Will America defend NATO?

Following the end of the Second World War, relations between Josef Stalin and the rest of the world declined rapidly. Russia is by far the largest country in Europe today, and the Soviet Union was bigger still. Western Europe feared an invasion from Russia, and President Harry Truman understood that if we didn’t defend Western Europe that the United States would quickly find itself alone in a hostile world. Not just that, but the United Kingdom was still in control of the Indian subcontinent, and the idea of giving the Soviet Union potential control of India was unthinkable. It would make America alone in an incredibly hostile world if the Soviet Union were to take over Western Europe through invasion, as per Leninist ideology.

There was  already evidence that the Soviet Union would use its military might to invade sovereign nations in Europe and replace their governments with Soviet “Republics”. These were the following:

1. Red Army invasion of Azerbaijan
2. Red Army invasion of Armenia
3. Red Army invasion of Georgia
4. Soviet Intervention in Mongolia
5. East Karelian Uprising
6. Red Army intervention in Afghanistan (1929)
7. Red Army intervention in Afghanistan (1930)
8. Invasion of Poland as part of World War II (1939)
9. Winter War with Finland (1939)
10. Occupation of the Baltic (1940)
11. Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina (1940, the creation of Moldova)

With 11 cases of invasion by the Soviet Union into their neighbors over the preceding 30 years, there was reason to believe that the Soviet Union would continue to expand their borders east, and if countries wouldn’t ally themselves with Russia that they would then be invaded. We can use Poland as an example where the Soviet Union setup a fraudulent election in 1947 which placed the “Democratic Bloc” in power which would remain the sole legal party for the next 43 years. Other members of the Warsaw Pact have similar stories.

Truman saw the Soviet Union occupying Eastern European countries, setting up fraudulent elections, and then taking full control of the country and by 1949 it became obvious that something had to be done. As a result, the United States setup NATO saying that an attack one on is an attack on all. It stopped the Soviet Union from attacking any more countries not already controlled by them in Europe up to the War in Abkhazia in 1991 and the assassination of President Gamaskhurdia of Georgia.

Georgia of course was not a NATO member at that point in time, and they wouldn’t join the Individual Partnership Action Plan until 2004, and Intensified Dialogue didn’t start until 2006. Ukraine is a similar story, they joined Intensified Dialogue in 2005. Because of this, the United States had no legal treaty guaranteeing the independence of Georgia and Ukraine.

Fast forward to 2008. The United States has now welcomed Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, and Ukraine to be members of Intensified dialogue. Czechia, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia are all members of NATO. Russia sees this expansion of a military alliance as an encroachment into their former colonies. The fact that these decisions were made by democratically elected governments and their joining the EU was done via a popular vote doesn’t matter to the Russian government. Russia sees itself as isolated (even though we haven’t gone to war with Russia and they still supply a large percentage of European gas and oil) and decide to test the American government to see if the Bush administration will defend Georgia.

We didn’t militarily defend Georgia. At this point is when we learned that intensified dialogue clearly does NOT come with a guarantee of military defense from the rest of NATO, and the United States will not defend any given country we have good relations with. Russia de facto annexes Abkhazia and South Ossetia as puppet states, and they prepare for their next attack.

Russia then decided to attack Ukraine in 2014, and as a result they annexed Crimea and the Donbass region became controlled by two unrecognized puppet states.

Now Russia is mounting its troops on the border of Ukraine again.

It is clear that Intensified Dialogue NATO means nothing in terms of real defense during an attack by another country. Unless if President Biden chooses to do something about it.

Biden also made comments downplaying Russia’s massing of troops on the border of Ukraine stating “There are no minor incursions” yesterday.

And today the Chancellor of Germany denied Biden’s request to talk with him directly.

Yikes.

I think what has happened is that Russia has seen that America gave up the War in Afghanistan, which is now an extremist theocracy with public beheadings, completely abandoning our allies. Russia is wondering if this unwillingness to defend our allies extends to Europe. The troops on the border is the biggest test Biden has had in his life.

Let’s hope the President makes the right decision which leads to less conflict, which will mean he cannot give Russia a free pass on invading Ukraine in a war that would certainly last years.

The last time Russia controlled Ukraine, it was really bad, and I think Ukrainians will fight to the death to defend their land. Because, at least from what I surmise, they probably see the choices as independence, death in war, or death by famine. At least that’s what history tells us.

References

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/01/20/ukrainian-president-rebukes-biden-over-russia-minor-incursion-remark/6590573001/

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/german-chancellor-turned-down-biden-invite-discuss-ukraine-crisis-der-spiegel-2022-01-21/

https://www.economist.com/europe/what-are-russias-military-options-in-ukraine/21807240