Invite Ukraine to join NATO now

In one month, NATO will hold a wartime summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. No issue will be more important than a decision about Ukraine’s future status with NATO. Alliance leaders should seize the moment and invite Ukraine to begin the process of joining NATO.

We have just returned from separate trips to Europe. Unlike previous rounds of NATO enlargement, there is an emerging European consensus in favor of a clear path to membership for Ukraine.

Two countries, for very different reasons, oppose taking action now: Hungary and the U.S. Hungary, acting for years as Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping’s stalking horse, engages in transactional diplomacy driven by a toxic mix of historical grievance and cynical populism. The Hungarian holdout can be addressed with the right package of incentives and disincentives.

The U.S. is a different story. In previous rounds, U.S. leadership was indispensable to NATO enlargement to include Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in the 1990s, and the Baltics and four more Central European states in the early 2000s. It was Putin’s unprovoked aggression in Ukraine that led Sweden and Finland to choose NATO over historic neutrality. Today, the loss of illusions about Putin’s Russia has led to a sea change in European capitals from Berlin to Madrid. Why, then, is the U.S. not only failing to lead, but in fact opposing the growing European consensus?

First, there is fear of escalation, regularly threatened by Putin and his lackeys. Any U.S. President must consider the danger of escalation with a nuclear-armed adversary. However, this is not the Cold War, where we must be prepared to trade Cleveland for Hamburg. If Putin escalates, it will most likely occur on Ukrainian territory, where his forces have already bombed hospitals, indiscriminately attacked urban areas, and committed other horrible war crimes. 

As Kori Schake pointed out recently,  the Ukrainians most likely to be affected by nuclear escalation are not overly concerned.  Excessive deference to nuclear threats only empowers those who make them. U.S. self-deterrence over perceived escalation risks has slowed decisions about, and delivery of, major weapons systems and thus prolonged the war. Statecraft must distinguish between rhetorical bluster and policy reality.

Second, there is concern that even inviting Ukraine to NATO could trigger NATO’s Article Five “an attack on one is an attack on all” clause. In fact, Article Five does not mandate a specific response by member states. NATO members could respond to attacks in a minimal manner, as they have already chosen. Or NATO members could respond to an attack by supplying advanced weaponry, sharing real-time targeting intelligence, and imposing harsh economic sanctions, as they have since February 23, 2022. Full Ukrainian accession to NATO could very well come after the Ukrainian government negotiates a peace agreement on its terms.

Finally, there is the question of admitting a Ukraine territorially divided by a cease-fire or some more lasting diplomatic settlement. There is ample precedent for such a scenario. In 1955, NATO admitted the Federal Republic of Germany while East Germany was under the de facto control of Moscow. Similarly, the U.S.-Japan Security treaty only encompasses “territories under the administration of Japan” to distinguish Japan proper from the Northern Territories opportunistically seized by Stalin in the waning days of World War II.   

In 2008 in Bucharest, NATO pledged that Ukraine and Georgia would become members but could not agree on concrete steps in that direction. (Once again, the U.S. was leading, but this time it was Germany and France successfully resisting.)  During the 14 years left in the “gray zone,” Georgia was invaded and dismembered, and an anti-Western government consolidated power there. Ukraine was invaded twice and dismembered.

Today, Zelensky’s Ukraine fights Russian aggression with Churchillian determination. This war, like all wars, will end. Now is the time to think about what kind of peace will emerge. What is preferable? A Ukraine left to itself, armed to the teeth, vulnerable to Russian attack, tempted toward preemption, martial law and renewing nuclear options? Or a Ukraine within NATO, democratic, anchored in the West, solidly behind the one red line Putin or future Russian leaders will not dare cross? This stark choice has convinced even a previous skeptic like Henry Kissinger that NATO membership for Ukraine is the wisest course.

At the end of World War II, allied leaders took bold steps to create institutions that led to victory in the Cold War and created the conditions for an unprecedented era of peace and prosperity. The result is an arc of stability and freedom from the Arctic to the Black Sea. 

In the aftermath of the Balkan wars of the 1990s, fighting was halted but underlying issues of security and justice were deferred. The result is a Western Balkan region still fraught with ethnic tension, unresolved borders, and a playground for Russian and Chinese influence. 

At Vilnius, NATO leaders should find the strategic and moral clarity that drove leaders from Harry Truman and Vaclav Havel to Madeline Albright and John McCain to look beyond the conflict and plan for a better future. Win the war, secure the peace, and invite Ukraine to join NATO at Vilnius.

Randy Scheunemann is Strategic Counselor at the Halifax International Security Forum and Vice Chairman of the International Republican Institute. Dr. Evelyn Farkas is Executive Director of the McCain Institute and former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia (2012-15).