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Head of NATO says Russia invaded Ukraine because of NATO expansionism (www.nato.int)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/worldnews@lemmy.ml
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From the guy's own mouth.

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[–] 37 points 2 years ago (4 children)

There is nothing in this that reflects the title. It's nothing more than passive propaganda. They are relying on people to just read the title and not open the link.

What is actually said is:

And let me just end by saying that this reflects the political reality that nations are sovereign. Nations decide themselves, and Ukraine has of course the right to decide its own path. And it's up to Ukraine and NATO Allies to decide when Ukraine becomes a member. Russia cannot veto membership for any sovereign independent state in Europe.

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  • [–] 48 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    The background was that President Putin declared in the autumn of 2021, and actually sent a draft treaty that they wanted NATO to sign, to promise no more NATO enlargement. That was what he sent us. And was a pre-condition for not invade Ukraine. Of course we didn't sign that.

    At least he had some good jokes to warm up the crowd!

    I think I've told you before that I know it's hard to allocate money for defence, because most politicians want to spend money on health, on education, on infrastructure instead of defence.

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  • [–] 47 points 2 years ago (8 children)

    And let me just end by saying that this reflects the political reality that nations are sovereign.

    I mean that's just factually untrue. Every nations sovereignty is restricted by geopolitical realities. No nation can just do whatever they desire, including joining certain alliances. Mexico will not be joining BRICS for instance, because of the geopolitical situation. And that's not even a military alliance, which NATO is! Europeans are not special, they have to play by the same rules as everybody else. To claim otherwise is to ignore the reality on the ground right now, both in Ukraine and globally.

    Also none of this factors in that joining NATO, by definition, involves giving up some part of your nations sovereignty. NATO in reality acts as an extended arm of the US military and it's industrial complex, and in joining, countries are subjected to this reality of Atlanticism.

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  • [–] [S] 31 points 2 years ago (65 children)

    Actually he also said (in the link):

    “The background was that President Putin declared in the autumn of 2021, and actually sent a draft treaty that they wanted NATO to sign, to promise no more NATO enlargement. That was what he sent us. And was a pre-condition for not invade Ukraine. Of course we didn’t sign that.”

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  • [–] 14 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    "If you don't promise to stop making new friends, I'm going to kill another one."

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  • [–] 50 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    NATO is not a friend or friendly force, it is one of the great evils of our time, anyone arguing otherwise just wants to bomb third world countries.

    Ask the citizens of Libya and Iraq how defensive and friendly NATO is.

    The process of "joining NATO" is not anything equivalent to making friends, any country joining NATO essentially becomes a vassal for US interests. There's a reason why Sweden and Finland held out for so long.

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  • [–] 21 points 2 years ago

    Then lastly on Sweden. First of all, it is historic that now Finland is member of the Alliance. And we have to remember the background. The background was that President Putin declared in the autumn of 2021, and actually sent a draft treaty that they wanted NATO to sign, to promise no more NATO enlargement. That was what he sent us. And was a pre-condition for not invade Ukraine. Of course we didn't sign that.

    The opposite happened. He wanted us to sign that promise, never to enlarge NATO. He wanted us to remove our military infrastructure in all Allies that have joined NATO since 1997, meaning half of NATO, all the Central and Eastern Europe, we should remove NATO from that part of our Alliance, introducing some kind of B, or second class membership. We rejected that.

    So he went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders.

    Learn to read.

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