Poland’s foreign minister says the presence of NATO forces “is not unthinkable” and that he appreciates the French president for not ruling out that idea.Related video above: Russian forces ramp up assault in UkraineRadek Sikorski made the observation during a discussion marking the 25th anniversary of Poland’s accession to NATO in the Polish parliament on Friday, and the Foreign Ministry tweeted the comments later in English.They reflect a larger European debate over how to help Ukraine, as Russia has gained some momentum on the battlefield and Kyiv is running low on ammunition. The U.S. Congress is withholding aid that Ukraine says it critically needs to hold off the Russians, putting more pressure on Europe to respond to the war that has shattered peace on the continent.Last month, French President Emmanuel Macron said the possibility of Western troops being sent to Ukraine could not be ruled out, a comment that broke a taboo among allies and prompted an outcry from other leaders. French officials later sought to clarify Macron’s remarks and tamp down the backlash, while insisting on the need to send a clear signal to Russia that it cannot win its war in Ukraine.The Kremlin has warned that if NATO sends combat troops, a direct conflict between the alliance and Russia would be inevitable. Russian President Vladimir Putin said such a move would risk a global nuclear conflict.Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk was among those European leaders who initially ruled out sending troops to Ukraine after Macron’s remarks, saying: “Poland does not plan to send its troops to the territory of Ukraine.”But less than two weeks later, Sikorski struck a different tone.”The presence of #NATO forces in Ukraine is not unthinkable,” he said, according to the Foreign Ministry’s post on X. He said he appreciated Macron’s initiative “because it is about Putin being afraid, not us being afraid of Putin.”Sikorski’s remark is part of a broader shift to align with Macron’s position, wrote Phillips O’Brien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland.”The issue of sending European forces to help Ukraine was never one to be dismissed — it was always a possibility,” O’Brien wrote in an email analysis sent to subscribers Saturday. “In fact it has become more of one as the USA has stepped back and withdrawn aid. Europe is now faced with a terrible dilemma — watching Ukraine potentially run out of ammunition, or stepping in and helping Ukraine more directly.”Polish President Andrzej Duda and Tusk will travel to Washington for a meeting at the White House on Tuesday, a visit the Poles hope they can use to spur the United States to do more to help Ukraine.Poland is a member of NATO along the alliance’s eastern flank, with Ukraine across its eastern border. The country has been under Russian control in the past, and fears run high that if Russia wins in Ukraine, it could next target other countries in a region that Moscow views as its sphere of interest.
WARSAW, Poland (AP) —
Poland’s foreign minister says the presence of NATO forces “is not unthinkable” and that he appreciates the French president for not ruling out that idea.
Related video above: Russian forces ramp up assault in Ukraine
Radek Sikorski made the observation during a discussion marking the 25th anniversary of Poland’s accession to NATO in the Polish parliament on Friday, and the Foreign Ministry tweeted the comments later in English.
They reflect a larger European debate over how to help Ukraine, as Russia has gained some momentum on the battlefield and Kyiv is running low on ammunition. The U.S. Congress is withholding aid that Ukraine says it critically needs to hold off the Russians, putting more pressure on Europe to respond to the war that has shattered peace on the continent.
Last month, French President Emmanuel Macron said the possibility of Western troops being sent to Ukraine could not be ruled out, a comment that broke a taboo among allies and prompted an outcry from other leaders. French officials later sought to clarify Macron’s remarks and tamp down the backlash, while insisting on the need to send a clear signal to Russia that it cannot win its war in Ukraine.
The Kremlin has warned that if NATO sends combat troops, a direct conflict between the alliance and Russia would be inevitable. Russian President Vladimir Putin said such a move would risk a global nuclear conflict.
Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk was among those European leaders who initially ruled out sending troops to Ukraine after Macron’s remarks, saying: “Poland does not plan to send its troops to the territory of Ukraine.”
But less than two weeks later, Sikorski struck a different tone.
“The presence of #NATO forces in Ukraine is not unthinkable,” he said, according to the Foreign Ministry’s post on X. He said he appreciated Macron’s initiative “because it is about Putin being afraid, not us being afraid of Putin.”
Sikorski’s remark is part of a broader shift to align with Macron’s position, wrote Phillips O’Brien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland.
“The issue of sending European forces to help Ukraine was never one to be dismissed — it was always a possibility,” O’Brien wrote in an email analysis sent to subscribers Saturday. “In fact it has become more of one as the USA has stepped back and withdrawn aid. Europe is now faced with a terrible dilemma — watching Ukraine potentially run out of ammunition, or stepping in and helping Ukraine more directly.”
Polish President Andrzej Duda and Tusk will travel to Washington for a meeting at the White House on Tuesday, a visit the Poles hope they can use to spur the United States to do more to help Ukraine.
Poland is a member of NATO along the alliance’s eastern flank, with Ukraine across its eastern border. The country has been under Russian control in the past, and fears run high that if Russia wins in Ukraine, it could next target other countries in a region that Moscow views as its sphere of interest.
The organization’s charter states that the signing parties will “seek to promote stability and well-being in the North Atlantic area,” and will “unite their efforts for collective defense and for the preservation of peace and security.”
April 4, 1949 – NATO is established.
2014-present – The current secretary general is Jens Stoltenberg, former prime minister of Norway. On March 24, 2022, Stoltenberg’s tenure was extended by one year due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
March 21, 2023 – The secretary general’s annual report is released.
Albania (2009) Belgium (1949) Bulgaria (2004) Canada (1949) Croatia (2009) Czech Republic (1999) Denmark (1949) Estonia (2004) Finland (2023) France (1949) Germany (1955, as West Germany) Greece (1952) Hungary (1999) Iceland (1949) Italy (1949) Latvia (2004) Lithuania (2004) Luxembourg (1949) Montenegro (2017) Netherlands (1949) North Macedonia (2020) Norway (1949) Poland (1999) Portugal (1949) Romania (2004) Slovakia (2004) Slovenia (2004) Spain (1982) Sweden (2024) Turkey (1952) United Kingdom (1949) United States (1949)
April 4, 1949 – The 12 nations of Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom and the United States sign the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, DC.
July 25, 1950 – First meeting of NATO Council Deputies in London. US Ambassador Charles M. Spofford is elected permanent chairman.
December 19, 1950 – US General Dwight Eisenhower is appointed the first supreme allied commander. The position leads NATO’s military operations.
March 12, 1952 – Lord Ismay is named the first secretary general of NATO and appointed vice chairman of the North Atlantic Council, which oversees NATO’s political decisions.
April 16, 1952 – NATO establishes its provisional headquarters in Paris at the Palais de Chaillot.
April 28, 1952 – First meeting of the North Atlantic Council in permanent session in Paris.
May 6, 1952 – West Germany joins NATO.
May 14, 1955 – The Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc countries form the Warsaw Pact in response to West Germany joining NATO.
July 26, 1956 – Egypt nationalizes the Suez Canal. France and Great Britain use troops to intervene, against the wishes of the United States, causing a rift in NATO.
October 22-23, 1963 – NATO and the United States demonstrate the size and speed of emergency forces when flying 14,500 US troops into West Germany for maneuvers.
March 10, 1966 – France formally announces intentions to withdraw from the military structure of NATO, accusing the United States of having too much influence in the organization.
March 31, 1967 – Opening ceremony of new NATO headquarters in Casteau, near Mons, Belgium.
August 14, 1974 – Greece, angered at NATO’s response to the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, withdraws from the military arm of NATO.
October 20, 1980 – Greece rejoins the NATO military structure.
December 13, 1991 – For the first time, the Soviet Union takes part in meetings at NATO as part of the North Atlantic Cooperation Council.
December 21, 1991 – Eleven of the republics of the former Soviet Union create a new Commonwealth of Independent States. On December 25, theSoviet Union is officially disbanded with the resignation of Mikhail Gorbachev as president and supreme commander-in-chief of Soviet Forces.
February 28, 1994 – NATO forces shoot down four Bosnian Serb planes violating the UN-imposed no-fly zone. It is the first time NATO has used force.
January 13, 1996 – Russian troops are deployed to support IFOR in Bosnia.
May 22, 1997 – NATO and the Russian Federation sign a security and cooperation pact, the “Founding Act” which establishes a NATO-Russia Permanent Joint Council (PJC).
March 24, 1999 – NATO launches air strikes against Yugoslavia to end Serbian aggression in the Kosovo region.
May 28, 2002 – NATO and Russia form the NATO-Russia Council (NRC), which makes Russia an associate member of the organization. The NRC replaces the PJC.
November 21-22, 2002 – During the Prague Summit, NATO invites seven former Eastern Bloc countries, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia, to discuss entry into the organization.
December 4, 2002 – US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz speaks before NATO in Brussels and requests that member nations contribute forces to a potential campaign in Iraq.
January 22, 2003 – France and Germany block discussion on war preparations submitted by the United States. The US proposal included provisions for Turkey’s defense, the use of NATO equipment, and NATO’s postwar role in Iraq.
February 10, 2003 – France, Germany and Belgium block a US request that NATO provide Patriot missiles, Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft, and other equipment to Turkey. The United States had made the request anticipating that Iraq will retaliate against Turkey in the event of war. Turkey invokes article IV of the NATO charter, which requires the organization as a whole to discuss security threats to any member nation.
February 16, 2003 – NATO produces three defensive plans for Turkey, in the event of a US war with Iraq: – Deployment of NATO AWACS aircraft; – NATO support for the deployment of theatre missile defenses for Turkey; – NATO support for possible deployment of Allied chemical and biological defenses.
March 29, 2004 – NATO is expanded from 19 to 26 members when seven nations, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia, join in an accession ceremony in Washington, DC. All are former communist states in Eastern Europe.
August 10, 2004 – NATO AWACS begin patrolling Greek airspace prior to the Olympic and Paralympic games. NATO’s presence at the Olympics is nicknamed Distinguished Games and includes AWACS and the Multinational Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear Task Force.
September 14, 2006 – Ukraine announces that it is shelving its aspirations to join NATO, due to opposition by the Ukrainian public and Russia.
April 2-4, 2008 – NATO leaders hold a summit in Bucharest, Romania. Croatia and Albania are invited to join the alliance.
June 17, 2008 –French President Nicolas Sarkozy announces France will soon rejoin NATO’s military command, 40 years after it left.
April 3-4, 2009 – The 23rd NATO summit also marks NATO’s 60th anniversary. During the summit, France rejoins NATO’s military command.
March 24, 2011 – NATO takes command of enforcing a no-fly zone imposed on Libya by the United Nations.
March 29, 2011 – The Council of Europe rules NATO, among others, responsible for the 63 deaths of African immigrants left adrift for two weeks while attempting to reach European shores from Libya.
May 19, 2012 – Demonstrators take to the streets of Chicago prior to the start of the NATO summit. Anti-NATO protests near Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s home focus on the cost of the summit to the city and city budget cuts to mental healthcare.
March 5, 2014 – In regard to the crisis in Ukraine, Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen announces that NATO has decided to “put the entire range of NATO-Russia cooperation under review” to send “a clear message Russia’s actions have consequences.”
February 11, 2016 – Secretary General Stoltenberg announces that NATO is deploying ships to the Aegean Sea to try to deter smugglers from trafficking migrants from Turkey to Greece.
May 15, 2022 – Finland’s government says it intends to join NATO, ditching decades of neutrality and ignoring Russian threats of possible retaliation as the Nordic country attempts to strengthen its security following the onset of the war in Ukraine. Sweden’s ruling party later said it will also support joining the alliance.
Hungary’s parliament voted 188 to 6 in favor of allowing Sweden to join NATO, the final hurdle standing in the way of the Scandinavian country becoming the 32nd member of the military alliance, one year after neighboring Finland was admitted. What do you think?
“That’s gonna be a big help when we pull out next year.”
Lucy Moss, Grimoire Expert
Biden Gives Americans Nuclear Launch Codes In Case Anything Ever Happens To Him
“I feel better knowing Russia will think twice before attacking ABBA.”
Austin Mabuza, Monologue Editor
“I finally understood geopolitics and now I have to start all over again.”
Two years after Russia invaded Ukraine and one week after dissident Alexey Navalny died in an Arctic prison, the Biden administration has announced more than 500 new sanctions against Moscow. CBS News senior White House correspondent Weijia Jiang has more.
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The long decline of the Republican Party’s internationalist wing may have reached a tipping point.
Since Donald Trump emerged as the GOP’s dominant figure in 2016, he has championed an isolationist and nationalist agenda that is dubious of international alliances, scornful of free trade, and hostile to not only illegal but also legal immigration. His four years in the White House marked a shift in the party’s internal balance of power away from the internationalist perspective that had dominated every Republican presidency from Dwight Eisenhower through George W. Bush.
But even so, during Trump’s four years in office, a substantial remnant of traditionally internationalist Republicans in Congress and in the key national-security positions of his own administration resisted his efforts to unravel America’s traditional alliances.
Now though, evidence is rapidly accumulating on multiple fronts that the internal GOP resistance is crumbling to Trump’s determination to steer America away from its traditional role as a global leader.
In Congress, that shift was evident in last week’s widespread Senate and House Republican opposition to continued aid for Ukraine. The same movement is occurring among Republican voters, as a new Chicago Council on Global Affairs study demonstrates.
The study used the council’s annual national surveys of American attitudes about foreign affairs to examine the evolution of thinking within the GOP on key international issues. It divided Republicans into two roughly equal groups: those who said they held a very favorable view of Trump and the slightly larger group that viewed him either only somewhat favorably or unfavorably.
The analysis found that skepticism of international engagement—and in particular resistance to supporting Ukraine in its grueling war against Russia—is growing across the GOP. But it also found that the Republicans most sympathetic to Trump have moved most sharply away from support for an engaged American role. Now a clear majority of those Trump-favorable Republicans reject an active American role in world affairs, the study found.
“Trumpism is the dominant tendency in Republican foreign policy and it’s isolationist, it’s unilateralist, it’s amoral,” Richard Haass, a former president of the Council on Foreign Relations and the director of policy planning at the State Department under George W. Bush, told me a few months ago.
That dynamic has big implications for a second Trump term. The growing tendency of Republican voters and elected officials alike to embrace Trump’s nationalist vision means that a reelected Trump would face much less internal opposition than he did in his first term if he moves to actually extract America from NATO, reduce the presence of U.S. troops in Europe and Asia, coddle Russian President Vladimir Putin, or impose sweeping tariffs on imports.
During Trump’s first term, “the party was not yet prepared to abandon internationalism and therefore opposed him,” Ivo Daalder, the chief executive officer of the Chicago Council, told me. “On Russia sanctions, on NATO, on other issues, he had people in the government who undermined him consistently. That won’t happen in a second term. In a second term, his views are clear: He will only appoint people who agree with them, and he has cowed the entire Republican Party.”
The erosion of GOP resistance to Trump’s approach has been dramatically underscored in just the past few days. Most Senate Republicans last week voted against the $95 billion aid package to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. After that bill passed the Senate anyway, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said that he would not bring it to a vote. All of this unfolded as an array of GOP leaders defended Trump for his remarks at a rally in South Carolina last weekend when he again expressed disdain for NATO and said he would encourage Russia to do “whatever the hell they want” to members of the alliance who don’t spend enough on their own defense.
Many of the 22 GOP Republicans who voted for the aid package for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan were veteran senators whose views about America’s international role were shaped under the presidencies of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, or George W. Bush, long before Trump and his “America First” movement loomed so large in conservative politics. It was telling that Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who was first elected to the Senate while Reagan was president in 1984, was the aid package’s most ardent GOP supporter.
By contrast, many of the 26 Republican senators who voted no were newer members, elected since Trump became the party’s leading man. Republican Senator J. D. Vance of Ohio, one of Trump’s most ardent acolytes, delivered an impassioned speech, in which he portrayed the aid to Ukraine as the latest in a long series of catastrophic missteps by the internationalist forces in both parties that included the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
Soon after the bill passed, first-term Republican Senator Eric Schmitt of Missouri noted a stark generational contrast in the vote. “Nearly every Republican Senator under the age of 55 voted NO on this America Last bill,” Schmitt posted on social media. “15 out of 17 elected since 2018 voted NO[.] Things are changing just not fast enough.”
Just as revealing of the changing current in the party was the vote against the package by two GOP senators considered pillars of the party’s internationalist wing: Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Marco Rubio of Florida. Both also unequivocally defended Trump against criticism over his remarks at the South Carolina rally. That seemed to encourage Putin to attack NATO countries that have not met the alliance’s guidelines for spending on their own defense.
To many observers, the retreat on Ukraine from Rubio and Graham suggests that even many GOP officials who don’t share Trump’s neo-isolationist views have concluded that they must accommodate his perspective to survive in a party firmly under his thumb. “Lindsey Graham is a poster child for the hold that Donald Trump has over the Republican Party,” Wendy Sherman, the former deputy secretary of state under President Joe Biden, told me.
Republican elected officials still demonstrate flickers of resistance to Trump’s vision. In December, the Senate and the Republican-controlled House quietly included in the massive defense-authorization legislation a provision requiring any president to obtain congressional approval before withdrawing from NATO. The problem with that legislation is that a reelected Trump can undermine NATO without formally leaving it, said Daalder, who served as the U.S. ambassador to NATO under President Barack Obama.
“You destroy NATO not by walking out but by just not doing anything,” Daalder told me. “If you go around saying ‘If you get attacked, we’ll send [only] a mine sweeper,’ Congress can’t do anything. Congress can declare war, but it can’t force the commander in chief to go to war.”
Nikki Haley, Trump’s former UN ambassador and his last remaining rival for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, has stoutly defended the traditional Reaganite view that America must provide global leadership to resist authoritarianism. She has denounced Trump’s comments on NATO, and she criticized him Friday for his repeated remarks over the years praising Putin following the reports that Alexei Navalny, the Russian leader’s chief domestic opponent, had died in prison. On Saturday, in a social-media post, she blamed Putin for Navalny’s death and pointedly challenged Trump to say whether he agreed.
Yet Haley has struggled to attract more than about one-third of the GOP electorate against Trump. Her foreign-policy agenda isn’t the principal reason for that ceiling. But Trump’s dominance in the race is evidence that, for most GOP voters, his praise for Putin and hostility to NATO are not disqualifying.
The Chicago Council study released helps explain why. Just since 2017, the share of Republicans most favorable toward Trump who say the U.S. should play an active role in global affairs has fallen in the council’s polling from about 70 percent to 40 percent. Likewise, only 40 percent of Trump Republicans support continued military aid to Ukraine, the study found. Only about that many of the Trump Republicans, the Council found, would support sending U.S. troops to fulfill the NATO treaty obligation to defend the Baltic countries if they were invaded by Russia.
By contrast, among the part of the GOP less favorable to Trump, majorities still support an active U.S. role in global affairs, sending troops to the Baltics if Russia invades, and continued military and economic aid to Ukraine. The “less-Trump” side of the GOP was also much less likely to agree that the U.S. should reduce its commitment to NATO or withdraw entirely.
Conversely, Trump Republicans were much more likely to say that they want the United States to be the dominant world leader, while two-thirds of the non-Trump Republicans wanted the U.S. to share leadership with other countries, the traditional internationalist view.
“Rather than the Biden administration’s heavily alliance-focused approach to U.S. foreign policy,” the report concludes, “Trump Republicans seem to prefer a United States role that is more independent, less cooperative, and more inclined to use military force to deal with the threats they see as the most pressing, such as China, Iran, and migration across the United States-Mexico border.”
The Chicago Council study found that the most significant demographic difference between these two groups was that the portion of the GOP more supportive of robust U.S. engagement with the world was much more likely to hold a four-year college degree. That suggests these foreign-policy concerns could join cultural disputes such as abortion and book bans as some of the issues Democrats use to try to pry away ordinarily Republican-leaning white-collar voters from Trump if he’s the GOP nominee.
Jeremy Rosner, a Democratic political consultant who worked on public outreach for the National Security Council under Bill Clinton, told me it’s highly unlikely that Trump’s specific views on NATO or maintaining the U.S. alliances with Japan or South Korea will become a decisive issue for many voters. More likely, Rosner said, is that Trump’s growingly militant language about NATO and other foreign-policy issues will reinforce voter concerns that a second Trump term would trigger too much chaos and disorder on many fronts.
“People don’t like crazy in foreign policy, and there’s a point at which the willingness to stand up to conventional wisdom or international pressure crosses the line from charmingly bold to frighteningly wacko,” Rosner told me. “To the extent he’s espousing things in the international realm that are way over the line, it will add to that mosaic picture [among voters] that he’s beyond the pale.”
Perhaps aware of that risk, many Republican elected officials supporting Trump have gone to great lengths to downplay the implications of his remarks criticizing NATO or praising Putin and China’s Xi Jinping. Rubio, for instance, insisted last week that he had “zero concern” that Trump would try to withdraw from NATO, because he did not do so as president.
Those assurances contrast with the repeated warnings from former national-security officials in both parties that Trump, having worn down the resistance in his party, is likely to do exactly what he says if reelected, at great risk to global stability. “He doesn’t understand the importance of the [NATO] alliance and how it’s critical to our security as well,” Trump’s former Defense Secretary Mark Esper said on CNN last week. “I think it’s realistic that [if] he gets back in office, one of the first things he’ll do is cut off assistance to Ukraine if it isn’t already cut off, and then begin trying to withdraw troops and ultimately withdraw from NATO.”
A return to power for Trump would likely end the dominance of the internationalist wing that has held the upper hand in the GOP since Dwight Eisenhower. The bigger question is whether a second Trump term would also mean the effective end for the American-led system of alliances and international institutions that has underpinned the global order since World War II.
The truth is, Europe only has itself to blame for the morass. Trump has been harping on about NATO’s laggards for years, but he hardly invented the genre. American presidents going back to Dwight D. Eisenhower have complained about European allies freeloading on American defense.
What Europeans don’t like to hear is that Trump has a point: They have been freeloading. What’s more, it was always unrealistic to expect the U.S. to pick pick up the tab for European security ad infinitum.
After Trump lost to Biden in 2020, its seemed like everything had gone back to normal, however. Biden, a lifelong transatlanticist, sought to repair the damage Trump did to NATO by letting the Europeans slide back into their comfort zone.
Even though overall defense spending has increased in recent years in Europe — as it should have, considering Russia’s war on Ukraine — it’s still nowhere near enough. Only 11 of NATO’s 31 members are expected to meet the spending target in 2023, for example, according to NATO’s own data. Germany, the main target of Trump’s ire, has yet to achieve the 2 percent mark. It’s likely to this year, however, if only because its economy is contracting.
The truth is, Europe was lulled back into a false sense of security by Biden’s warm embrace. Instead of going on a war footing by forcing industry to ramp up armament production and reinstating conscription in countries like Germany where it was phased out, Europe nestled itself in Americas skirts.
John Dickerson reports on a push from President Biden to protect civilian lives in Gaza, Donald Trump’s comments on NATO, and how Chinese hackers are getting into U.S. infrastructure.
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Trump’s threat took the form of a story that is likely exaggerated or made up completely (one obvious sign of Trump’s fake stories is that he is always being called “sir” in them), but what he said nonetheless reveals his attitude toward the United States’ most important alliance:
The president of a big country stood up and said, “Well, sir, if we don’t pay, and are attacked by Russia, will you protect us?”
I said, “You didn’t pay? You’re delinquent?”
He said, “Yes, let’s say that happened.”
“No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want.”
Trump has long depicted NATO as a protection racket, in which America’s allies pay up or else they get invaded by Russia. His defenders have sought to sanewash this disturbing idea by treating it as just Trump’s way of encouraging NATO allies to spend more on defense — see, Trump isn’t a Russia simp, they say, but a kind of hawk.
During his presidency, many allies did implement an (already-planned) increase in military expenditures, and NATO supporters tried to sell this to him as a Trump “win” forcing the allies to pay their “dues.” But Trump has refused to take this win, because his goal isn’t actually a stronger NATO, but a weaker one.
Trump has claimed that Russia never would have invaded Ukraine if he were still president. He has also insisted his presidency would put an end to wars. But it’s clear a second Trump term would create incentives for Vladimir Putin to undertake even more risky military adventures.
The risk of a second Trump presidency bringing a destabilizing war in Europe is now enormous. Whether or not Trump actually would directly urge Russia to attack allied countries he considers to be deadbeats — or perhaps whose leaders merely fail to flatter him sufficiently — the fact that he has already publicly suggested this is provocation enough. He has now floated the idea that the United States would abandon its NATO allies. That bell can’t be unrung.
“If we compare modern NATO armaments, the armaments of the last period of the Soviet era, in some respects are inferior, but not always,” Putin said, according to Russian state media outlet TASS. “And if you take our newest armaments, they are clearly superior to everything. This is an obvious fact.”
The Russian leader’s comments were made during a meeting with arms industry workers in Tula, Russia, where he also once again attempted to justify his war with Ukraine. Putin claimed that he ordered the invasion to protect Russian speakers in Ukraine as well as to thwart what he claimed were threats made by the United States and NATO on Russia’s security.
Speaking about Russia’s defense industry, Putin said it “demonstrates a very good both pace and quality of work,” and the superior weapons it produces includes “missile equipment, armored vehicles and everything that is used on the battlefield.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday delivers a speech at a forum in Tula, Russia. During the address, Putin claimed Russia’s weapons are “clearly superior” to arms from NATO countries. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday delivers a speech at a forum in Tula, Russia. During the address, Putin claimed Russia’s weapons are “clearly superior” to arms from NATO countries. GETTY IMAGES
Putin also touted what he claimed were some positive effects the war in Ukraine has had on Russia’s economy, namely the creation of more than half a million new defense industry jobs.
“In the last 1 1/2 years alone, 520,000 new jobs have been created in defense,” Putin said.
Newsweek reached out to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs via email on Friday night for further comment.
Agence France-Presse (AFP) noted Moscow has increased arms production to meet the accelerated pace of its offensives in recent months, providing somewhat of a financial boost to an economy that’s otherwise been hit hard by Western sanctions.
In September, the Russian finance ministry’s draft budget for 2024 showed defense expenditures soared by 68 percent compared to 2023. The budget also included a new allocation of $111 billion for national defense.
The already high tensions between Russia and NATO have seemingly escalated in recent weeks after the alliance’s announcement last month of its largest military exercise in more than 35 years. Dubbed “Steadfast Defender 2024,” the drills launched on January 22 and will ultimately include participation of around 90,000 military personnel from 31 NATO allies and Sweden.
NATO officials have said the exercise will test the allies’ ability to quickly deploy forces and test new defense plans. Military analysts have speculated Steadfast Defender is meant to prepare alliance members for the potential of a future Russian invasion on NATO territory.
When asked about the exercise this week, Kremlin spokespersonDmitry Peskov told reporters Russia considers NATO a “threat” that it is “constantly taking appropriate measures to deal with.”
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
For the first time since Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin established the international group to support Ukraine in April 2022, the United States will host the monthly gathering of about 50 countries out of money, unable to send the ammunition and missiles that Ukraine needs to fend off Russia’s invasion.
While waiting for Congress to pass a budget and potentially approve more money for Ukraine’s fight, the U.S. will be looking to allies to keep bridging the gap.
Tuesday’s meeting will focus on longer-term needs, deputy Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters.
“Even though we aren’t able to provide our security assistance right now, our partners are continuing to do that,” Singh said.
On Tuesday in Brussels, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced a new $1.2 billion joint contract to buy more than 222,000 rounds of 155 mm ammunition. The rounds are some of the most heavily used munitions in this conflict, and the contract will be used to backfill allies that have pushed their own reserves to Kyiv.
While the conflict between Israel and Hamas has dominated headlines since October, Russia’s bloody onslaught of Ukraine has continued.
Russia on Tuesday launched a barrage of more than 40 ballistic, cruise, anti-aircraft and guided missiles into Ukraine’s two biggest cities, damaging apartment buildings and killing at least five people. The assault came a day after Moscow shunned any deal backed by Kyiv and its Western allies to end the almost two-year war.
Ukraine’s air defenses were able to intercept at least 21 of the missiles, however the attacks injured at least 20 people in four districts of Kyiv, the capital.
Additional air defense systems and munitions for them remain a top need of Ukraine, Singh said Monday.
The Pentagon announced its last security assistance for Ukraine on Dec. 27, a $250 million package that included 155 mm rounds, Stinger anti-aircraft missiles and other high-demand items drawn from existing U.S. stockpiles.
The U.S. has not been able to provide additional munitions since then because the money for replenishing those stockpiles has run out and Congress has yet to approve more funds.
More than $110 billion in aid for both Ukraine and Israel is stalled over disagreements between Congress and the White House over other policy priorities, including additional security for the U.S.-Mexico border.
The meeting will be virtual because Austin is still recuperating at home from complications of treatment for prostate cancer.
The U.S. has provided Ukraine more than $44.2 billion in security assistance since Russia invaded in February 2022. About $23.6 billion of that was pulled from existing military stockpiles and almost $19 billion was sent in the form of longer-term military contracts, for items that will take months to procure. So even though funds have run out, some previously purchased weapons will continue to flow in. An additional $1.7 billion has been provided by the U.S. State Department in the form of foreign military financing.
The U.S. and approximately 30 international partners are also continuing to train Ukrainian forces, and to date have trained a total of 118,000 Ukrainians at locations around the world, said Col. Marty O’Donnell, spokesman for U.S. Army Europe and Africa.
The United States has trained approximately 18,000 of those fighters, including approximately 16,300 soldiers in Germany. About 1,500 additional fighters are currently going through training.
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A politician in Russia allied with Vladimir Putin has issued a nuclear threat to the West if it takes hostile action against the Kaliningrad enclave bordering NATO.
Sergey Mironov, leader of the party “A Just Russia” which is part of the systemic opposition sympathetic to Kremlin foreign policy, responded to a report in German paper Bild that Germany’s armed forces (Bundeswehr) were planning for a scenario in which Russia would attack the alliance.
Citing a classified document, the paper said Germany was preparing for an attack by Moscow on the alliance’s eastern flank.
It outlined a “path to conflict” between Russia and NATO in claims that have not been independently verified, have been denied by Moscow and about which Newsweek has contacted the German foreign ministry and NATO.
“A Just Russia-For Truth” Party leader Sergey Mironov on May 20, 2023, in Istra, Russia. Mironov has warned of a possible nuclear response, should the West move against the Kaliningrad enclave Getty Images
Bild predicted that tensions starting in February would escalate to “border conflicts” by December in the “Suwalki corridor” between Belarus and Kaliningrad along the Polish-Lithuanian border.
But Mironov said in an emailed statement to Newsweek that motives for the report were to sow “panic” and “anti-Russian hysteria” in Europe and express a desire among some in Germany to see “the return of East Prussia,” referring to Kaliningrad’s pre-Russian status.
“But these dreams are not destined to come true. Any attempt to block or even attack the Kaliningrad region will inevitably lead to a military clash with Russia,” he said.
Formerly known as Konigsberg, Kaliningrad was part of the German Empire and joined the Soviet Union under the Potsdam Agreement of August 1, 1945.
As its most westerly outpost and bordered on three sides by NATO member states, Kaliningrad is one of Russia’s most strategically sensitive regions, and is the base of the Baltic Sea Fleet between Poland and Lithuania on NATO’s eastern flank.
Mironov, who was chairman of Russia’s Federation Council from 2001 to 2011, said that any Western move on the region was “a real red line, or rather a red button, by clicking on which the West will inevitably force Russia to take retaliatory measures.”
“As a nuclear power, it will take all available forces and means to defend its territory,” he said. “These protection measures will apply to every Russian region, regardless of whether the West recognizes it as such or not.”
In September 2022, Putin announced the annexation of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson, which Moscow does not fully control.
Repeating Kremlin rhetoric about its reasons for invading Ukraine, Mironov added that Russian forces were acting in “retaliation” to NATO actions and to oust the “neo Nazis in Ukraine.”
“Russia did not intend and is not going to attack the members of the alliance,” he said.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
The foreign affairs committee of the Turkish parliament on Tuesday gave its approval for Sweden to join NATO, reported Turkey’s Anadolu news agency.
This brings Sweden a step closer to joining the Western military alliance. It also comes after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan delayed action on Sweden’s bid for a year, arguing the country is too friendly toward Kurdish activists regarded by Ankara as terrorists.
Erdoğan has also linked the approval of Sweden’s accession to the sale of F-16 fighter jets by the United States to Turkey — something that’s currently pending approval by the U.S. Congress.
The general assembly of the Turkish parliament now needs to give its final green light before Sweden can officially become a full NATO member. However, no date for this plenary vote has been set.
The unanimous approval of all current NATO member countries is required for any new state to join the military alliance.
Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán has also been stalling Sweden’s accession bid, saying last week that there was no “great willingness” from Hungarian lawmakers to approve it. This makes Hungary the last NATO member country that hasn’t started the ratification process.
Sweden and Finland both dropped their neutrality and asked to join the alliance in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Finland joined the alliance in April.
Former President Donald Trump once wanted to withdraw the U.S. from the obsolete NATO alliance. 2024 presidential candidate Trump has said the same thing.
So Republicans in Congress, rather than securing the border, cutting spending, cutting taxes, reducing red tape, slashing regulations, shoring up the industrial base, or anything else useful, spent their time helping Democrats make sure he can’t do it if he wins.
Including some Republicans who have claimed to be ‘America First’.
The measure, spearheaded by Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), was included in the annual National Defense Authorization Act, which passed out of the House on Thursday and is expected to be signed by President Biden.
The provision underscores Congress’s commitment to the NATO alliance that was a target of former President Trump’s ire during his term in office.
Some normally reliable “MAGA” votes, like Rep. Lauren Boebert, voted in favor of this measure, baffling supporters.
So Lauren how could you vote yes on NDAA and betray the Constitution and the American people? This is disgusting and not America First. Who are you?
Criticizing NATO in October, Trump reportedly called the alliance a “paper tiger.”
With the U.S. being by far the largest member nation of NATO, Trump has said repeatedly that it was time to put America First and insist that Europe begin pulling their weight.
Florida Senator Marco Rubio was far from the only Republican behind this bill.
After years of screaming about FISA abuses against Trump, here are some self-declared “MAGA” Republicans who just voted to renew FISA 702 surveillance:
Max Miller (OH) Lauren Boebert (CO) Mike Kelly (PA) August Pfluger (TX) Elise Stefanik (NY) Mike Waltz (FL) Ryan Zinke (MT)
It should be noted that while Congress’s constitutional role is to declare war, it hasn’t done so since World War II. Few in Congress seem concerned about that.
But on Thursday they voted to make sure a president couldn’t singularly take America out of organization in which belonging likely means more war.
Now is the time to support and share the sources you trust. The Political Insider ranks #3 on Feedspot’s “100 Best Political Blogs and Websites.”
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned Thursday that Russian President Vladimir Putin will wage war elsewhere if Russia defeats Ukraine.
“If Putin wins in Ukraine, there is real risk that his aggression will not end there,” Stoltenberg told reporters during a meeting with Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico. “Our support is not charity. It is an investment in our security.”
Fico, who won September’s election, is skeptical of aiding Ukraine and has ended military deliveries to Kyiv.
But Stoltenberg wants the alliance to hold firm against Russia.
“The only way to reach a just and lasting solution is to convince President Putin that they will not win on the battlefield.And the only way to ensure that President Putin realizes that he is not winning on the battlefield is to continue to support Ukraine,” the NATO chief said.
His comments came on the same day the Russian leader made clear he has no intention of backing down in his war against Ukraine.
Making fun of the headlines today, so you don’t have to
The news, even that about Taco Bell, doesn’t need to be complicated or confusing; that’s what any new release from Microsoft is for. And, as in the case with anything from Microsoft, to keep the news from worrying our pretty little heads over, remember something new and equally indecipherable will come out soon:
Really all you need to do is follow one simple rule: barely pay attention and jump to conclusions. So, here are some headlines today and my first thoughts:
Taco Bell order is easy prey for a hungry bear.
Nacho average bear: Florida mammal swipes $45 Taco Bell order from porch after Uber Eats delivery
Black Friday sales surge, despite economic uncertainties
Actually, I went to an after-Thanksgiving sale once. Never again … because it’s true, ‘once you go Black Friday you never go back.’
Joe Biden confused Britney Spears for Taylor Swift
… While Trump confused his ex-wife with the woman he sexually assaulted.
21 warning signs someone is Bipolar
For one, they think there are 42 signs.
NATO jets intercept Russian military plane over Baltic States
… As opposed to NY Jets, who only get intercepted.
Leonardo DiCaprio celebrated his 49th Birthday
… Big turnout, probably because it wasn’t on a school night.
Trump releases a letter from a doctor declaring that the former president’s “overall health is excellent” and “cognitive exams were “exceptional”
So, it was signed Dr. George Santos, MD.
Swimmer spots ‘once in a lifetime’ sight of sea lion battling octopus, video shows
Weirdest thing was guest ref Sponge Bob Referee Pants.
Former US first lady Rosalynn Carter dies at 96
… And, not just a First Lady, but always a lady first. God speed.
Founder of far-right Catholic site resigns over breach of its morality clause, group says
I believe they made the announcement on XXX.
Robert De Niro didn’t appreciate the claim that he would take phone calls while using the bathroom
No word if bad cell service in bathrooms forced him to ask callers: ‘Hello, hello. You talking to me?’
Republicans only care about the debt when a Democrat is president
Yup, otherwise they suffer from ‘Lack of Attention To The Deficit Disorder.’
Britney Spears’ memoir sold 1.1 million copies in its first week
With all the dating revelations In Britney Spears’ new book, instead of the ‘Woman in Me,’ it should be called ‘The Men in Me.’
Virginia Democrat Susanna Gibson loses state House race after sex video scandal
… People were shocked seeing a politician with their actual spouse …
Paul Lander is not sure which he is proudest of — winning the Noble Peace Prize or sending Congolese gynecologist Dr. Denis Mukwege to accept it on his behalf, bringing to light the plight of African women in war-torn countries. In his non-daydreaming hours, Paul has written for Weekly Humorist, National Lampoon, American Bystander, Huff Post Comedy, McSweeney’s, Bombeck Writers Workshop Blog and the Humor Times, written and/or produced for multiple TV shows and written standup material that’s been performed on Maher, The Daily Show, Colbert, Kimmel, etc. Now, on to Paul’s time-commanding Special Forces in Khandahar… (See all of Paul’s “Ripping the Headlines Today” columns here.)
BRUSSELS — Turkey has promised Sweden it will ratify its bid to join NATO “within weeks,” Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billström said Wednesday.
Referring to his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan, with whom he spoke on Tuesday, Billström said: “He told me that he expected the ratification to take place within weeks. And of course, we don’t take anything for granted from the side of Sweden, but we look forward to this being completed.”
The Turkish parliament’s foreign affairs commission recently abruptly postponed a session to vote on Sweden’s accession bid.
According to Billström, the top Turkish envoy didn’t put forward any new conditions in the conversation. “There were no new demands from the Turkish government, so we look [at] our part as being fulfilled,” he told reporters at the NATO foreign ministerial meeting.
Apart from Turkey, Hungary has also not ratified Sweden’s membership status in the alliance.
Ukraine’s 2023 fighting season is drawing to a close under a cloud of unmet expectations. Its soldiers and citizens, who are steeling themselves for a Russian winter blitz, will not be warmed by the memories of summer success, Kyiv’s long-awaited counteroffensive operation having failed to achieve the breakthrough needed to collapse Moscow’s occupation of the south of the country.
President Volodymyr Zelensky and top commander General Valerii Zaluzhnyi have admitted Ukraine’s shortcomings. “There will most likely be no deep and beautiful breakthrough,” Zaluzhnyi said in an interview with The Economist earlier this month. Zelensky, meanwhile, told citizens that “all attention should be focused on defense.”
As Kyiv works to maintain its Western coalition, stress fractures are forming. In Europe, a wave of right-wing populism threatens to derail the continent’s political establishment, while in the U.S. President Joe Biden is heading into a fierce re-election contest with a Republican Party cowed by former President Donald Trump and shifting into open Ukraine-skepticism.
A common refrain since February 2022 is that the U.S. is giving Ukraine enough military aid to survive, but not enough to win. In this telling, Washington, D.C. fears that a strategic Kremlin defeat in Ukraine could prompt chaos within Russian borders, perhaps the unseating of President Vladimir Putin, and a vicious regional struggle to fill a power vacuum littered with weapons of mass destruction. With the China challenge looming, Eurasian anarchy would pose many new problems for the White House.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and U.S. President Joe Biden walk to the Oval Office of the White House September 21, 2023. Biden has tied his presidency closely to Ukrainian victory. Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Zelensky appears to be feeling the pinch. “The Ukrainians do see continued hesitancy and this mindset of worrying about escalation, not provoking the Russians in some sort of way,” Daniel Vajdich—president of Yorktown Solutions and one of Ukraine’s most prominent lobbyists in Washington, D.C.—told Newsweek.
“On the implementation side, there’s a whole lot of continued caution that raises real questions in Kyiv about whether there is a desire for the Ukrainians to truly defeat the Russians. And the conclusion is ‘no’.
“The Ukrainians believe that despite all the assistance, despite the fact that the administration is doing so much, there is still so much caution because there is not a desire for the Ukrainians to decisively defeat the Russians, thinking that this would really lead to internal turmoil and collapse in Russia.”
Newsweek has contacted Zelensky’s office and the White House by email to request comment.
‘Failure Is an Orphan’
American and allied Western officials have been privately critical of Ukraine’s offensive approach. The New York Timesreported in August that U.S. planners felt Kyiv’s attacking forces were too spread out along the 600-mile front, failing to concentrate enough firepower in one spot to punch through.
But for many Ukrainians, the U.S. bears some responsibility for the as-yet underwhelming counteroffensive. “I’m grateful to the U.S. as the leaders of our support,” Zelensky told CNN in July. “I told them as well as the European leaders that we would like to start our counteroffensive earlier, and we need all the weapons and materiel for that. Why? Simply because if we start later, it will go slower.”
Vajdich said this sentiment is still strong in Kyiv. “It is an empirical fact that a lot of the assistance has not gotten to the Ukrainians as quickly it as it could have,” he said. “There are supply chain issues, there’s no doubt about that. But there’s also a portion of this assistance, both qualitatively and quantitatively, that could have gotten to the Ukrainians a lot earlier.
“It had a decisive impact in terms of the situation on the ground…the spring offensive this year would have been a spring offensive and not a July offensive, which made all the difference. It allowed the Russians to literally entrench themselves and fortify their defenses.”
Kyiv has had to fight hard for every new NATO weapons system. The first American-made main battle tanks had arrived in Ukraine as of October, more than 18 months since Russian armored columns rolled across Ukrainian frontiers. Kyiv is still pushing for the longest-range version of the MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System—known as the ATACMS, and U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets will not expected to arrive until early 2024.
Flags on Independence Square, each honouring a soldier lost in the war, after fresh snowfall in Kyiv, Ukraine, on November 22, 2023. Ukraine is thought to have suffered more than 100,000 casualties in its war with Russia. Liberov/Libkos/Getty Images
Ukraine is fighting a war of national survival. Biden and other Western leaders, though, have been clear that the Western coalition is charged with global survival. “We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis,” Biden said in October 2022.
The White House has favored a graduated approach to military aid for Kyiv. Too much too soon, officials have warned, could prompt dangerous escalation from the Russian side. Western partners have also cited the need for strategic ambiguity and the element of surprise. Actual strikes on Russian positions have often been the first sign that Ukraine has received certain NATO weapon systems.
But step-by-step Western aid has sown frustration nonetheless. Steven Moore—once a chief of staff for former chief deputy GOP whip Rep. Pete Roskam (R-IL), and now running Ukraine Freedom Project in Kyiv—told Newsweek: “Ukrainians view themselves as our partners in taking out a long-held American adversary in Russia.”
“We supply the weapons, they supply the lives of their very best people,” Moore said. “The Ukrainians aren’t getting the weapons that we promised nor are they getting the weapons that they need.”
America’s Inflection Point
Some hope the onset of winter and the relatively static front may facilitate fresh peace negotiations. Putin has repeatedly said he is open to revived talks, though only on the condition that Ukraine accepts the “new territorial realities” of Moscow’s occupation of around 20 percent of Kyiv’s territory.
Zelensky has refused talks on Russian terms, and disputed suggestions that the war has become a stalemate. “A few military tricks, and you remember, the Kharkiv region was liberated,” he said this month, referring to the surprise counteroffensive success in northeastern Ukraine in fall 2022.
“We have no right to give up. What’s the alternative? What, we need to give away a third of our state? This will only be the beginning. We know what a frozen conflict is, we have already drawn conclusions for ourselves. We need to work more with air defense partners, unblock the sky, give our fighters the opportunity to carry out offensive actions.”
Zelensky denied any pressure from Western partners to go back to the negotiating table. Vajdich said he too sees no coercion. “But if it did exist, or if this is what some Western leaders are thinking without acting on it, what they need to do is not convince President Zelensky, they need to convince the Ukrainian people,” he said, noting sustained public support for full liberation of the country.
An unpopular peace proposal may spell the end of Zelensky’s stint in office, “with an election or without an election,” Vajdich added.
Ukraine cannot continue its war without Western—and especially U.S.—support. Richard Haass and Charles Kupchan of the Council on Foreign Relations think tank wrote this month in Foreign Affairs that the looming winter and disappointing Ukrainian summer push “necessitate a comprehensive reappraisal of the current strategy that Ukraine and its partners are pursuing.”
Both told Newsweek that neither the U.S. nor Ukraine has yet reached that point. “That broader public debate is overdue and is necessary,” Kupchan said. “We’ve been in a political environment in which having this kind of conversation has been almost taboo.”
“It’s a dangerous situation to be in,” he added. “That’s how wars go on endlessly. Good strategy is about not just what’s desirable, but also what’s possible.”
Haass proposed “an interim definition of success,” one that pauses rather than abandons the goal of full territorial liberation. “It might have to wait years or even decades to accomplish the larger definition of success,” he explained. “That would probably have to wait on the emergence of a post-Putin leadership, or a post-post-Putin leadership.”
Full liberation is “unlikely to be achievable given the military balance,” Haass said. “We’ve now had two fighting seasons. I don’t see a basis for saying if you had a third, or a fourth, or fifth Ukraine would be able to realize that goal.”
“I think it is essential for Ukraine survive that Russia be frustrated. And the current situation I would describe as a strategic victory for Ukraine and the West. It’s not everything, but it’s a lot. And it doesn’t rule out more down the road.”
The Biden administration shows no sign of breaking with Kyiv, despite the difficult environment almost two years after Russia’s full-scale invasion. “The Biden administration finds itself in something of a dilemma,” Haass said.
There are some “who are sympathetic to what I’ve just articulated, but don’t want the Biden administration to be seen to be at cross purposes with Ukraine,” he added.
Two Ukrainian soldiers in Maidan Square, Kyiv, Ukraine, on November 22, 2023. The country is bracing for a tough winter after a summer-fall of underwhelming battlefield progress. Liberov/Libkos/Getty Images
“It’s always an awkward topic when you disagree with an ally with about policy aims,” Haass said, warning that the broader geopolitical trends are not necessarily in Ukraine’s favor. “I would argue we should do this now from a position of strength, and I would argue Ukraine should do it now from a position of strength.”
The sense in D.C., Kupchan said, is that “Zelensky is not ready to begin to pivot to a strategy aimed at ending the war. If the Ukrainians are not ready for this conversation, then the West is not going to foist it upon them.”
“My guess is that behind closed doors there is a conversation about how to end the war, and about a set of feasible war aims, and about the role of diplomacy,” he added. “But I don’t think you’re going to see that conversation go public until the there is a sense that the Ukrainians themselves are ready to have that conversation.”
“It’s inevitable that Ukrainians themselves begin to address the question of ‘what do we do now?'” Kupchan said. “Perhaps, at some point, it makes more sense for Ukraine to invest the resources that it’s getting from the West into the defense and reconstruction of the 82 percent of Ukraine under Kyiv’s control.”
Post-Putin Planning
Ukrainians will not look kindly on Western partners urging what amounts to surrender, even if only in the short term. Kyiv is believed to have sustained more than 100,000 casualties in nearly two years of fighting, and tens of thousands more in the lower intensity war with Moscow and its separatist puppets since 2014.
Ukrainians are scarred by the collective Western failure to hold Putin to account in 2014, or to deliver on the security assurances given to Ukraine in the 1997 Budapest Memorandum, under which Kyiv surrendered its Soviet-era nuclear weapons. Few Ukrainians want to allow the Russian dictator to keep the spoils of another round of aggression.
Vladimir Putin in Moscow, Russia, on November 24, 2023. The Russian president appears to be waiting out Ukraine and its Western partners. Contributor/Getty Images
Growing Western discomfort is clear to Ukrainians. “Maybe it’s a sign for us, for Ukrainians that we have to discuss a few more options of how to stop this war, not only to reach our borders of 1991—now, it’s very difficult to achieve it,” Ivan Stupak—a former officer in the Security Service of Ukraine and now an adviser to the Ukrainian parliament’s national security, defense and intelligence committee—told Newsweek. “Maybe [there is] a middle point.”
But the lack of trust between the two sides remains a serious problem. “Russians never kept their promises,” Stupak said. “How do we force the Russian Federation to keep their word?”
Kupchan acknowledged that the “downside” of his proposed approach “is that you let, at least for now, Russia get away with a blatant act of aggression and territorial conquest. And that sends a terrible message to the world about the rule of law and the sanctity of sovereignty.”
Still, he added, not all is well for the Kremlin. “Russia has already been dealt a profound strategic defeat,” Kupchan said. “Putin has lost Ukraine. We know that. And now the question is whether he going to get a consolation prize by holding on to some percentage of Ukrainian territory.”
Both Haass and Kupchan were part of a group that reportedly took part in back-channel talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov earlier this year. “I think, at the moment, the Russian conversation is based on the assumption that things are going their way politically,” Haass said.
“They see the populist trends, they see the polls in the United States. I think Putin strategy boils down to, ‘Let’s see where things stand in a year,'” he added. “I assume he’s lighting candles for a Trump victory.”
Kupchan said Ukraine and the West should, like Putin, consider “the long game.”
“You get the fighting to end, you get Ukraine back on the path of prosperity, and then you wait Putin out, and you hope for a day when at the negotiating table Russia gives Ukraine back its territory.
“Is that outcome in sight? No. But how many people in 1985 believed that Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia would be independent democracies and members of NATO? Nobody.
“Everyone talks about Putin waiting out Ukraine and the West. I think we turn the tables. We out-wait him.”
Ukrainian soldiers operate a Flakpanzer Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft gun near Kyiv on November 23, 2023. The country is approaching the two-year mark of war following Russia’s full-scale invasion, with no end in sight. Kostya Liberov/ Libkos/Getty Images
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
BRUSSELS — Outgoing Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte is emerging as the front-runner to be the new NATO chief, but faces resistance in Washington from lawmakers who accuse the Netherlands of underspending on defense on his watch, and from others who think it’s time for a woman at the top.
In what’s shaping up to be at least a three-person race, Rutte is considered a strong favorite, according to two European officials and a diplomat granted anonymity to talk about internal deliberations.
“He’s certainly a heavyweight, he’s a very good candidate,” Poland’s Ambassador to NATO Tomasz Szatkowski said at an event hosted by POLITICO Pro Defense on Tuesday.
One of the officials said the longtime Dutch leader had won the support of “senior U.S. and German officials.”
France, another crucial decision-maker, is also favoring Rutte, driven primarily by his personal rapport with President Emmanuel Macron, who was one of Rutte’s earliest cheerleaders in his quest for the NATO top job.
“That Macron and Rutte appreciate each other is no secret,” said a French diplomat.
However, some American lawmakers adamantly oppose Rutte, as the Netherlands has consistently failed to meet NATO’s defense spending target of 2 percent of gross domestic product.
That pits him unfavorably against Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, who signaled interest in the NATO job while in Washington last week. Her government agreed to raise defence spending to 3 percent of GDP for 2024-2027, from 2.85 percent this year. Tallinn has also been an outsize supporter of Ukraine in terms of weaponry.
The underdog is Latvia’s Foreign Minister Krišjānis Kariņš, whose announcement on Sunday that he was running was even a surprise to some in Riga, according to a diplomat.
The candidacies of Kallas and Kariņš ruffle some Western European feathers — still smarting from the intense criticism they faced from Baltic nations that they are insufficiently supportive of Ukraine and too fearful to challenge Russia.
The White House was coy when asked whether U.S. President Joe Biden prefers Rutte.
“We’re not going to get into internal deliberations over the next secretary general,” said National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson. “We look forward to working closely with allies to identify a secretary general who can lead the alliance at this critical time for transatlantic security.”
Penny-pincher
For some, though, the record of burden sharing in a secretary-general candidate’s home country does matter politically, and Washington is scrutinizing that closely.
U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan, a Republican from Alaska and senior of member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Rutte “should be unequivocally disqualified” over his country’s record on NATO burden sharing. He said there is “deep bipartisan frustration in the U.S. about NATO members not pulling their weight.”
Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas signaled interest in the NATO job while in Washington last week | Leon Neal/Getty Images
The Netherlands has a poor track record. In 2014 it spent only 1.15 percent of its GDP on defense, while the alliance has a 2 percent spending goal. This year, The Hague will spend 1.7 percent of GDP and has agreed to spend 2.03 percent in 2024 and 2.01 percent in 2025.
Ahead of July’s NATO summit in Vilnius, Sullivan led a bipartisan group of 35 senators in writing a letter to Biden urging him to ensure NATO countries meet their defense spending commitments. That tally — which amounts to more than a third of the U.S. Senate — hints at the potent politics of burden sharing in Washington.
Congress’ ongoing negotiations over its annual defense legislation include a provision from Sullivan that would require the Pentagon to prioritize NATO members that hit the 2 percent target when making decisions about U.S. military basing, training, and exercises.
Some in Biden’s own Democratic Party also believe it’s time for a woman to run NATO.
“I’ve long thought it was time the allies appoint the first woman NATO secretary general,” Senate NATO Observer Group Co-Chair Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire, said in a statement.
“That said, it’s critical that support for NATO remains strong and bipartisan in the Senate and for that to happen, the successor for this important position should hail from a country that is meeting the 2 percent defense spending commitment, or has a robust plan in place to meet that goal, which was agreed to by all allies in Vilnius,” she added.
With NATO helping coordinate members’ efforts to help Ukraine fight Russia, there are also calls for someone from the eastern flank of the alliance to become the next leader.
“Maybe at some point it is also [the] right time for the alliance to look at the region of Eastern Europe,” Ukraine’s Ambassador to NATO Natalia Galibarenko told POLITICO. “So my preference … would be at some point to see [a] secretary-general representing Eastern Europe.”
Such as Kallas?
“Why not?” said the Ukrainian envoy.
With additional reporting from Clea Caulcutt. and Joshua Posaner. Joe Gould and Alexander Ward reported from Washington.
As the world’s eyes turn from Ukraine to Israel and Gaza, NATO countries on the alliance’s eastern edge are staring down Russia and strengthening their presence on the bloc’s “most exposed” flank.
Lithuania, Poland, and other NATO nations close to Russia and Belarus are bolstering defense and their “deterrence posture on the Eastern flank,” including protection for the contentious Suwałki Gap, Vilnius’ defense minister, Arvydas Anušauskas, told Newsweek.
A small strip of land close to the Polish-Lithuanian border that links Belarus to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, the Suwałki Gap is a constant, rumbling concern in eastern Europe. With Poland and Lithuania staunch allies of Ukraine—and Belarus firmly standing with Russia—the Suwałki Gap has been intermittently described as NATO’s weak point and the alliance’s most fortified boundary.
“Together with our allies, we are creating [the] right set of capabilities and plans to defend every inch of NATO’s territory,” Anušauskas said. Lithuania is investing in its armed forces and its supplies and NATO’s presence close to the Gap, he added, although the strategically important strip of land will “remain a fundamental challenge.”
Polish (R) and Romanian (L) soldiers near Szypliszki village, located in the so-called Suwałki Gap on July 7, 2022. Lithuania, Poland, and other NATO nations close to Russia and Belarus are bolstering defense and “deterrence posture on the Eastern flank,” including protection for the contentious Suwałki Gap, Vilnius’ defense minister, Arvydas Anušauskas, told Newsweek. WOJTEK RADWANSKI/AFP via Getty Images
“In geographical terms, the Baltic States remain as the most exposed [of] NATO’s territory, which requires specific measures to ensure credible deterrence and defense,” Anušauskas explained.
Russia used Belarus as a springboard to launch its invasion of Ukraine 20 months ago, and reignited fears over the Suwałki Gap earlier this year when exiled Wagner mercenaries moved en masse to Belarusian bases close to it.
In the midst of the heightened tensions around Belarus, Poland and Lithuania, a Russian lawmaker told Moscow-controlled state television that Wagner forces could be in Belarus to seize the Suwałki Gap. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko also commented in mid-July that Wagner mercenaries arriving and training in Belarus after leaving Russia were itching to move “westward” towards the country’s border with Poland.
The main concern for the Baltic nations is that Russia could mount some form of military incursion into NATO via the Gap from Belarus, burrowing into Europe via the strip of land on the way to Kaliningrad.
“It facilitates the possible land routes for NATO troops in between Central Europe and the Baltic States,” Anušauskas said. With Belarus “basically integrated into Russia’s military planning,” as Anušauskas put it, it is not hard to see how Moscow could move a large number of its troops through it into NATO heartlands, while having the ability to resupply them via the port at Kaliningrad.
Any incursion of this type on a NATO country would likely spark a collective, emphatic response under the alliance’s Article 5, which regards an attack on a member as an attack on all other member states.
But despite the worries of the NATO governments close to the Gap, the Kremlin is not inclined to do so, not least because of NATO’s attention on the territory, Western experts say.
It is “baffling” to consider the Gap a significant possible flashpoint now, and it is very hard to see how Russia could, or would want to, mount such an attack on NATO, Keir Giles, a senior consulting fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at the Chatham House think tank, told Newsweek.
For the moment, Russia has neither the intent nor the capability to mount such an assault on NATO, agreed Emily Ferris, a research fellow specializing in Russia at the London-based Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) think tank. It is “quite unrealistic” to imagine Russia could launch a ground operation in the Gap as it fights its war in Ukraine, she told Newsweek.
“Russian troops are so embroiled in eastern Ukraine at the moment, but very hard to see where there would be even breathing room for them to consider a land assault on another country,” she said. It would “be a declaration of war in Europe” that Moscow shows all the signs of wanting to avoid, she continued. And while Kaliningrad, and the Baltic Russian bases there, may be “inherently vulnerable,” this is balanced out by Russia’s significant military presence and missile systems based there, she added.
“The idea of attacking a NATO state, I think, is a red line—even for Moscow,” Ferris said.
The Wagner troops that loomed on the alliance’s eastern flank have retreated as a threat in recent weeks; reports have suggested their Belarusian bases have been dismantled, and many fighters have returned to Ukraine.
But the geography hasn’t changed, and the NATO countries do not forget the “range of provocations from Kaliningrad Oblast and Belarusian sides” described by Anušauskas. The Wagner formations may have faded, but Lithuania remembers “orchestrated migration waves” and “increased tactical nuclear threatening” over the last two years, he said.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
A US F-16 fighter jet shot down an armed Turkish drone in northeast Syria that was operating near US military personnel and Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces, officials familiar with the incident told CNN.
The US assessed the armed drone posed a potential threat and issued more than a dozen warnings before shooting it down, the officials said. It is unclear how the warnings were issued. US forces exercised their right to self-defense in shooting down the drone, officials said.
There were no reports of US casualties, an official said.
Several drones made repeated approaches toward US troop positions in Hasakah, Syria, the officials said. Turkish airstrikes targeted several Kurdish-controlled areas in northeastern Syria on Thursday, killing at least eight people, including six security forces, and wounded three civilians, according to a statement by Kurdish Internal Security Force, Asayish.
The incidents put the US in a precarious position. Turkey is a NATO ally and a critical partner for the US in the region, as well as playing a key role in the Ukraine conflict. At the same time, the SDF partners with the US in the campaign to defeat ISIS.
The Turkish Defense Ministry said the drone didn’t belong to the Turkish armed forces, Reuters reported. CNN is reaching out to the Turkish government.
US officials do not believe the drone was targeting American personnel specifically, but US forces operate closely alongside the Kurds in northern Syria as part of the anti-ISIS coalition there. Turkey considers the Kurdish forces to be a terrorist organization and regularly targets them inside Iraq and Syria.
Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said on Wednesday that Turkey considers all Kurdish militia facilities and infrastructure in Syria and Iraq as “legitimate targets” after the Kurdistan Workers Party carried out a suicide attack in Ankara on Sunday.
Fidan added that “third parties” should stay away from the Kurds.
“I advise third parties to stay away from PKK and YPG facilities and individuals,” he said. “Our armed forces’ response to this terrorist attack will be extremely clear and they will once again regret committing such an action.”
Last November, a Turkish drone strike in northeast Syria endangered US troops and personnel, according to the US military. That prompted a call between the top US general and his Turkish counterpart.
The strike targeted a base near Hasakah, Syria, used by US and coalition forces in the ongoing campaign to defeat ISIS. The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said two of their fighters were killed in the attack. The strike earned a stern rebuke from the Pentagon, which said it “directly threatened the safety of US personnel.”
