Poland is in favor of “opening up a NATO perspective for Ukraine,” Polish PM Donald Tusk said during last week’s summit of EU leaders. “This has not changed. In this respect, we stand in solidarity with Ukraine.”
But those smaller countries are having to make way for the united front of Berlin and Washington.
Scholz told reporters during U.S. President Joe Biden’s visit to Berlin last week: “We are making sure that NATO does not become a party to the war, so that this war does not turn into a much greater catastrophe.”
However, the officials who spoke to POLITICO sought to underline that neither the U.S. nor Germany are ruling out Ukraine’s eventual accession to the alliance.
The Biden administration’s position has long been that admission to NATO would occur after the war ends — but no timeline has been outlined to avoid enraging Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
While Biden has helped reinvigorate and expand NATO, and while the U.S. is Ukraine’s top military aid donor, his administration also believes that most European capitals would not support a NATO move in the short-term, according to a senior U.S. official. Any future offer to NATO would also be tied to required reforms to combat corruption within Ukraine, the official said.
The White House expressed no surprise at the possibility that Zelenskyy may ratchet up the pressure campaign to get a commitment on NATO before the U.S. election out of fear that, if Donald Trump were to win, he would dramatically slash aid to Kyiv.
Veronika Melkozerova reported from Kyiv and Robbie Gramer and Jonathan Lemire from Washington.
