BigBeerBellyMan t1_ja8ok2z wrote on February 27, 2023 at 5:47 PM

Reply to comment by nybbleth in France, Germany, and the UK offer a plan for Ukraine that doesn’t include NATO membership by Core2score

>This often gets thrown around but this is a misconception based on policy rather than strict rules. There's no rule that says countries with existing territorial conflicts can not join.
>
>The actual condition is that the country must demonstrate the intent to resolve any such conflicts in accordance with international law. Ukraine has met this condition.

Chapter 1.6 of the 1995 Study of NATO Enlargement states:

>States which have ethnic disputes or external territorial disputes, including irredentist claims, or internal jurisdictional disputes must settle those disputes by peaceful means in accordance with OSCE principles. Resolution of such disputes would be a factor in determining whether to invite a state to join the Alliance.

nybbleth t1_ja8rgqq wrote on February 27, 2023 at 6:06 PM

Yes. First; you're quoting a study regarding enlargement guidelines. These aren't hard rules. They don't show up in the Treaty text.

Secondly, it states it's a factor in deciding whether to invite a state to join. In other words, this is not a hard binary yes/no. It's not saying that countries must have settled their disputes to be members (or many existing NATO countries should not be in NATO); rather that they must show a commitment to settling them in that manner.

Furtherrmore, given that these guidelines are not part of the treaty text, NATO can simply change or override these rules if desired. So again, the decision on whether or not Ukraine can join NATO or not, is a political decision, and not an automatic one based on this rule you're imagining is a hardcoded one when it isn't.

BigBeerBellyMan t1_ja8xng4 wrote on February 27, 2023 at 6:44 PM

>Yes. First; you're quoting a study regarding enlargement guidelines. These aren't hard rules. They don't show up in the Treaty text.

Yea but weren't the proposals in the 1995 Study of NATO Enlargement eventually adopted as official policy during the 1999 Washington Summit?

nybbleth t1_ja98054 wrote on February 27, 2023 at 7:50 PM

Yes. That's when NATO adopted the Membership Action Plan(MAP).

Note that the preamble ends with the following line: "The programme cannot be considered as a list of criteria for membership."

These are guidelines, not hard criteria.

And again, it's about showing the commitment to resolving these types of conflicts according to international law. Ukraine has shown this to be the case. The fact that a hostile power has illegally invaded them doesn't change that.

The idea that NATO can not accept prospective members if they have a territorial dispute is a propaganda tool that primarily serves Russian interests.

The first benefits by sowing the seeds of doubt in both its own and western audiences. It lets Russia paint NATO as a warmongering alliance that's either trying to provoke Russia or inadvertently about to get dragged into WW3 by considering an application from countries like Ukraine. At the same time, NATO governments concerned about exactly that sort of thing can also use this misconception about the rules by shrugging and saying 'well everyone knows we can't accept someone with ongoing disputes'; even though this is a lie (or misrepresentation at best).