Lawfare Daily: Ukraine’s Past and Future with NATO

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[Intro]

Mary Sarotte: The key to making Putin stop is firm military guarantees for what will then be a West Ukraine, and the firmest military guarantee that exists today is Article 5, right? So you put Ukraine into NATO, and then you say, after, you know, such and such date, this is Article 5 territory, and we will shoot back.

Anastasiia Lapatina: It's the Lawfare Podcast. I am Anastasiia Lapatina, Ukraine fellow at Lawfare, with Mary Sarotte, an American historian and professor at John Hopkins University, who focuses on post-Cold War history.

Mary Sarotte: So the question is there a way to thread that needle where, you know, there is a sustainable membership for Ukraine, despite all the historical significance to Putin of, you know, Ukraine, obviously he's obsessed with this in a very twisted way, despite the bloody combat, despite where we are. If there is a solution, I think it's going to have to be along the lines of the Norwegian and West German model.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Today we're talking about Ukraine's history with NATO and how Ukraine could join the alliance, given Russia's ongoing war.

[Main Podcast]

So we're going to be discussing a lot about Ukraine and NATO today and Ukraine's potential future in NATO. But we, before we go into all of that, I also want to talk about the history between Ukraine and NATO just for a little bit. And that history really starts in the early 2000s, with the first Ukrainian leader who seriously put Ukraine on the path towards NATO. It was Viktor Yushchenko, and he was the pro-Western, pro-European president of Ukraine who came to power after the Orange Revolution in 2005.

And so a few years into his presidency, his government writes an official letter to NATO, asking the alliance to consider putting Ukraine on a path towards NATO membership, and they're asking that NATO gives Ukraine a membership action plan.

And then there's this NATO summit in Bucharest and the Ukrainian delegation goes there expecting a positive response to this letter, but it doesn't really go as well as the Ukrainians would prefer. So, can you just tell us what ends up happening at Bucharest and why is this summit so consequential to this day?

Mary Sarotte: Yes, I can certainly do that. Before I do that, though, I need to go back in time, and with apologies, I need to actually point out that the question of NATO in Ukraine arose in the 1990s, so, not just in the 2000s. Back in the 1990s, of course, the Cold War had ended, the Soviet Union had collapsed, and there were big question marks everywhere in geopolitics, in particular over the future of European security.

And President Bill Clinton, who came into office, he was elected in 1992, and came into office January 1993. Bill Clinton was very much aware of the significance of Ukraine. When I was researching my book on the history of NATO enlargement, “Not One Inch,” I spent three years getting documents declassified from the Clinton Library. And it was challenging. I had to go through a three year appeal, which I eventually won.

I got the, nearly all records from, for example, summits between Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin declassified. And when I got these documents, I was amazed at how much they focused on Ukraine. So I realized, again, you've asked about the Bucharest Summit, but I think it's important to have this context before talking about Bucharest.

So in the early 1990s, obviously many countries, former Warsaw Pact countries, even former Soviet Union countries, were talking about potential NATO membership. And the obvious question in the West is, well, how do we accommodate them? Do we accommodate them? What do they do? And so there was a lot of high level speculation. And one of the more amazing documents I found was a letter from, or a briefing from Tony Lake, who was the national security advisor to Clinton in the early nineties, talking about potential NATO membership, not just for the Baltics, but also for Ukraine.

And President Clinton was receptive to this idea as a matter of fact, the document itself, he put a check mark on it, wrote, looks good. And later in conversation with the German leader, he talked about Ukraine as the linchpin of peace in Europe. Now I'm paraphrasing that, but the exact quotations are in my book, “Not One Inch.”

So Ukraine was just a huge factor, and it was a factor in discussions about NATO that far back. Now, if you think about it, that makes sense, because Ukraine, as you well know, is obviously, you know, a huge country. Back then the population was above 50 million people. That put it on a par with, you know, with England, for example. It's obviously hugely important in agricultural terms. And immediately after it became independent, Ukraine became, for a brief time, the third biggest nuclear power on earth because of the amount of the Soviet arsenal left on Ukrainian territory.

Now, obviously command and control of those weapons was set up for Moscow. So obviously it was kind of, you know, an unusual nuclear power, but as you all know, there were engineers living in Ukraine who could probably have done something about command and control.

So if you're a foreign leader, if you're President Clinton, suddenly there's this brand new country, which is the third biggest nuclear power on earth, and it has, you know, over a thousand missiles that are targeting your citizens. That's obviously something that's going to rise to the top of your priority list.

So the question of what to do with Ukraine, where to put it in the security structure, that is a question that goes way back. And initially President Clinton proposed what I thought was an appropriate idea, which is something about the Partnership for Peace. And the Partnership for Peace was an intentionally ambiguous kind of halfway house, between not being a NATO member and being a NATO member. And as I describe in my book, he explicitly talked about that as providing a security berth for Ukraine, because it was going to be, you know, really challenging to just put Ukraine in NATO that early on, especially because, as you would expect, of the Russian reaction.

Now, the concern about the Russian reaction isn't just out of altruism. This was the moment of the greatest nuclear disarmament since the dawn of the atomic age, Washington and Moscow working together to not only take systems offline, but to actually destroy them.

This was a huge moment for making not only, you know, the United States, not only Europe, but the whole planet safer from these terrible weapons that can end civilization, you know, within a matter of hours. And so the idea was, if we immediately put Ukraine in NATO, this is a very speculative discussion, but if we immediately put Ukraine in NATO, that could really create a huge reaction in Russia, and that might stop this very desirable process of destroying these terrible nuclear weapons.

So this idea they came up with, of the halfway house, and Clinton proposed this with the support of his Pentagon. I personally thought it was a good idea. As Clinton put it at the time, this way, we don't leave Ukraine in the lurch, because it's probably too soon to put it in NATO, but we don't want to just leave it in the lurch. And if I just start adding countries to NATO, then I'm going to draw a new line across Europe, again, President Clinton. And considering we just erased the Cold War front line through Europe, why should I draw a new line and leave Ukraine on the wrong side?

So this is all happening in the early 1990s, but then several things change. And again this is a precursor to why you end up having such a train wreck in Bucharest. Then several things change. Boris Yeltsin starts using bloodshed again as a tool of politics. So this is the first of about five factors. Boris Yeltsin has tanks fire on his parliament. He kills over a hundred people. He puts 800 people in the hospital. Parliament is left unable to function.

Second and more important, he then invades Chechnya at the end of 1994. This as a result, causes number three, Central and Eastern Europeans to say, oh, we've seen this movie before, right? Moscow using force, you know, we've, we were going along with this idea about the Partnership for Peace because we understood the point about Ukraine, but now if Russia's using violence again, we needed Article 5 yesterday. We need to get into NATO right now. So the Central and Eastern Europeans start really pushing.

And then fourth, in the United States, there are midterm congressional elections and the Republicans win the House and the Senate. It's a huge victory, and the Republicans did that on the basis of a contract with America that advocated for, you know, basically putting countries in NATO as soon as possible. And last but not least, fifth, Ukraine denuclearizes. As I'm sure you know, Ukraine gives up its nuclear weapons in exchange for assurances of its territorial integrity.

So suddenly because of those five factors, Yeltsin firing on his parliament, the Chechen War, Central and Eastern Europeans renewing their push to get into NATO. The Republican victory in the midterm congressional elections in November, 1994, Ukraine denuclearizing, because of all of that, suddenly Clinton's calculus shifts. He wants to be reelected in 1996, right? And the Republicans have just won this huge victory. Now Ukraine is less important because it's not nuclear. Now Russia is more reliable.

And having said, President Clinton, I don't want to draw a new line across Europe and leave Ukraine in the lurch. He then ends up doing just that. He pushes aside the Partnership for Peace. It does, I should add, still exist, but it became a sideshow. It ceased to be the pathway to NATO membership, and so it ceased to be important. And he switches to what I call all-or-nothing NATO enlargement, where you just add a country or not, and so you draw a new line across Europe.

So that's a long winded explanation of the background. So this, I think, would have been a better solution longer-term for Ukraine. But now you're moving forward into this century, and it's the 2000s, and exactly what Clinton said he didn't want to do has happened. So he's drawn a new line across Europe, and he's left Ukraine on the far side of it, right? Ukraine is now left in the lurch.

And so now the question is, okay, well, given that's where we are now, what do we do? And then you have this renewed, and as you rightly said, very serious discussion about putting Ukraine into NATO, and then you get to the Bucharest Summit.

So I should add, as we are recording this on November 26th, Angela Merkel's biography has just appeared. I have not read it yet. It is published today. My understanding is that she talks quite a bit about the Bucharest Summit. So by the time your listeners hear this, there may be articles about that, about what has happened. I have not read that book yet, but I can summarize my understanding of Bucharest, based on what I know to date, not including Angela Merkel's new memoir that came out today.

Basically, at the Bucharest summit, you had, as you rightly pointed out, you have a Ukrainian desire to get into NATO. There's also Georgia trying to get into NATO. You have a United States under President George W. Bush, which is strongly supportive of that. But then you have the Europeans, such as Angela Merkel, who was then chancellor of Germany, concerned about what the consequences might be for relations with Russia, which is not an unreasonable concern. And so the challenge then is, well, what do you do?

And unfortunately, the summit, as I said, ended up being a bit of a trainwreck because it ended up with what I have described in foreign affairs as the worst possible solution. And that was the following: There was all this debate at the summit itself, which is unusual. Usually these things are agreed in advance. But there was all this debate at the summit.

And the ultimate result was to issue a declaration saying that Ukraine and Georgia will become members, but then not to take any practical steps to make that happen. And that's deeply unfortunate because it has the effect of drawing a target on Ukraine and Georgia, right?

Because if you're Vladimir Putin, you're thinking, wow, I don't want that to happen. And I, Putin, am aware that NATO does not like to take on countries that have active conflicts on their soil. And I can create one of those. So you have then shortly after the 2008 summit, of course, the Russian military action in Georgia. And now, of course, you have, you know, what's going on in Ukraine.

So that, you know, created this dangerous situation where Ukraine and Georgia were identified as potential members, but then they didn't actually get the benefit of membership and still haven’t to this day. That was a cautionary lesson, by the way, for Finland and Sweden, which saw the most dangerous time as a time between when you declare you want to get into NATO and when you actually get in. And that was one of the reasons why they were trying to wrap up, you know, that phase as quickly as possible.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Shifting away from strictly the history for a bit, could you just explain what is the process through which a country becomes a NATO member? So like, let's say if Ukraine were to receive an official invitation, like tomorrow or next month, what would be the next steps for it to become an official NATO member?

Mary Sarotte: Well, according to the North Atlantic Treaty, right, that is the heart of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, from April 4th, 1949, the amount of requirements are actually relatively limited. Now, obviously, in practice, the process of membership has evolved in complexity.

But if you go back to the North Atlantic Treaty, and I'd recommend to your listeners to look at it, it's only a couple pages long, it basically says that, I'm looking at the treaty here. Basically, any European state, quote, in a position to further the principles of this treaty and to contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area, can become a member, right? And the way that happens in a formal legal term is that the country deposits the instrument of accession, which is basically a paperwork handover.

So that's it in terms of formal terms, but obviously that raises a whole bunch of questions. So what does it mean to be a European state? What does it mean to contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area? Obviously, Turkey is a member and it's not on the Atlantic Ocean. So obviously that's open to a lot of interpretation.

Also, your listeners will know, of course, because you have savvy listeners to Lawfare, that NATO enlargement didn't start just after the Cold War. There was NATO enlargement during the Cold War as well. So, there's basically a process whereby a potential member state, you know, reaches out to NATO and basically contacts the alliance and starts to talk about its options for membership.

Now, despite the fact that NATO tends to say all memberships are alike, in fact, various members have negotiated bespoke conditions as part of their membership. And two of those countries are particularly relevant to our conversation today, Norway and West Germany, and I think we'll get into that shortly. That was the basis of my Foreign Affairs article.

So again, the basic idea is that there's not a lot of formal requirements. The devil is in the details. Every country basically ends up negotiating pretty much its own deal.

Anastasiia Lapatina: But then I guess the really difficult part for Ukraine here is that every NATO member has to be in support of that member accession and it has to be ratified, right? So there's a whole lot of politics weaved into all that.

Mary Sarotte: Thank you for bringing that up. I apologize, I should have mentioned that all members do have to be accepted unanimously by all their members. So thank you, I was remiss in not mentioning that. That is correct. And as you said, that's where the politics come in. 

Anastasiia Lapatina: So, Ukraine's story with NATO is really complicated in part because right now we're in the middle of a terrible, brutal, full-scale war.

Mary Sarotte: Yes

Anastasiia Lapatina: And we feel all this sense of perhaps betrayal or misunderstanding on behalf of the NATO and the West, largely. And people kind of tend to get angry at NATO for not accepting Ukraine sooner. But there's a lot, there's a lot that's complicated there though, because for example, during the time that Yushchenko was pushing for Ukraine to be in NATO, something like half of Ukraine, if not more, I think more than half the country, didn't want to be a part of it because we just came out of the Soviet Union. People didn't even really know what NATO is and why we should be in there.

So there's a lot of complexity. But now Ukraine is still pushing for it. We're still actively asking to be in NATO, so much so that we enshrined it into our constitution. So, it's literally in our constitution that our foreign policy has to be geared towards becoming a part of the European Union and NATO. And just several months ago, our president, Volodymyr Zelensky, presented his victory plan. And a part of that victory plan, is that Ukraine receives an invitation to NATO, as soon as possible, like right now, is what he said. And of course that's really not easy.

And that's partially what your Foreign Affairs article is about is what kind of historical useful cases we can find to help Ukraine become a part of NATO as fast as possible and not just close this door for us because we're in the middle of a war. And so one of the examples that you bring up is this example of Norway. So could you just describe the Norwegian case and how you think that could be useful for Ukraine in the middle of the war right now.

Mary Sarotte: Sure. Let me just say briefly, because we've mentioned the war, I would like to express my profound admiration for all Ukrainians for the way you have conducted yourself in the face of unspeakable brutality, what happened in Bucha, the abductions of children, bombings of maternity wards. Obviously, the list goes on and on and on. So I have just the deepest and most profound admiration for Ukraine.

If it were under my control, I think that Ukraine should have its 1991 borders back. That is unfortunately not under my control. If it were under my control, the Russians would lay down their arms and go home. I cannot make them disarm. The only thing I can do, is that Putin is trying to use history as a weapon. He's trying to justify what he's doing on the basis of history. And there in a tiny little way, I can help to disarm him because I have been working on these topics for many decades and I can provide evidence and arguments.

So, before I get to the Norway example, I would just like to preface it by saying what I'm about to say is not my preference. My preference is that the war would not have happened, Ukraine would be in its 1991 borders. In essence, what I'm about to describe is a terrible idea and it is unworthy of Ukraine. The problem is I don't have a good idea that is worthy of Ukraine that I can see working. So I freely admit that this is a terrible idea and that it has many problems. So, that being said, let me describe the idea.

This came about because as you'll know, last summer was the 75th anniversary summit of NATO, and I was fortunate enough to attend that in Washington, DC, hear President Biden speak and so forth. And the journal of Foreign Affairs asked me as part of that if I would write an article for the 75th anniversary, and so I said, of course. And I had been thinking about this idea of, again, using history to help us find a way forward. As a historian, it's something I believe in very much.

Drawing on this theme that not all memberships are alike, I was thinking hard about the example of the Norwegian membership and the West German membership. So, and I believe the combination of the two of them may be useful. Since I wrote that article, of course, President Trump has been elected to a second term. So that is a huge wild card. I obviously, you know, I don't think anyone really knows what Trump foreign policy is going to look like. But let me first describe the idea as I came up with it for the 75th anniversary, and then we could perhaps speculate together on what will happen under Trump.

So the idea is as follows, Norway was unique among all of the founding member states of NATO because it shared a border with the then-Soviet Union. No other founder member shared a border with the Soviet Union. So that made Norway's membership qualitatively different from all other memberships and the Norwegians knew it and they were very savvy.

And the Norwegians, now they actually had, they were not in a situation like you are now, obviously. The Soviet Union was not invading Norway. In fact, the Soviet Union had even helped to liberate parts of northern Norway from the Nazis. So the situation was not the same. But the Norwegians did see what was happening, for example, in Czechoslovakia, and did worry as another, you know, country near to obviously, the Soviet Union, that they might come under the same kind of pressure.

Norwegians also had a very bitter experience with their neutrality collapsing, and they had experienced horrific occupation by the Nazis. So they were no longer interested in neutrality, which was the Swedish solution. So the Norwegians are trying to figure out what to do, and they came up with what I thought was a terrific idea, which is we will join NATO, so we won't be neutral. But we will impose restrictions on ourselves to make that membership sustainable, considering that we share a border with the Soviet Union.

So the Norwegians, of their own accord, this was not forced on them, of their own accord, the Norwegians said we're going to join NATO, but we will not have foreign troops on our soil or in our ports unless we are under attack or under threat of attack. And then later they also added that to say we won't have nuclear weapons on our port or in our soil, on our soil or in our ports, unless we are under attack or under threat of attack.

And that was really smart because it gave them the ability to manage contingency, the ability to manage contingency. It could scale up or down. And this proved to be a sensible way forward. And as we know, Norway became a member state and it did not lead to conflict with the Soviet Union. So I think that idea would be important for Ukraine.

Another way of thinking of it is that the problem isn't Ukraine in NATO, it's NATO in Ukraine. In other words, it's how much NATO infrastructure goes in. And the Norwegians were basically saying, look, we're not going to allow certain kinds of infrastructure. I hasten to add, they still did a ton of stuff. They put together a major headquarters for NATO. They prepositioned equipment. It's not as if nothing happened, quite a bit happened, but there were these certain categories where they said that's not going to happen.

And I think that could be useful for Ukraine because when, in history, when I've looked at the history of NATO enlargement, when push really came to shove at the eleventh hour, when some treaty was up for signing at, you know, I don't know what, at noon that day, and the negotiators were still trying to finalize the wording and, you know, at one in the morning, when it was really down to the wire, then the Russians would back off a little bit and say, okay, you know, we're not so much opposed to NATO membership, what we're opposed to is NATO infrastructure.

So we'll, you know, agree to this happening as long as there are limits on the infrastructure that can go in there. That, for example, applies to former East Germany, which to this day is the only nuclear free zone by treaty in Europe because of what the Allies agreed would not happen there. So that example, I think, is relevant.

And I think you need to combine it with the West German example, because obviously there you have a country which, sadly, like NATO, is, you know, de facto divided. And that's important because the West Germans became part of NATO without ever formally acknowledging that division. It did not happen. West Germany did not recognize East Germany as a separate state. It did not recognize the border as permanent.

Indeed, West Germany did a whole bunch of things to show that it considered itself to be a provisional state, as provisional state. It picked, for example, a small Rhine village called Bonn as its capital, instead of a place like Frankfurt, because that Bonn looked more temporary. It decided West Germany not to write a constitution. Instead, it wrote something called a basic law, and the basic law actually said in the document, we'll have a, you know, we'll write a constitution when we actually are unified. In other words, there are all these signals that this was not a definitive acceptance of the division. And that, I think, could be useful as well.

Now, obviously, you can come back with all the problems, and as I said, this is a terrible idea, because among other things, the obvious parallel is that makes East Ukraine into East Germany, and, you know, consigns it to being under domination by Moscow. And that is heartbreaking. That is a tragedy. The problem is, I don't know how to change that. And I don't see, you know, outside powers willing to rush in and massively fight. I don't see a real way of changing that in the near future. So given that's where we are, that's why I pose this combination of the Norwegian and the West German models.

Anastasiia Lapatina: The big question with how to make this work. I mean, there, there are countless questions on how to make this work.

Mary Sarotte: Yes

Anastasiia Lapatina: One is that, you know, Zelensky has to sell that to the Ukrainian public.

Mary Sarotte: Yes

Anastasiia Lapatina: And many are still opposed to these kinds of nonmaximalist solutions.

Mary Sarotte: Actually, if I could just interrupt you, just to say there's actually, a whole bunch of problems, right? So this is why I say it's a terrible idea. It needs to be approved by every member state which obviously would be very difficult, even more difficult now that there's Trump.

Also, another big question is what happens in the transition period, right? Assuming member states want to do this, there would still be some transition period between when it's declared and when it would happen. That would obviously be very dangerous. And there, I follow the work of Jade McGlynn, the very smart British scholar, who talks perhaps about some kind of no-fly zone.

I think also, to be clear, and this would be truly gutwrenching, to make this happen, I think Ukraine, Zelensky, your country, would have to unilaterally declare an end to major combat operations. Again, this is unworthy of Ukraine. I'm only suggesting it because I'm out of good ideas. And obviously that's something that Zelensky would have to sell. But my idea is that in exchange for doing that, for taking that enormous step, that Ukraine would then finally get NATO membership. So the negotiations would be between Ukraine and NATO.

I should add that I personally think we need a peace without Putin, a peace without Putin. What I mean by that is I do not see Putin as a credible negotiator in any context. I don't think there is anything he could sign that is worthwhile. I know there's a huge discussion now about the need for negotiations. I believe that is a mistaken discussion because I do not see Putin as a credible negotiator.

So I think that the negotiations should be between Zelensky and NATO. And again, ideally, you know, what would happen then is there would be an agreement on Ukraine going into NATO via some combination of the Norwegian and West German model, and that would just be then declared as a fait accompli, an end to major combat operations, a no-fly zone enforced by allies during the transition period, and then Ukraine going into NATO.

That's my idea. I realize there's many problems with it, but again, I don't have a better idea. Anyone who has one, please let me know. So that's the full idea.

Anastasiia Lapatina: This sounds definitely better than, you know, Trump is going to sell Ukraine out to Putin, kind of, rhetoric.

Mary Sarotte: Right, right.

Anastasiia Lapatina: This is, at least, something that my Ukrainian brain can like, hold on to as like a credible potential solution.

So you briefly mentioned this, but what I was going to say is that the big problem is that you have to draw a line where NATO Article 5 is going to be applied to, right? And for that, the frontline in Ukraine has to get static somehow. And right now it's really not right now. Right now, Russia has the initiative. They're occupying village after village, pretty much every day.

And so the big question here is how does Ukraine make that problem go away. How do we actually freeze, and I know Ukrainians hate that rhetoric, but freeze the frontline for the NATO/West Germany solution to work.

Another question there is like, why would Putin stop? That's a whole, and I actually think that's the main question, like for everyone who is talking about Trump ending the war right now, blah, blah, blah. It's not the Ukrainians that have to be forced into a peace deal. It's actually Russia that has to be forced into negotiations, so.

Mary Sarotte: Yes, the enemy gets a vote. Yeah. So I hear two questions there. The first is how to establish a line. And the second question is how to make Putin stop.

Anastasiia Lapatina: And I don't know if you have any answers to that, but I was just bringing that up as like, those are some major complications here.

Mary Sarotte: Yeah. I mean, I have, you know, I have ideas. I wouldn't call them answers, but I have ideas. So I have two main thoughts. So the first thought is what you just said is accurate. There needs to be a border for Article 5 to be effective. There has been discussion for a while about using some kind of West German model for Ukraine. That's actually, I'm not the first person or the only person to say that.

It's important to clarify there is a version of that argument that I think is misleading. And I do not agree with that version. And that version goes as follows: Well, since Germany was divided and since divided Germany got into NATO, we can just give Article 5 and give NATO membership to Ukraine because divided Germany was in Ukraine, so that's precedent. No, divided Germany did not get into NATO. West Germany got into NATO. East Germany got left in the lurch. That's not the same thing. So divided Germany was not in NATO. West Germany was in NATO.

And the reason West Germany could go into NATO was, as you rightly pointed out, because there was a clear border. Now, nobody wanted this border, right? It evolved out of the Cold War, which is a different situation than now, again. But, there was a clear border. Indeed, very clear, because, you know, there are things like the Berlin Wall and so forth. Obviously, Berlin was an island inside East Germany, but there was also an armed border between the two Germanys.

That, tragically, was useful, because then you could say, this is the territory protected by Article 5. And Article 5 is the core of the NATO treaty, as you know, means an attack on one should be treated as an attack on all. It means an attack on one should be treated as an attack on all. It does not require a military response, but it does require serious consultation and does require an assessment of the situation by all partners.

So the version of the West German model that I am advocating is a West German model based on a clear border. Now what Ukraine needs to do is not, I would say, think of it slightly differently. It's not just freeze the border. It's actually establish a militarily defensible frontline. A militarily defensible frontline.

And I'm saying that very consciously. I am not saying internationally recognized. I am not saying UN-sanctioned. I am not saying permanent. None of those things. I'm just saying militarily defensible. And there I would have to defer to military experts, and it may be that line is not exactly the same as the current front line, right? It may be again tragically that Ukraine actually has to cede more territory. So the question is to find some kind of a line that is militarily defensible and there I would defer to military experts as to which would, what would make the most sense.

But once you have that line then you get to your very important question, which is how do you make Putin stop? I think the problem with this discussion now, that is, I really, it's really disturbing to me, this discussion now that, oh, what Trump's going to do is bring an end to the war by saying Ukraine will promise never to go into NATO.

That's just, you know, giving hostages to fortune. I mean, basically that's going to give, you know, Russia time to recover, regroup, and then there will just be more conflict, that will make Trump look weak. That'll make NATO look weak. That'll be dangerous for the Europeans. I think that, you know, that that is a false solution. It looks like it might be a solution, but it just leaves the door open to more aggression against Ukraine. And again, incoming President Trump's main concern is looking weak. That would make him look very weak.

I would notice that the nominee for the national security advisor position actually made some interesting comments about, you know, don't try to find daylight between Biden and the incoming administration. I think he might understand that issue.

So I think that, the key to making Putin stop is firm military guarantees for what will then be a West Ukraine. And the firmest military guarantee that exists today is Article 5. So you put Ukraine into NATO and then you say after, you know, such and such date, this is Article 5 territory, and we will shoot back.

And that, I think, is how you make Putin stop, because despite everything he's done, all the war crimes he's committed, the atrocities, Putin has not launched an attack on Article 5 territory, you know, I know yes, there've been, you know, stray missiles in Poland and windows in Romania have been violated. There was a strange incident where the cable was cut underseas.  I realize that.

Anastasiia Lapatina: I realized I was going to mention sabotage that the Europeans are really worried about.

Mary Sarotte: There's the DHL plane. Exactly. I realize there's massive cyber attacks. I realize there’s sabotage. I realize all that. What there has not been is an invasion on the scale that sadly Ukraine has experienced.

I mean, put differently, my proposal requires a belief in Article 5. It requires a belief in the deterrent capability of Article 5. I believe in Article 5 because of exactly what I just said. Because despite everything he's done, he's not launched an attack on Article 5 territory.

Reasonable people can differ about that. I understand if someone pushes back and says to me, hey, it would be different if it were Article 5 in Ukraine. That's different, then Article 5 might not hold. It might not be deterrent. Well, then my response to that is OK. That's a fair point. But if Article 5, if you don't believe in Article 5, then we have a bigger problem. Then it's not just Ukraine. Then it's the Baltics and it's Poland. Then it's NATO as a whole in the era of Trump. So, okay, that's a fair point.

But then explain to me, person who doesn't believe in Article 5, how are we defending the Baltics? How are we defending Poland? How are we maintaining NATO altogether, right?

Anastasiia Lapatina: I feel like that just makes NATO look scared of Russia and weak of Russia, and that basically tells Putin in his face that NATO doesn't think that it can stand up to Russia in a military conflict.

Mary Sarotte: Right, and so I do believe in the deterrent power of Article 5. I think it is currently deterring Putin. In fact, my contacts in Finland, I hear regularly from them just how few Russian soldiers there are on the Russo-Finnish border now. Partly that's because they're needed in Ukraine, tragically, but I think partly it's because Finland is now Article 5 territory.

So, I mean, you know, there's no certainty, right? We're speculating about the future. Obviously, I'm a historian. I'm much worse on the future than I am in the past, but I feel like a belief in Article 5 is warranted. I understand reasonable people can differ, but I feel like it is warranted. I feel like it is the strongest possible security guarantee, and I feel like some kind of Norwegian model slash West German model for bringing Article 5 to Ukraine is probably the most workable solution at this point.

The big wild card is Trump, and actually there I would have a question for you, if you're in Ukraine. What was the reaction to the Trump election in Ukraine? I'd be interested to hear what it was like there.

Anastasiia Lapatina: My latest article for Lawfare, actually, that I published just last week ago, dives exactly into that question.

Mary Sarotte: Ah, okay.

Anastasiia Lapatina: And I take the framing of pessimists versus the optimists, because that's something that I've noticed, especially because I work with Americans, but live in Ukraine and it's an amazing place to be in, because then you get to hear from both sides of the aisle. And in my, I guess, small d, and also big d, democratic bubble in the U.S., people are terrified and definitely many are pessimists thinking that Trump is just the worst possible thing that could happen to Ukraine.

But in Ukraine, there are a lot of optimists, actually. And many of them are extremely disappointed in Biden. So, kind of like half of the U.S. that voted for Trump, people want radical change for better or for worse. That's genuinely one thing that Trump does bring, is radical change. And that's kind of where Ukrainians fall under because they think that Biden is too slow, too cautious, scared of Russia, scared of escalation.

And Trump is a wild card. But that leaves, kind of, this opportunity for the Ukrainian government to persuade him that helping Ukraine is in his interest, that you can't let Ukraine lose because that's going to make you look weak. There's a lot of discussion of like hope and optimism, this kind of window of opportunity for the Ukrainian government to persuade people in Trump's orbit that, like, actually going tough on Russia is what's going to make him look the best and not sell us out to Putin.

Mary Sarotte: Right. I mean, I think that's the argument, obviously. I mean, if I were Mark Rutte, the new NATO secretary general, I'm obviously just speculating. He's not calling me and asking for advice, but I'm optimistic, he seemed to be able to deal with Trump in the past. I'm hopeful he'll be able to deal with him.

I think that's the argument you need to make, given that, you know, Trump above all is concerned about looking weak. Say something like, you know, President Trump, congratulations on your victory. You know, I know that you want to end the Ukrainian conflict as soon as possible. I know you've said in a day, you know, that's, I support that idea. We all want this terrible conflict to end. We just don't want, you know, you or America to look weak if Putin resumes the fighting. So let's, you know, let's end this in a way that looks strong and that helps us.

Anastasiia Lapatina: That's exactly the argument. Yeah.

Mary Sarotte: Right. I think that's the way that you have to phrase the argument, and-

Anastasiia Lapatina: I mean, the caveat is like, we don't really have another choice, right? So it's not like Ukrainian politicians genuinely love Trump as a leader or think that any of his policies are correct or think his personal contact is flawless. It's none of those things.

It's really that, like, we're in a position where we don't have a choice, like more than 80 percent of all of our military aid comes from the U.S. We really don't have a choice, but to get along with whoever comes to the White House.

Mary Sarotte: Right. And I think if there is a way to thread this needle, if there is a way to put Ukraine in NATO, then I think it's going to have to be along the lines of the Norwegian and West German model. I, that I really can say with some, you know, confidence. I have a hard time seeing a way for Ukraine to go in other than under those models, but there I am, as I said, because of my understanding of the history where I'm on firmer footing than using my crystal ball to speculate on the future.

Because I do see in history, this repeated pattern under various Soviet and Russian leaders where they would start by opposing NATO membership, but end by opposing NATO infrastructure. And those are not synonyms. Membership is not the same thing as infrastructure. And so again, just to repeat, I think the problem is not Ukraine going into NATO. It's the degree to which NATO goes into Ukraine.

So the question is there a way to thread that needle where, you know, there is a sustainable membership for Ukraine despite all the historical significance to Putin of, you know, Ukraine. Obviously he's obsessed with this in a very twisted way, despite the bloody combat, you know, despite where we are, if there's a solution, I think it's going to have to be along the lines of the Norwegian and West German models.

Now, obviously there's other truly horrific, terrible outcomes that I don't even want to think about, but if there is a way to get into NATO, then I think that would be the way to do so.

Anastasiia Lapatina: I have one last question, which you already kind of brought this up, but the fact that for this to work, Ukraine would need to agree to not pursue deliberation of its territory militarily. So, you know, it can't say that, you know, we're going to get into NATO, build up our forces and in five years, and in five years, we're going to try and go liberate Crimea and the rest of the territory that's temporarily under Russian occupation.

Mary Sarotte: By force, by force.

Anastasiia Lapatina: By force, yeah. And for many, many months, I mean, the, for the, basically since the very beginning of the full-scale invasion, the Ukrainian government was extremely firm, even when its allies weren't so firm on this. The Ukrainian government would say that, you know, we're never going to accept any occupation of our territory. We're always going to strive for 1991 borders. And this is the only way how the war can end.

But just last week, Zelensky seems to have signaled that there is a change, that they are accepting the tragic reality that perhaps the 1991 borders cannot be back under Ukrainian control anytime soon. He said that Ukraine might have to outlive someone in Moscow to restore its sovereignty and to restore its borders. So clearly alluding that like, okay, Putin is going to have to die at some point and then we can figure out some diplomatic solution.

So anyway, I wanted to ask you on that and why that's true, because I had conversations with some of my colleagues. And someone brought up the example of Turkey or some other NATO states that definitely engage in, in conflict, but it's never seen as like, you don't talk about NATO attacking the Kurds, or NATO attacking, you know, some other country in the Middle East where, when that NATO member is engaged in some sort of fighting proxy or otherwise. So why would this be such a huge issue for Ukraine in NATO if it wasn't NATO?

Mary Sarotte: Yeah. So three thoughts. So first is the gap between rhetoric and reality. There's obviously, when you're dealing with, you know, a major international organization like NATO, that's been around now for 75 years, that defends countries with a combined population of a billion people, that's pretty much the definition of complexity, right?

And there are gaps between the reality and the rhetoric, and that was there from the start. I mean, in theory, NATO was an alliance of values, an alliance of country that shared democratic values, right? But then one of the founder members was Portugal, which was not exactly so democratic, but did have valuable Atlantic real estate, right? The idea is there will be stepping stones across the Atlantic, and some of those were Portuguese islands. So from the get-go, there's always been a certain amount of gap between the rhetoric and the reality, and that would continue to be the case, number one.

Number two, the, yes, it's correct as you were saying, West Germany as part of becoming a member of NATO in 1955 had to make clear that it wouldn't pursue basically using, you know, the NATO military available to it. It wouldn't pursue its reunification, you know, by force.

But obviously West Germany, as I said, made clear that it viewed its division as provisional. And there were a number of ways that it reached across the border to try to maintain a feeling of, you know, of community with former East Germans. In fact, I wrote my dissertation about a policy called Ostpolitik, trying to deal with East Germany under Soviet domination. And obviously, there was a whole bunch of covert activity going on, especially in divided Berlin.

So you would obviously have, you know, rhetoric saying that Ukraine would not pursue a unification by force. But again, there could be a gap between rhetoric and reality. And there would be, I think, quite a bit going on in social terms and political terms and cultural terms, in intelligence terms, covert action, and so forth. So I think that there would be, obviously, as there were during the Cold War, there would be efforts made to try to maintain a sense of unity among the people as there were among divided Germans.

Third, the idea that you're, you know, you're going to renounce use of force doesn't mean that you're renouncing a hope of a unified future. And that I think is important. It will be an important part of selling this idea. This is not saying, well, we've lost these territories forever. Now, I realize conceptually that it seems like weak tea, you know, obviously part of the country is now, you know, Putin says he's annexed it formally, but I believe that actually is significant longer term as the German example shows.

So I am in no way advocating a permanent division of the country. I'm not advocating any formal recognition of that. I think that that mindset that What Ukraine would be doing is saying, look, we still want our 1991 borders back, but that is an issue we're not going to be able to decide today. This is an issue for another day. That doesn't mean you just forget about it, right? That doesn't mean all the links that you in your country have to people and those reasons just go away.

And so you maintain it as a goal, and I think that, I mean, it's heartbreaking that there isn't more on offer, but I think it's important to say this is, I believe, better than simply saying, oh, well, you know, we're just going to give up on it. Too bad, Putin succeeded. That I think would be very dangerous, not just for Ukraine, but also for Europe and indeed for the world, right? If, you know, if you have someone who just succeeds and that is accepted, that looks weak. That's another argument for Trump, right? And Putin just succeeded in this.

What you're really worried about, Trump, is China. What message does it send to China if, you know, Putin succeeds in Ukraine? What does that send to China? And you are clearly very worried about China because all the people he's named as nominees are China hawks. So I personally view what's happening in Ukraine as hugely important, not just for Europe, not just for the United States, but globally.

And I'm hoping that there will be people inside the Trump team who, perhaps only because they care about China, will see that and will try to pursue a better solution than simply, you know, what, as Trump is saying, ending it in 24 hours, presumably by throwing Ukraine under the bus, which I hope very much does not happen.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Mary, thank you so much. This was extremely interesting.

Mary Sarotte: Sure. I enjoyed our conversation too, and stay safe over there.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Thank you.

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