Rat u Ukrajini

Biden’s Reluctance to Let Ukraine Join NATO Tests Alliance’s Unity
The president says Ukraine isn’t ready to join NATO, warns of being drawn into war

By Andrew Restuccia and Vivian Salama
July 11, 2023 12:59 am ET

VILNIUS, Lithuania—President Biden has spent much of the past year rallying the world behind Ukraine, funneling billions of dollars in aid to the war-torn country and strengthening ties with leader Volodymyr Zelensky.

But for Biden, Kyiv’s campaign for rapid entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a bridge too far.
The American president has emerged as the leading opponent to granting Ukraine speedy membership to the alliance, putting him at odds with several key U.S. allies. The unresolved question about Ukraine’s place in NATO will put to the test the Western world’s unprecedented unity in the face of Russia’s assault.

Biden arrived late Monday in the Lithuanian capital, about 140 miles from the Russian border, for the second gathering of NATO leaders since Russia launched its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. His goal: Reinforcing the U.S. commitment to support Kyiv’s fight for as long as it takes, amid political headwinds at home and a growing strain on the American defense industry.

But Biden’s outspoken concerns with Ukraine’s push to join NATO—he has raised the prospect that doing it too early could start World War III—have frustrated officials in Kyiv and elsewhere.

“I don’t think it’s ready for membership in NATO,” Biden said in an interview with CNN that aired on Sunday, warning that bringing Ukraine into the alliance while it is at war with Russia would draw the U.S. and Europe into the conflict. He said NATO should lay out a path for Ukraine’s eventual entry into the alliance, but he said Kyiv still has work to do to meet the alliance’s standards for membership in areas like democratization.

In drawing a line on the issue, Biden is breaking with several NATO members, including central European nations that have publicly backed Kyiv’s push for expedited membership. The president has embraced the so-called Israel model, in which the U.S. would provide security assistance to Ukraine without a guarantee that it will use military force to defend the country.

Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, has called on NATO members to articulate a clear path for Ukraine to enter the alliance during the meeting. He argues that membership would deter Russia from attacking again.

“The Biden administration is notably isolated in the alliance in its resistance to giving Ukraine membership,” said Ian Brzezinski, who served as a key adviser on NATO policy during the George W. Bush administration. Brzezinski argued that most NATO countries, aside from Hungary, are predisposed to supporting Ukraine’s entry into the alliance. Those who haven’t publicly backed the effort, he said, are taking their cues from the U.S., the alliance’s most influential member.

A growing chorus of senior U.S. foreign policy officials is calling on Biden to temper his reluctance.

“The likelihood of a future Ukraine dragging us into a war is much greater if they’re untethered to any Western alliance,” said Tom Malinowski, a former Democratic congressman from New Jersey who previously worked at the State Department during the Obama administration. “I don’t think it’s in our interest to see a Ukraine that is armed to the teeth, highly nationalistic, completely untethered to any western alliance and thus free to do whatever it wants.”

Malinowski was one of nearly four dozen foreign policy experts and former U.S. officials who signed a recent open letter calling on NATO members to use the summit to “launch a road map that will lead clearly to Ukraine’s membership in NATO at the earliest achievable date.”

Some of the signatories on the letter have argued that Ukraine’s membership in NATO can be structured in a way that applies the alliance’s Article 5 mutual defense obligation only to territory Ukraine controls at the time of ascension, which would prevent members from being drawn into a fight over winning back Crimea and other areas that Russia annexed.

The Biden administration has been working with allies to provide Ukraine with security assurances, according to U.S. and European officials, a promise that is both welcomed by Kyiv and falls short of its desire for guarantees that pave the way toward NATO membership.

NATO countries are also searching for a compromise that signals their intent to welcome Ukraine into the alliance without offering a firm timeline.

Members of the alliance are set to waive a requirement that Kyiv complete a bureaucratic membership plan that could have delayed the country’s accession to the group for years, according to U.S. and European officials.

But the move, which will be included in the NATO communiqué to be released at the close of the alliance’s summit in Lithuania, doesn’t mean Ukraine will join the group immediately. The country will still need to meet NATO’s standards for membership, including on democratic reforms, officials said.

Zelensky is planning to attend the summit, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday. Biden plans to meet him on the sidelines of the summit, people familiar with the matter said. The Ukrainian president previously said he would only attend the meeting if he received a signal from NATO members on his country’s accession into the alliance.

Despite the Biden administration’s efforts to emphasize unity, other signs of disagreement in the alliance have emerged. Turkey only dropped its opposition to Sweden’s membership in NATO on Monday, more than a year after the long-neutral Nordic country applied. And several NATO members have raised objections to the Inflation Reduction Act, the sweeping U.S. law that includes billions in incentives for the American clean energy sector.

After the NATO summit, Biden is slated to travel to Finland, where he is expected to mark the country’s recent entry into the alliance.