Now that the United States and Russia have kissed and made up over missile defence in Eastern Europe, there’s a logical next step to averting a new Cold War. Russia should join Nato.
Most of the irritants that have inflamed relations with the West in recent years have concerned Russian perceptions of threat from Nato “encroachment” towards its borders. This would be redundant if it was also seeking membership.
Nato does not even have to say “yes” right away for the terms of the relationship to improve. The process of engagement would act as a powerful stimulus for Moscow to rethink its antagonism towards the Baltic States, Ukraine, Georgia and, most recently, Poland, since winning them over would be central to any successful application.
It would be a test for Nato too. The alliance’s borders would circle the northern hemisphere with Russia inside the tent, completing its transformation from a body focused principally on European security into one demonstrably engaged, as it is in Afghanistan, in securing global stability.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen used his inaugural address as Nato’s new Secretary-General last week to declare that the alliance needed Russia “to be a real stakeholder in European and international security”. Membership would offer a permanent stake.
President Medvedev has sought to resolve the tensions by proposing a new pan-European security structure. But most Nato states are not interested in re-inventing the wheel, partly out of suspicion at Moscow’s motives.
An application to join Nato would encourage the alliance to reflect on Moscow’s need for reassurance, however. It would also defuse tensions with Ukraine over the fate of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Crimea if both were in Nato.
If, as many Ukrainians believe, the real issue here is Moscow’s desire to reclaim Crimea, then Russian ambitions would be restrained by the commitment to mutual defence that it would undertake in joining the alliance.
So too with the Russian bases in Georgia’s breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The Kremlin presently has no incentive to give them up, but would have to weigh their usefulness against the potential gains for Russia’s military from Nato membership.
Russia has embarked on wholesale restructuring of its armed forces to bring them into line with modern, ie Nato, standards. How much easier to do that with Nato help in preparation for integration into the alliance?
Nato membership provides Moscow with a guarantee that no defence decisions can be taken on the European continent without its consent, a level of influence it has long sought.
When Vladimir Putin held his first summit with President George W. Bush in 2001 in Slovenia, he disclosed that the Soviet Union had secretly approached Nato about membership talks in 1954. Asked whether Russia could join, he responded: “Why not?”
Stating that Russia did not view Nato as “an enemy organisation”, Mr Putin then said something remarkable about the US in the context of subsequent relations. He said: “When a President of a great power says that he wants to see Russia as a partner, and maybe even as an ally, this is worth so much to us.”
President Obama’s moves to “reset” relations with Russia after the breakdown over missile defence offers an opportunity to test what becoming an ally inside Nato may be worth to Moscow.
An application to join would shatter the myth peddled by domestic advocates of Kremlin authoritarianism that Nato is an anti-Russian organisation. With security worries off the table, democracy in Russia would then come into much sharper focus.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/world_agenda/article6852344.ece
