The 2024 NATO Summit hosted all 32 international allies in Washington this week, from Tuesday to Thursday.
Former U.S. Ambassador Kurt Volker spoke with VOA regarding the summit, noting that while he found it to be predictable, with no major decisions being made, it was useful. He also spoke about Ukraine’s bid to become a NATO ally and how nothing is yet solidified.
The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Overall, what do you think about the summit results for Ukraine?
The outlines of the summit were set several months ago, really. No invitation for Ukraine to join NATO, some fresh language, but it's still not an invitation. No major new alliance role in helping Ukraine defeat Russia, no clear commitment to victory, but some additional support. So, we heard about the new Patriot systems that are coming in, some other air defense systems. All that's good. Coordinating assistance to Ukraine through NATO as opposed to only through the U.S., that's also good. But it's not the game changer that a lot of people would have wanted to see.
We had several items here. First, how important is the formulation in the communiqué that the path to NATO is “irreversible”?
There is either a decision that we are inviting Ukraine to join NATO, or there's not. And in this case, it's still not there. So, to say that it's irreversible, all you have to do is have the next communiqué not say that. It doesn't do anything unless it's actually an invitation. I understand the hesitation that people have as the war is still ongoing. They don't want to imply that NATO countries are going to send forces to fight on the ground in Ukraine. OK, but we should be thinking strategically about how we get Ukraine what it needs to win the war. And how as part of that we bring them into NATO in order to end the war successfully, so we deter the next war.
Part of this bridge is creating the Command and Logistics Center in Wiesbaden. Is it a good outcome? Would it be substantial in helping Ukraine?
: What we're doing is we're taking something that we're already doing, and we're putting a NATO flag on it. I think that is good. I think it should be NATO. I don't think it should be the U.S. alone. And I think when we talk about burden-sharing, it's good for the U.S. to see that this is an alliance activity with lots of allies taking part. Even though that was already the case, the optics of it are better I think for it to be a NATO activity. But it's what we're already doing. It's not a substantial change.
What about the civil representative of NATO in Kyiv?
We used to have one of those, and we pulled it out after Russia's full-scale invasion. It's good to put it back. We should not hesitate to have U.S. and allied personnel present in Ukraine. I would argue we should do more. We should lift the ban on uniformed military personnel being present in Ukraine, embedding with Ukrainian forces. We need to do that to learn from Ukraine and adapt our systems as best we can. We also ought to have military contractors authorized to be in Ukraine. Because they need to see what's happening to the equipment and supplies that they're providing and provide real-time support and service in the country.
I talked to the ministers of Norway and Sweden, and both were very enthusiastic about this part of putting NATO in charge of coordinating assistance to Ukraine, saying that there's a lot of benefits. Would you agree with that?
Well, I would. And I think for Sweden in particular. They're the newest member of the alliance, and it gives them an immediate pathway to visibility and participation if it's made as a NATO activity.
One of the biggest items on the agenda for the Ukrainian delegations was to convince allies to remove all red lines on striking inside Russian territory, and we are kind of receiving conflicting messages, even from within the Biden administration. Do you think there is some sort of progress on that?
Just like everything else, you get a little bit of progress, but not enough. And in this case, I think the Biden administration has gone from saying “Don’t hit inside Russia with our equipment” to “OK, go ahead. But only if it's around Kharkiv.” To then saying, “OK, go ahead. But only if it is an ongoing attack or an imminent attack.” And then they relax that a little bit, but they're still sending a signal “but don't go far. Don't go deep inside Russia, taking out military targets.” So, there's still a restriction in place, and it seems like they have not yet come to grips with lifting that.
We had very strong statements from the Scandinavians saying that it has to be allowed.