Perhaps President V. Yuschenko and Premier Y. Timoshenko (it seems that NATO membership is an only factor uniting them) are encouraged with the actions of the USA and its President George Bush who expressly speaks for early admission of Ukraine and Georgia to the Alliance. It is not impossible that the leaders of the former Soviet republics have got certain advances that infatuate and provoke into adventures. For example, the adventure of well-known “letter of three”, in which the orange power represented by the president, premier and parliament speaker thievishly requested for NATO membership ignoring the opinion of the people!
Undoubtedly, the visit of G. Bush to Ukraine on the eve of the Bucharest Summit will add fuel to the flames. Perhaps it is only an attempt of the White House to gild the bitter pill to be offered to the Ukrainian Atlanticists by the US partners in NATO that yet do not want to see Kiev and Tbilisi in the Alliance. If the scenario is different, and Ukraine receives firm guarantees of its NATO-aspirant status from the US President (no need to forget that the States are experiencing the election campaign now), this grave event and most powerful geopolitical challenge to Russia will have a painful and loud echo in Moscow with absolutely unpredictable consequences for the European security. It is not for nothing President Putin referred to a hypothetical possibility to aim Russian nuclear missiles at NATO bases in the Ukrainian territory. And the point at issue is not the patriot games but wise prudence dictated by the military and political situation and requirements of military science.
However, the West perceives the situation differently. On the eve of the Bucharest Summit ten NATO states sent an unofficial letter to NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer requesting him to give a chance to Ukraine in the form of the NATO Membership Action Plan. According to the authors, this step would strengthen stability and security in Europe!
The letter to the NATO Secretary General was signed by NATO neophytes: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Rumania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Czech Republic as well as Canada that oddly joined them. These countries believe that a positive decision on participation of Ukraine and Georgia in the NATO Membership Action Plan at the Bucharest Summit on April 2-4 would become a logical continuation of cooperation policy with these countries taking into account those efforts that have been made by them for restructuring of their military and political institutions.
In so doing, the authors of the letter start shamefully weaseling and dodging to claim that joining the Action Plan does not mean an invitation to Ukraine and Georgia to enter NATO but only a demonstration of a moral support to Ukraine and Georgia, complying with the NATO “open door” policy. Probably they want to convince themselves that they speak not about a notorious “sanitary cordon” around Russia, “Energy NATO” and new “World Government” represented by “a league of democratic states” and similar alternatives to the UNO.
In turn, the official Kiev appreciates such “moral” support. President V.Yuschenko also does not sit twiddling his thumbs but sends “signals” to Moscow. For example, in his interview to Gazeta Polska he even promised his guarantees of security to Russia. Most likely, the Ukrainian leader just forgot that membership in NATO will infringe to a certain degree the national sovereignty of Ukraine in the sphere of the national defense. The global problems of war and peace in Europe will be solved not by Yuschenko, so his personal guarantees cost almost nothing.
"When we speak about our membership in NATO, we think about the sovereign Ukrainian choice, which poses no threat to our neighbors. All these warnings on possible NATO bases in Crimea are just fairy tales. Read the Constitution of Ukraine that definitely prohibits locating any foreign bases in the territory of Ukraine”, V. Yuschenko claims. I beg your pardon, what Ukrainian choice is the Ukrainian President speaking about?! Firstly, the majority of Ukrainians does not want to march to NATO, and the Ukrainian political establishment also is not solid with this respect. Secondly, the Ukrainian President is requested to read and refresh in his memory the text of the Declaration on Sovereignty of Ukraine that proclaims Ukraine a neutral state!
But V.Yuschenko does not want to recollect it! Instead, on March 17 both the President and the Premier of Ukraine again reminded NATO about their personal striving to the Alliance. In their letter to Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer they again expressed their “hope that NATO member-states will take a positive decision on participation of Ukraine in the NATO Membership Action Plan”. They also approached German Federal Chancellor Angele Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy with a request to support the decision in favor of Ukraine. It’s encouraging that this time Chairman of the Ukrainian Supreme Rada Arseny Yatsenyuk respected the law and common sense, and claimed that he considers joining the NATO Membership Action Plan untimely. In his interview A.Yatsenyuk emphasized that if the decision in made now “it will look like NATO is throwing down the gauntlet to Russia”. It is no need to cherish illusions, the Speaker hasn’t recovered his sight; he just wants to relax the tension until the next NATO summit.
While V.Yuschenko cuts the window for Ukraine to NATO, 16 military units of the national armed forces have no gas, heat and power supply due to lack of funds in the state budget to compensate the increase of tariffs.
And it is not the gravest Army’s evil! In January the President expressly claimed that the situation in the armed forces does not improve, combat capabilities and patriotic sentiments of the troops are very low and decrease every year. And it happens in the situation when the defense budget increases annually by 30-35 per cent! So as the saying is, the hope is NATO only…
