Putin’s big plan strikes back when NATO formally invites Sweden and Finland to join the alliance
The first full day of NATO’s historic conference in Madrid has confirmed an uncomfortable truth for Vladimir Putin – that he has become the most effective recruiter the military alliance can ever have.
For someone who for decades has been nagging against NATO’s expansion to the east and using it as one of his motivations for invading Ukraine, that’s pretty good.
But think of what has already happened at the summit in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Sweden and Finland, once staunch non-aligned states that could not imagine compromising their neutrality, have been invited by NATO to become the 31st and 32nd members of the alliance.
President Joe Biden announced that the United States would establish a new permanent army headquarters in Poland, strengthening NATO’s eastern flank in a country that until 1991 was in a defense alliance with the Soviet Union.
After that, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson called on his NATO members to increase defense spending above 2 percent of GDP.
“You have seen the massive commitment from the Germans and increased spending around the table.”
When President Biden announced what he described as his country’s “forced position” in Eastern Europe, President Biden said that the United States would ensure that NATO was ready to face threats from all sides.
“At the moment, once Putin has broken the peace in Europe and attacked the very principles of rule-based order, the United States and our allies, we will take the step,” he said.
“We are proving that NATO is needed more now than it has ever been and is as important as it has ever been.”
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg mocked President Putin, saying his actions had been counterproductive.
“He gets the opposite of what he wants,” he said.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese spoke to reporters at the summit, saying that President Putin had made a strategic mistake when he attacked Ukraine.
“What his actions have done is to unite the democratic world and give real determination to ensure that the resilience shown by the Ukrainian people is backed by the resilience and support of democratic countries, including NATO, but also countries around the world.” he said.
Ukrainian MP Oleksiy Goncharenko told ABC that it was a critical moment for the free world to unite and that his countrymen and women were watching the summit with hope.
“I am absolutely delighted to see this unification of the free world because it is the only way to survive,” he said.
“Otherwise, we will have a planet that will be geopolitical like a wild jungle, with a bear, a tiger and other predators, which will only destroy peaceful nations.”
NATO was revived by invasion
There is no doubt that NATO has been revived and made more relevant following President Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
The amount of media interest in this summit also tells part of that story.
More than 3,000 media workers have been accredited for this meeting. There are journalists in Madrid from 55 countries.
The media room is the kind of size and scale you would normally see in a primary election in the United States, not a security alliance summit.
Over the past five years, NATO has sometimes fought for respect and relevance.
In 2018, then-US President Donald Trump threatened to withdraw the US from the alliance and accused other countries of “not paying their bills”.
One year later, French President Macron described NATO as “brain dead” when he warned European allies that they could no longer rely on US support for defending member states.
And earlier this year, former President Trump claimed he had told other NATO leaders that he might not defend its members against an attack by Russia if they did not meet defense spending commitments.
But at this summit, members believe that the alliance is more important than ever, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the conference via video link that members must act against Russia now, otherwise the same thing could happen to other countries.
“This is not a war waged by Russia only against Ukraine,” he said.
“That is why it is absolutely necessary to support Ukraine, even now, with weapons, finances and political sanctions against Russia, which will stop its ability to pay for the war.”