Re Booting NATO Russia Relations

France was one of the founding members of NATO (1949).

Re Setting the NATO Russia Relationship

We want a cooperative NATO Russia relationship that produces concrete results and draws NATO and Russia closer together.

NATO needs Russia, and Russia needs NATO, and the US shift away from unilateralism has restored the importance of multilateral security institutions while giving NATO the chance to establish new partnerships with the EU and Russia.

Russia has in particular opposed its neighbors joining NATO. What is NATO against, the Russians ask?

Nor does Ukraine s relationship with NATO pose a threat to Russia.

Canada was a founding member of the United Nations in 1945 and of NATO in 1949.

Yet NATO Russia cooperation is of the outmost importance to global security.

West Germany joined NATO in 1955 and was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1957.

beginning a dialogue on tactical nuclear weapons involving Russia, the US, and NATO

On the other hand, Russia will not go cap in hand to NATO.

But such a strategy requires that Russia clearly demonstrate its political will to cooperate with NATO. Russia must make a choice.

His presence is an embarrassment to NATO, but an even greater disgrace for Russia.

Yes, such a bold step would transform NATO. But it would transform Russia even more.

This new agreement makes the world safer, and it will give impetus to cooperation with Russia in other fields, particularly NATO Russia relations.

The peripheral nature of the NATO Russia Council was clearly not enough and did not work.

In a sense, Russia has behaved like Greece in claiming that NATO enlargement threatens its security.

We need a missile defense system that includes not just all NATO countries, but Russia, too.

Yet, for the last four years, Russia has tried to hinder NATO in every possible way.

Some argue that Russia has done nothing not previously done by NATO in Kosovo in 1999.

In fact, Russian officers are welcome to participate in military exercises and to visit NATO headquarters under the Partnership for Peace program. Residual suspicions and Russian pride limit the NATO Russia agreement, but the organization is no longer focused on Russia.

I do not apologize for rejecting knee jerk calls for Russia s expulsion from the G 8, or for EU Russia or NATO Russia relations to be broken.

Under ideal diplomatic circumstances, Russia and China would be persuaded to join with NATO in a joint declaration.

At a time when Russia was taking a more pacific course, NATO unlike the Warsaw Pact was not dismantled.

The report recommended that NATO open its door to new members while seeking a more constructive relationship with Russia.

The reality, of course, is that NATO is as much of an offensive threat to Russia as Switzerland is.

In other words, NATO s strategy towards Russia must be guided by a spirit of inclusiveness. But such a strategy requires that Russia clearly demonstrate its political will to cooperate with NATO.

Russia also needs to clarify its attitude about the use of force to solve disputes. Some argue that Russia has done nothing not previously done by NATO in Kosovo in 1999.

Nor does Ukraine s relationship with NATO pose a threat to Russia. The strengthening of Ukraine s democratic institutions and independence that will result from it will benefit Russia in the long term.

I was supposed to put forward Russian proposals on the new security concept to the NATO Russia Council (NRC) last September.

A real, working NATO Russia relationship could provide the Alliance with solutions to problems that it cannot tackle on its own.

The old way of negotiating via proposals and counterproposals, with Russia and NATO perceiving each other as adversaries should be abandoned.

He wanted to demonstrate to his Western partners that Georgia needed NATO protection from Russia, and that accession was therefore urgent.

Indeed, the country partners include all of Europe s non NATO countries, such as Austria, Switzerland, Finland, and Sweden, and aspiring and possible NATO members such as Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, Ukraine, Belarus, and even Russia.

While some Central European members that were formerly occupied by the USSR continue to see NATO as a political insurance policy against a revival of Russian ambitions, NATO is no longer aimed against Russia.

The idea was that Russia would protect NATO from attacking missiles traveling over its territory, with the expectation that the alliance would then forego developing defenses capable of engaging missiles over Russia.

The CSCE was launched more than 20 years ago with the Helsinki Final Act of 1975 as its founding political constitution.

Russia is expected to act in ways that are beneficial to US and Western interests.

Russia is just about to enter the third act of this tragedy, a banking crisis.

Georgia is not a NATO member, and the United States, it is clear, will not go to war with Russia over Georgia.

But Russia, China, and other countries felt that NATO exploited the resolution to engineer regime change, rather merely protecting citizens in Libya.

The proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery is a threat to both the NATO allies and Russia.

In the early 1990 s, many westerners and Russians wanted Russia to become a full fledged member of both the European Union and NATO, on the condition that Russia became a full fledged democracy.

If for now a democratic Serbia prefers radical nationalism and alignment with Russia to membership in the EU and NATO, so be it.