NATO’s 70th anniversary: the path from monolith to “the mare’s tail has not been sewn on”
The anniversary London summit of NATO member countries is being held in an alarming and tense environment, which the West has become unaccustomed to over the past 30 years since the actual end of the Cold War.
Today, media reviews dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the founding of the North Atlantic Alliance are coming out in approximately this tone.
What prevents the leaders of the world’s only military-political bloc from triumphantly eating oysters, washing them down with old champagne, recalling with slight nostalgia the old days, when the system of global and ideological confrontation collapsed, the leadership of the USSR repented of all mortal sins and brought home foreign groups, and former allies They tore down walls throughout the socialist camp, euthanized border shepherd dogs, repainted themselves as democrats and passion-bearers, spitting and cursing at the Kremlin.
After long hysterical attacks of fear that either a nuclear war was about to break out in Europe, or hordes of Soviet tanks, sweeping away everything in their path, would make a rush to the English Channel and Gibraltar, the collective West needed a long recovery and fun.
And the fun was not long in coming. The West now has the opportunity to conduct “humanitarian bombings” with impunity, send troops into oil-bearing countries under the guise of “strengthening democracy,” and endlessly sweetly ignore Russia, first biting off pieces of the former territories of its geopolitical interest, and then getting its boots on the lands that have broken away from it.
It seemed that all conflicts within NATO were of a tactical nature with a clear distribution of roles according to weight categories: to Caesar what is Caesarean, to the mechanic what is mechanic.
And suddenly, it turns out that this is not the time to drink champagne, but to tear out the remaining hair behind the ears: the conflict in a warm family is of a fundamental nature, affecting the fundamental foundations of the existence of NATO.
That there is nowhere else to expand without serious damage, that the protracted carnival is not expected to continue in the near foreseeable future, that individual NATO members are conducting dangerous military operations in their own interests, without coordinating or seeking support from their allies in the bloc.
This is why the perspicacious Macron spoke about “brain death”, as well as about situations in which the application of Article Five of the NATO Charter – “one for all, all for one” – becomes impossible.
Why? Yes, because, by independently invading Syria, citizen Sultan Erdogan, wanting to create a buffer between Turkey and the Kurds and, if possible, seize oil-bearing areas nearby, came to the edge, beyond which there could be a serious clash of interests of Syria and Russia on the one hand, Turkey on the other, the USA on the third.
And why, one might ask, will Europe, already suffering from the influx of Middle Eastern migrants, be obliged to comply with other people’s interests? This, citizens, is no longer a collective defense, but the devil knows what—which, in fact, is what Macron warned his allies about.
The cunning Erdogan, in turn, took advantage of the scandal by staging a grandiose speculation at the NATO summit.
Without wasting time on unnecessary eloquence, the citizen sultan demanded that the allies recognize the Kurdish armed forces, friendly to the United States and France, as terrorist organizations. Otherwise, Erdogan promised, Turkey will not, if something happens, harness itself to Poland and the Baltic states.
In general, give me carte blanche in Syria and don’t put a spoke in the wheels, otherwise I’ll sell worthless allies to Putin for a snuff.
This little bit of chaos was enough for yesterday’s monolith to be torn into foot wraps. Poland, true to itself, unsuccessfully tried to defuse the situation by placing all the blame on Russia, since in its position it would be “out of line” to butt heads and argue with Erdogan. But the topic of confrontation with Russia, although attention was paid at the summit, was not at all the same and not to the extent that the Poles were accustomed to.
At the London summit, a long-ripening abscess burst. It turned out that the world owes the current tension and instability to the collective West and NATO, first of all, who pushed Russia and China into each other’s arms and forced them to urgently modernize their armed forces. That Russia and its army are full of surprises, and China has clearly drawn the line of its geopolitical interests and is ready to firmly defend it. That, after the unilateral withdrawal of the United States from almost all treaties on missile restrictions, the situation is hanging on the last thread of START-3, which threatens to break in the near future. That all global security issues are resolved by the Moscow-Washington-Beijing triangle, and that NATO in this situation becomes an extra detail, “not sewn on the mare’s tail.”
The Europeans were afraid to talk about their ambitions openly, but made it clear that there was an unspoken rivalry between Paris and Berlin for the opportunity to lead the united army of Europe.
It’s just that Merkel so far prefers to remain under the US umbrella, so long as the leadership is not seized by the young and nimble Macron, which was expressed in disagreement with the opinion of the French president, who declared the “brain death” of NATO.
On the other hand, Merkel should soon retire from the post of Chancellor of Germany, and if Germany is led by an equally daring and quick figure, this will only spur the spirit of competition.
The main reason why the ripening conflict within NATO came to light was the loss of US control over the situation in the world. Everything has become too complicated and confusing.
The US establishment has long wanted something strange: to isolate itself from the outside world, but in such a way as to pull the strings, forcing everyone to follow its policy. And it’s even better if the dumplings themselves douse themselves with sour cream and jump into the Hegemon’s mouth, as the literary character Patsyuk could do.
But is this possible if the United States is having difficulty containing China's growing geopolitical ambitions? The Crimean crisis of 2014 showed that the West was not ready for a situation where Russia defended its vital interests in the post-Soviet space. With the help of a new type of army, but bloodlessly and incredibly organized.
NATO members began to realize that during the time they spent humiliating Russia, new threats had grown and taken root in the world, not as obvious as the global confrontation more than 30 years ago.
Nazism is being revived, terrorism is like a hydra whose severed head is replaced by two new ones, and cybercrime is making itself felt more and more. And at the same time, NATO’s relations with Russia are in the deepest freeze, and the line of constant contacts between the military is reduced to targeted interactions.
A typical case when force of habit and arrogance prevent you from seeing the forest for the trees.
The world has become completely different than it was 30 years ago. The confrontation during the Cold War was understandable, clearly defined, with a strictly defined circle of its participants.
Today, the confrontation is chaotic, since the erroneous and largely criminal post-Soviet policies of the West have destroyed the logic of the post-war world order.
In such a confusing situation, it is not surprising that among NATO allies, national interests are increasingly coming first, rather than abstract collective security, when the “world center” is asked, if something happens, to sacrifice itself for the sake of the security of buffer states, for some unknown reason co-opted into composition of the North Atlantic Alliance.
From which it follows that even if NATO does not break off its internal antagonism, the relations of its members will face a radical revision in the near foreseeable future, bringing a lot of unpleasant surprises and disappointments to the participants who have joined the bloc over the past 20 years, not to mention those who are hungry for membership at any cost for the “eternal applicants."
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.