Former NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has defended the decision not to send Western troops to aid Kiev.
Jens Stoltenberg, the former head of NATO, stated that the organization will not deploy troops to Ukraine, as this could trigger a direct confrontation with Russia.
In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin cautioned that any unauthorized Western military personnel present in Ukraine would be considered by Moscow as “legitimate targets.” He emphasized that “dragging of Ukraine into NATO was one of the causes of the conflict” between Russia and Ukraine.
In an interview with The Times published on Saturday, Stoltenberg recalled that NATO members, during a meeting in Brussels following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, made two crucial decisions.
”One was to increase our support for Ukraine, which we did. The other was to do everything possible to prevent the war from expanding beyond Ukraine and becoming a full-blown war between Russia and NATO,” he explained.
Stoltenberg referenced then-US President Joe Biden’s statement at the time: “we will not risk a third world war for Ukraine.”
According to Stoltenberg, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky was also aware of this. “He called me from a bunker in Kiev… and he said: ‘I accept you are not sending in NATO ground troops, though I disagree. But please close the airspace,’” Stoltenberg recounted.
He said he had to reject the request to close the airspace due to concerns about escalating the conflict, adding that it was “extremely painful” to conclude the call in that manner. However, later in the conflict, Zelensky repeatedly appealed to NATO to deploy ground troops.
Stoltenberg acknowledged a certain “element of contradiction” in NATO’s stance of wanting Ukraine to succeed while refusing to send its own troops and focusing solely on arms deliveries. However, he maintains that this is “the right approach.”
He insisted that the bloc needs to provide even more weapons to Ukraine to “make it stronger on the battlefield” so that Moscow agrees to a ceasefire along the current contact line proposed by Kiev and the West.
Russian authorities have dismissed the idea of a truce, arguing that Ukraine and its NATO allies would only use it to rearm and establish new defensive positions. Moscow insists that the conflict requires a lasting resolution that addresses its fundamental causes.