The offending sentence appears at the bottom of paragraph 11 of the NATO summit’s final statement. “We will be in a position to invite Ukraine to join the alliance if the allies agree and the conditions are met.”
For the NATO allies, who always decide by consensus, the rather non-committal passage on Ukrainian membership was the highest attainable. It was a disappointment for Ukraine.
While the heads of government were still meeting on the final statement on Tuesday afternoon, President Volodymyr Zelensky already announced on Twitter that it is “unprecedented and absurd” that no time frame has been mentioned for accession. “Uncertainty is weakness,” he wrote. “I will bring that up openly at the summit.”
The heads of government were not distracted by the tweet and approved the text, which was discussed for months and which was worked on until just before the summit. Outgoing Prime Minister Rutte had tried to mollify Zelensky in a phone call on Saturday. “I said: let’s radiate unity now. I understand that you want even more, but in the end you also have to agree with everyone,” said Rutte in Vilnius.
‘Unity’
The two-day summit must become a model of unity. Rutte: “I want them to think in Moscow: Fuck, they have again succeeded in keeping all those countries on the same page.” On the eve, Turkish President Erdogan had given the unity a strong boost by agreeing to Sweden’s accession. The tweet from guest of honor Zelensky was a stain on the staging. Rutte called the tweet “not helpful”.
Read more about Sweden’s accession to NATO here: Erdogan is now tipping the balance to the West
Zelensky sent his criticism while on his way to Vilnius, where he and his wife sat down for dinner with government leaders. At the beginning of the evening he spoke to hundreds of residents in the setting sun. “NATO makes Ukraine safer, Ukraine makes NATO stronger,” he said. At the summit, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg was trying to sell the NATO offer to Kyiv as best he could at the time.
Safety guarantee
Ukraine has been campaigning for accession for months because NATO membership is the best conceivable security guarantee. After all, NATO allies promise to help each other if a country is attacked. It soon became clear to Kyiv that membership during the war was therefore not feasible: the alliance itself would then go to war with Russia. That’s a line you don’t want to cross.
Kyiv, supported by a number of Eastern European NATO countries, including the host country Lithuania, therefore committed to an irreversible invitation to join, complete with a timeline and step-by-step plan. The US and Germany opposed it. The non-binding text, which mentions conditions and underlines that the NATO countries reserve all rights, was the highest possible.
There are two types of conditions, Stoltenberg explained at a press conference. The requirements that every accession must meet: a democratic constitutional state and an armed force that meets NATO requirements and that can cooperate with other countries. In addition, there is the condition that the war has ended.
Permanent consultation
Yet Zelensky is not left empty-handed. Ukraine is getting a lot of help to modernize its armed forces as quickly as possible and, if the time comes, will no longer have to go through the standard accession procedure. In addition, a permanent consultative body has been set up, the NATO-Ukraine Council, where Kyiv can consult on an equal footing. The new Council meets this Wednesday.
More important than accession is now that Ukraine is helped with arms and ammunition. Germany and the US have promised new weapons. France supplies cruise missiles.
A system of security guarantees for Ukraine will soon be added to this. Outside the alliance, NATO countries want to pledge long-term support in a joint political statement, backed up by bilateral letters of intent. For example, the Netherlands wants to promise the delivery of Patriots and F-16s.
The summit also laid down how the defense of NATO territory against possible Russian aggression will be improved. The allies agreed to spend 2 percent of GDP on defense annually in the future – the Netherlands will meet this standard for the first time in years next year. The Hague received a commitment that the summit will take place in the Netherlands in 2025.
Erdogan admits P 6-7