Ukraine War Latest: NATO Labels Russia Its ‘Most Significant and Direct Threat’

NATO declared Russia the “most significant and direct threat” to its members’ peace and security, as the military alliance met Wednesday to confront what NATO’s chief called the biggest security crisis since World War II.

It also promised to “step up political and practical support” to Ukraine as it fights off Russia’s invasion.

But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy chided NATO for not embracing his embattled country more fully and asked for more weapons to defeat Moscow’s forces.

Russia’s invasion of its neighbor shattered Europe’s peace, drove NATO to pour troops and weapons into eastern Europe on a scale not seen since the Cold War, and was set to give the defense organization two new members in Sweden and Finland.

President (Vladimir) Putin’s war against Ukraine has shattered peace in Europe and has created the greatest security crisis in Europe since the Second World War,” said Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.

The alliance promised to more support for Ukraine, which has already received billions in military and civilian aid from NATO countries. But Zelenskyy lamented that NATO’s open-door policy to new members did not appear to apply to his country.

“The open-door policy of NATO shouldn’t resemble the old turnstiles on Kyiv’s subway, which stay open but close when you approach them until you pay,” Zelenskyy said by video link to the leaders of the 30 NATO nations meeting in Madrid. “Hasn’t Ukraine paid enough?”

He asked for more modern artillery systems and other weapons and warned the leaders that they either had to provide Ukraine with the help it needed to defeat Russia or “face a delayed war between Russia and yourself.”

“The question is who’s next? Moldova? Or the Baltics? Or Poland? The answer is: all of them,” he said. “We are deterring Russia to prevent it from destroying us and from destroying you.”

Zelenskyy has acknowledged that NATO membership is a distant prospect. The alliance is trying to strike a delicate balance, letting its member-nations arm Ukraine without sparking a direct confrontation between NATO and nuclear-armed Russia.

Under NATO treaties, an attack on any member would be considered an attack on all and trigger a military response by the entire alliance.

U.S. President Joe Biden, whose country provides the bulk of NATO’s military power, vowed the Madrid summit would send “an unmistakable message … that NATO is strong and united.”

“We’re stepping up. We’re proving that NATO is more needed now than it ever has been,” said Biden. He announced a hefty boost in America’s military presence in Europe, including a permanent U.S. base in Poland, two more Navy destroyers based in Rota, Spain, and two more F35 squadrons to the U.K.

Still, strains among NATO allies have also emerged as the cost of energy and other essential goods has skyrocketed, partly because of the the war and tough Western sanctions on Russia. There also are tensions over how the war will end and what, if any, concessions Ukraine should make to stop the fighting.

Money could also be a sensitive issue — just nine of NATO’s 30 members currently meet the organization’s target of spending 2% of gross domestic product on defense.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose country does hit the target, urged NATO allies “to dig deep to restore deterrence and ensure defense in the decade ahead.”

The war has already triggered a big increase in NATO’s forces in eastern Europe, and allies are expected to agree at the summit to boost the strength of the alliance’s rapid reaction force nearly eightfold, from 40,000 to 300,000 troops. The troops will be based in their home nations but dedicated to specific countries on NATO’s eastern flank, where the alliance plans to build up stocks of equipment and ammunition.

Stoltenberg said it was part of the “the biggest overhaul of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War.”