Yesterday, former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte officially took over as NATO Secretary General from his predecessor, Jens Stoltenberg, during a meeting of the North Atlantic Council at its headquarters in Brussels. According to the new Secretary General, the Ukrainian issue will be a priority for him as the new head of the Alliance. Other priorities, he said, will be deterrence and defence of the Alliance. Valeriy Klochok, head of the Centre for Public Analysis “Vezha ” , shared his forecast for the future NATO policy under Rutte’s leadership in an exclusive commentary for Komersant ukrainskyi
In his opinion, we should not expect any dramatic changes in the Alliance.
“Nothing in NATO’s policy will change. This is not pessimism, this is reality. Rutte’s statements are attractive. It is very important for Europe to maintain its security, and Rutte said it directly, because investment in Ukraine is Europe’s security,” said Valeriy Klochok.
In his opinion, NATO will continue to help Ukraine.
“NATO will help, especially as it is creating a new command in Germany to replace Ramstein. on 12 October, we will have a final or pre-final meeting at the level of heads of state. And the management of all processes of military assistance to Ukraine will be transferred to the new headquarters, which will include NATO countries and other countries that are part of Ramstein, but it will be NATO that will manage this process, because now Washington is in charge. But the policy in this regard will not change in any way,” the expert said.
He reminded that Rutte is only talking about supporting Ukraine on its way to joining NATO.
“No one knows how long this path will take. But he says he will support it. Perhaps, he will promote the idea of Ukraine’s membership in certain territories that we control as a security factor against Russia’s attack and seizure of more territories. This option has been considered in the West for a long time, but it is not supported in Ukraine. As far back as last year, I recall, Stoltenberg’s predecessor, Mr Rasmussen, who worked in the same team as Andriy Yermak, prepared the Kyiv compact, a document that formed the basis of Zelenskyy’s Peace Formula. He, in particular, expressed the idea that Ukraine should really join NATO before the end of the war, but on the territories that we control. Rutte will continue this policy. But will we accept this proposal? This is an open question. There are definitely threats in such a scenario,” said Valeriy Klochok.
Another of Rutte’s tasks in his new position will be to ensure the stability of Euro-Atlantic cooperation and maintain ties with the United States.
“Since he is a really good communicator and knows how to negotiate, he will probably be able to unite Hungary with, for example, Germany or, conditionally, Poland. So far, we are not in this format. He will also be able to find a common language with Trump if he wins the election. He did this successfully in 2018 during the summit held in Brussels, at NATO and at the Munich Security Conference last year. But I don’t think he will personally change NATO’s policy towards Ukraine in any way, shape or form,” the expert added.
Valeriy Klochok believes that only the US President can really change the current world paradigm in this regard.
“The key person who can do this will be the US president, regardless of his or her name, but we don’t know what kind of president Kamala Harris will be, for example. Also, Joseph Biden, if he decides to launch our movement towards NATO before the end of his term, does not mean that this plan will be implemented. Will Harris, if he wins, continue his policy? It is a questionable question. So is Trump. So there are a lot of problems,” said Valeriy Klochok.
In his opinion, Ukraine should still promote the idea of creating its own military and political bloc on the basis of the EU with the countries of Eastern Europe. This is what Europe is already doing.
Author: Alyona Kaplina