are already talking about Russian submarines who sometimes stand in the North Sea for 24 or 48 hours at data cables. The Netherlands does not want to see it. “We are that little Gallic village that is invulnerable,” says then army chef Martin Wijnen.
Putin invades Ukraine on 24 February 2022. Three weeks earlier debated The room about the prospects. The VVD MP Ruben Brekelmans, now Minister of Defense, is receiving questions about Bolkesteins skepticism regarding NATO expansion: does that not also apply to Ukraine? He rejects Bolkestein’s analysis. “The underlying principle is that a country can determine itself.”
And while American intelligence services say those days say that Putin is going to attack, Wilders asks in a motion “that the accession of Ukraine is not and will be discussed.” Even now that Ukraine stands for a Russian invasion, he rejects such structural Western protection for the country.
‘Unabated support’
If it’s too late, and being Russian troops in Ukraine, The Hague comes to self -insight. Rutte IV is in a hurry to get the 2 percent of GDP. The cabinet supports Ukraine military and financial: solidarity with the victim of Putin’s aggression. The Government Program of the Schoof Cabinet confirms the autumn 2024: The Netherlands continues to support “Ukraine unabated”.
And then it appears Tuesday that PVV, NSC and BBB draw a limit: no risks with our money (European loans) to increase European defense spending. After consultation, the coalition agrees a limit of European loans: the three still support the European defense plans.
It does not detract from the core of the matter.
That the Netherlands has neglected its defense for decades. That ministers swallowed their poetin criticism for too long. That they sacrificed Ukrainian interests to economic self -interest – certainly in 2014. That the population remained blind for Russian positions and machinations for too long – see the Ukraine referendum, 2016. That the most influential politician for a long time put an indefensable poetin -friendliness on the day – see his visit to the game – see also on the game – see also on the game – see also on the game – see also on the game – see also on the game – see also on the game.
A country, in short, that Defense, Ukraine and Russia approached decades from scraper, self -interest and geopolitical naivety: the Emmen of Europe (sorry, Emmen).