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Originally published at CDM.press.
American taxpayers will have to foot the bill for Ukraine’s potential entry to the biggest military alliance in history. President Volodymyr Zelensky told journalists on Friday that the Americans, for the first time, raised the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO in exchange for leaving Donbas, the Interfax-Ukraine news agency reported. Zelensky relayed the question just as it was reportedly put to him: “What if Ukraine joins NATO? Would Ukraine withdraw from Donbas?” He said this was the first time the question had been raised, according to Interfax-Ukraine.
But whatever that formula is, it is not peace. Ukraine’s membership in NATO would not be the end of the war; rather, it would formally chain the United States to a conflict with the largest nuclear power in the world. The American guarantee to defend a country in the midst of a brutal war would not bring an end to hostilities. Instead, it would Americanize the war, without the American people having ever been consulted in a democratic election.
A second serious defect in this formulation, which is not to be fixed by favorable White House marketing, is that the Ukrainians have already rejected this key concession that it is supposed to purchase. Asked about the occupied territories, President Zelensky said Ukraine would not give up its territory, that no concrete proposal had been made, and that any formal offer would go to public discussion, according to Interfax-Ukraine. He reiterated that he would not recognize Russian sovereignty over the occupied territories of Ukraine.
The same Interfax-Ukraine account of Friday’s briefing added that the US is also talking about bilateral security guarantees similar to Articles 4 and 5 of the NATO treaty, while Zelensky said he was told there would be no American troops in Ukraine. In a Tuesday interview with the Danish outlet DR, Zelensky said that the Americans had asked about trading Donbas for so-called “security guarantees” that were “not NATO, but something like NATO.” Something like NATO is still something that the US would have to fight. Article 5 of the NATO treaty is the only sentence in it that matters to the average American voter. It is a commitment to use American power and treasure to protect other members of the alliance, and, if necessary, to send young Americans to their deaths in defense of members.
It would be a catastrophe for the United States to go to war over Ukraine. The United States would be obligating itself to possibly fight a nuclear war with Russia over a piece of territory that poses no strategic interest to the United States. What American campaign ever promised to take the American people to the Donbas?
The America First answer to these questions is clear. Ukraine should not be granted membership in NATO. The United States should not enter into any Article 5-style guarantee in exchange for a withdrawal from Donbas. All the different versions of “something like NATO” guarantee only one thing: an eventual commitment of American lives, funds and physical might to a conflict in which the American people have no vital interests at stake. As Zelensky himself said Friday, Ukraine will not give up any of its territory. So the plan that relies on NATO membership that Kyiv itself has priced out of the deal is, in fact, just a bill. The United States should decline to pay it.
