NATO has been actively trying to tear away from the CIS the countries inclined to cooperate with the West in order to cause the maximum harm to Moscow, as the "fight against Russia" has become the main task of the alliance in its current shape, experts told TASS on the eve of the North Atlantic Alliance’s 75th anniversary.

"I would characterize the alliance's policies in the post-Soviet space as an attempt to tear away from the CIS the unstable states that show little intention to build relations within the Commonwealth and tend to opt for another vector of development, more aimed at the collective West, including the European Union. In other words, NATO seeks to actively cooperate with those who might turn their backs on the CIS," says Andrey Koshkin, the head of the Department of Political Science at the Plekhanov Russian Economic University.

He expressed the certainty that such steps of the North Atlantic Alliance stem from the wish to "oust Russia from this region."

"That is, they target not so much Armenia or Georgia as such, as rather their territories, their relations with Russia. They target the historical memory linking them to Moscow," the analyst said. "This is what is being exploited here as a basis for achieving the main aim - to harm Russia."

Koshkin attributes NATO's increased military activity in the region recently to "resuscitate itself as an organization that has experienced clinical death."

"In a sense, the organization looks worn and shabby. French President Emmanuel Macron once diagnosed it with brain death. In the meantime, Russia has risen to begin to gain a firmer foothold in the niche it deserves, and so they have identified it as a common enemy to they are to fight against together," he explained.

Fighting Russia as main task

In turn, the deputy director of the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies of the National Research University Higher School of Economics, Valdai Discussion Club expert Dmitry Suslov notes that NATO has formulated the fight against Russia as its main task for the foreseeable future.

"This is so in terms of their frenzy, the degree of unprincipledness, the list of the countries that have joined NATO and the coordinates where the eastern border lies today," he said, adding that the world was currently in a worse situation than that during the Cold War.

"NATO's functions have not changed over the past 75 years. The key one is institutionalizing US hegemony in Europe and preventing Europe from becoming an independent geopolitical center," Suslov pointed out. This status quo is to be maintained by all means and for this reason former US President Donald Trump, should he stage a comeback, "will by no means withdraw the United States from NATO."

"He will simply be more harshly urging the European countries to spend more on defense and purchase primarily US-made weapons and military equipment," the expert continued. "There is no reason to speculate the European countries may create something separate and independent. That is, the Europeans will not let NATO, say, fall apart. The United States under Trump or without Trump will not do that either."

Expansion

Sergey Oznobishchev, the head of the Political-Military Analysis and Research Projects Sector at the Primakov National Research Institute of the World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) under the Russian Academy of Sciences, has a similar opinion. He sees the United States as the largest sponsor and supplier of weapons within the alliance and at the same time forecasts that Trump's rise to power will lead to the weakening of NATO as a whole and will affect the declining defense capabilities of Washington's European partners.

"In all likelihood, we will see that the United States' military support for Europe will be waning under Trump. Clearly, support for Ukraine will also dwindle, but it will not be reduced to naught because of the US establishment’s political commitments to its electorate and to Kiev," he explained.

At the same time, Oznobishchev believes that the US authorities will continue to push for NATO expansion in another region - the Asia-Pacific. "Any bureaucratic organization seeks to expand its influence. For NATO this has long been a postulate and a natural raison d'·tre - meaning of existence," the expert noted. "They want to see larger funding and enjoy greater influence. To do this, they need to constantly emphasize various kinds of threats, like the situation around Taiwan in this particular case."

Continued NATO expansion in the Asia-Pacific will have a destabilizing effect on the entire region, the analyst believes. "Although some states will have an illusion of better protection from external threats, this will lead to further militarization and entail retaliation not only from Russia, but also from other states in the region," he concluded.