A Conversation With NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg

Jens Stoltenberg reflects on his ten years as the secretary general of NATO and what lies ahead for transatlantic relations. 

MOHYELDIN: Hello, everyone. Welcome to what I think is going to be a very interesting and important and timely conversation. My name is Ayman Mohyeldin. I’m the host of Ayman on MSNBC. I’ve had a chance to interview the secretary general previously on my show. This is the first time we’re doing it in person. So I was saying it was nice to finally meet him, and thanks to the Council for making it happen. I thought this was going to be his last interview, so I was saying I was going to push him a little bit on some things, but I found out that he has a lot more work to do before he steps down, I believe, on Tuesday, right? Tuesday morning, is the hand over, sir?

STOLTENBERG: Eleven o’clock.

MOHYELDIN: Eleven o’clock, is it? (Laughter.) Trust me, he was not counting down the minutes in the few—in the few minutes that we spent backstage. You know the rules. This is on the record. I’m going to open this up for questions from the audience in just a moment, but I’m going to get the ball rolling with a few questions of my own.

And, of course, some news today coming out of Russia that I wanted to start off by getting your reaction to. This was Russian President Vladimir Putin announcing to the Security Council in Russia a change in the country’s doctrine. I want to read for you the specific quote and get your reaction to it. “It is proposed that aggression against Russia by a non-nuclear state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear state, be considered as their joint attack on the Russian Federation. We reserve the right to use nuclear weapons in the event of aggression against Russia, including if the enemy using conventional weapons creates a critical threat to our sovereignty.”

As far as a thinly veiled threat, I think that meets the definition. Your reaction to that, sir.

STOLTENBERG: No, I think you’re absolutely right. This is a way to try to threaten Ukraine, or to threaten us from supporting Ukraine. And this is part of a pattern of nuclear rhetoric and nuclear messaging we have seen from Moscow, from President Putin, since the start of this war. Because at every pivotal moment, they have tried to coerce us from providing military support to Ukraine. They have not succeeded because, despite all these threats and all this nuclear rhetoric—which, note, didn’t start today, it started actually back in 2022, actually, before the invasion. But very much, for instance, on the morning of the invasion, President Putin gave this speech where we had all these threats again.

So the purpose is to prevent us from helping Ukraine to defend themselves. We are closely watching what Ukraine—what Russia is doing. Russia’s nuclear rhetoric is dangerous and reckless. We have conveyed, and Moscow must know, and we know that they know, that a nuclear war can never be won and must never be fought. And we will continue to follow what they do, but they cannot coerce us from supporting Ukraine.

MOHYELDIN: To go back to something you had said previously, you had said there have been many red lines declared by him before and he has not escalated, meaning also involving NATO allies directly. Do you think today is different with this kind of language? Because it was so specific about what NATO is considering, which is the offensive capability of giving Ukraine long-range missiles to strike deep into Russia? He used very specific language that if a nuclear country, which obviously many NATO members are including the United States, are giving non-nuclear weapons that threaten our sovereignty, that is an act of war. Is this different?

STOLTENBERG: I don’t think so, because we have seen, again, as I said, similar threats, formatted in different ways, but fundamentally the same. And NATO allies and the United States, and also all the nuclear powers—France and the United Kingdom—have delivered weapons to Ukraine before the full-scale invasion, but even more so after the full-scale invasion. And the message was that any support would be unacceptable. We provided them—we provided them unprecedented support. When we started delivering more long-range weapons, HIMARS, another thing that was unacceptable. Then advanced battle tanks were unacceptable. F-16s was absolutely unacceptable. And, for instance, ATACMS or the Storm Shadow cruise missiles from the United Kingdom, all of these weapons are advanced weapons.

And some allies have no restrictions on the use of these weapons against legitimate military targets on the territory of Russia. Other allies have had restrictions. But most of them have actually loosened those restrictions, in particular after Russia opened a new front in Kharkiv. Because until then—as this is some months ago—until then, most or almost all the fighting in this war took place deep inside Ukrainian territory. But after Russia opened the new front in Kharkiv, then the frontlines were across the border into Kharkiv. Then then the frontline and the borderline has been more or less the same.

And of course, there is only one way to then hit military targets behind the Russian alliance, is to hit military targets on Russian territory. Even also the United States has opened up for the use of their weapons on the other side of the border in the Kharkiv region. So, yes, I understand the difference between deep and deeper, and very much deep into Russian territory, but fundamentally we have crossed those lines many times already because we cannot accept that Russia is trying to get control over Ukraine and prevent us from supporting Ukraine by using all these different threats.

Let me then add two more things. We need to remember what this is. This is a war of aggression, a war by choice by Moscow. No one forced them to attack Ukraine. Ukraine was never a threat to Russia. President Putin decided to launch a full-scale invasion by choice. It was his decision to do so. That is a blatant violation of international law, to invade another country.

Second, according to international law, every nation has the right to defend itself. That’s part of international law. It’s enshrined in the U.N. Charter. The right for self-defense includes the right to hit legitimate military targets on the territory of the aggressor, Russia. So it’s self-defense when Russia—when Ukraine strikes military targets on Russian territory, and that’s according to international law.

And if you accept that a nuclear power can prevent those from upholding international law because they are threatening us, then we are in a very, very dangerous situation, because then we’ll be beginning something where we will end Russia defining what we can do and not do in Europe, and in support of a sovereign independent nation in Europe. That’s the first message.

The second message is that, of course, wars are dangerous. That’s the reason why NATO is there, to prevent wars. And that’s the reason why we are very concerned about the war in Ukraine. And there are no—there are no risk-free option in a war. So notwithstanding that what we do, there are no—risks. But I’m saying that the biggest risk is if President Putin wins, because then he would be in a position that next time he can just coerce us again. And if I’m Latvia or Lithuania or Norway—I’m from Norway. We are a neighbor of Russia. And when Norway joined NATO in 1948, Joseph Stalin said there was a provocation effect. But Washington said and London said that, no, it’s the right of Norway, a small country bordering Russia, to decide its own path, and they allowed us into NATO.

So these are some fundamental principles. And when we start to compromise on those principles, we are creating a very dangerous world.

MOHYELDIN: Let me stay on Ukraine just for a little bit longer, because when you came into NATO in 2014, obviously, at the time the biggest operation NATO was dealing with, Afghanistan. Since the arc of the last ten years, it’s safe to say Ukraine has now dominated NATO’s, I guess, major concern and operations. If you could go back ten years to your younger self or to NATO back in 2014, what would you have done differently about Ukraine that may have prevented what we’re seeing right now?

STOLTENBERG: So I will answer that question in a moment, but first I would like to say that fundamentally we did the right things from 2014 and up to now. Because since 2014 and up to now, over this last decade, we have implemented the biggest reinforcement of NATO and NATO’s collective defense in a generation. And we have done so triggered by the illegal annexation of Crimea, because we saw that Russia was willing to use military force to not only take Crimea in 2014, but also go into eastern Donbas. So when I came, it was obvious that we really had to do something, and we did a lot.

First of all, we started to increase defense spending. In 2014, three NATO allies spent 2 percent more on defense: United States, United Kingdom, and Greece. This year, twenty-three allies are spending 2 percent. I mean, that’s significantly more on defense. That started in 2014.

Second, in 2014 we had no combat-ready NATO troops in the eastern part of the alliance, zero. Now we have eight battle groups with thousands of combat-ready troops 24/7 in the Baltic countries, Poland, and Romania, and other eastern allies. We have increased the number of troops on high readiness from thousands to half-a-million and invested in new high-end capabilities including I think it’s 600 F-35s across Europe.

So NATO’s military strength is enormously much stronger now than in 2014. I’m not saying that because I tried to tell you that in 2014 we foresaw the full-scale invasion in February 2022. But we foresaw, we understood, that we—that we were—that we had to tackle, to handle, a much more aggressive Russia. And we started that preparation day one, 2014. Therefore, when the full-scale invasion happened, we were well-prepared, not only because we had very precise intelligence at least some months ahead, but mainly because we started the adaptation eight years earlier.

So, therefore, when the full-scale invasion happened, we could do two things. We could significantly ramp up our support to Ukraine, as we did, and we could reinforce our defenses in the eastern part of the alliance to fulfill two tasks, because NATO has two tasks in this war. One is to support Ukraine, as we do. The other is to prevent the war from escalating beyond Ukraine. And the way we do that is to send a very clear message to Moscow that an attack on one ally will be an attack on all the alliance. And we do that by having more forces in the eastern part of the alliance to remove any room for misunderstanding and miscalculation.

So this was perhaps lengthy non-answer to your question, but I say all this because—(inaudible)—or, the mistake.

MOHYELDIN: Regret. Or mistake.

STOLTENBERG: Oh, regret. I need to put it in the right context because, fundamentally, NATO allies have done the right things. We understood the increased danger, we acted, and we acted more than I think many people believed was possible over these years.

Then what I will regret is that we didn’t do more in support to Ukraine, because I think if we had armed Ukraine more, brought in more military and lethal aid, we cannot guarantee the outcome, but at least the cost of Russia to invade would have been higher—and maybe so high that they would not have invaded. But even if they had decided to invade, they would not have been able to make those gains they have been able to make.

If the—if the Ukrainians had much more also artillery and long-range fire; and if they had modern battle tanks, and—as they have now, with the Panzer and the Abrams—or, the Leopard, I mean—and the Abrams; or the Storm Shadows, the cruise missiles; or F-16s with well-trained pilots; of course, it would have been a totally different task for Russians to invade them than it was back in 2022.

And, yes, in hindsight, of course, I think that would have been the right thing to do. Some allies tried to push it through. It was a controversial thing. Some were afraid that we—remember, back in 2015, ’16, ’17, there was a big discussion whether NATO allies should deliver lethal aid. Javelins was something that was controversial to deliver. Some allies were afraid that that was too provocative. But deterrence is there to prevent war.

And, of course, to end this answer is that if you had just taken—because now we deliver an enormous amount of military support, and that has helped the Ukrainians to hold back the invading forces. If we had delivered a fraction of that earlier, maybe we prevented the war.

MOHYELDIN: You have said Ukraine’s path to membership is irreversible. Your exact quote: “There can be no stability and peace and security in Europe without peace and stability in Ukraine. And in the long run, there can be no peace and security in Ukraine without Ukraine becoming a NATO ally.” I don’t have to tell you, not all the members of NATO see it that way, specifically the president of Turkey telling my own network just yesterday that his country will not be rushed into a decision about Ukraine. And he said the U.S. and other member states don’t want Ukraine to be a member. Is he telling the truth?

STOLTENBERG: Well, I can only speak on behalf of NATO, and all NATO allies have agreed that Ukraine’s path to membership is irreversible. That is—

MOHYELDIN: Including Turkey?

STOLTENBERG: Including—I say all of them, and I don’t understand—(laughter)—but that’s language we agreed in July at the beautiful Washington Summit. And it’s very strong language that Ukraine will become a member and the path is irreversible. And not only did we have strong language, but we also had actions underpinning that message.

We have removed the requirement for something called a Membership Action Plan. That was the requirement we had before. So it made the whole process to become a NATO member a two-step process. First, you were allowed into this Membership Action Plan that—(inaudible). And then after that, you could be—you could be invited. We said for Ukraine there is no need for Membership Action Plan. Their process, their path into a NATO membership is a one-step process, not a two-step process. Then we established something called the NATO-Ukraine Council, which is an important political body that can make decisions, Ukraine and all NATO allies together on equal footing.

And then we have launched big programs for interoperability to ensure that Ukrainian forces have the same doctrine standards as NATO forces, reducing the threshold for becoming a full member. We have established a joint—we are establishing a joint training and evaluation center in Bydgoszcz in Poland to interact more closely. And we have established a big NATO command in Wiesbaden, Germany to facilitate, and organize, and coordinate the delivery of military support Ukraine. Partly to give it more predictability, but also to ensure that the future force we are building for them, by delivering F-16s or whatever, is as interoperable with NATO. So all of these actions are real actions to ensure that Ukraine can become a member.

But then to reflect on why I strongly believe that Ukraine should be a member of NATO. And that’s the following. For this war to end—also, first of all, we all want the war to end. The quickest way to end a war is to lose a war. But that doesn’t bring peace. That will bring occupation of Ukraine. So the challenge is not to end the war, in a way. If you want to—if you accept to lose the war. The challenge is to end the war in the way where Ukraine prevails as a sovereign, independent nation.

And the way to do that is to convince President Putin that he cannot win on the battlefield. And the only way to achieve that is to have enough military strength in Ukraine so the cost for President Putin is so high that he is forced to sit down and negotiate an agreement where Ukraine continues to be a sovereign, independent nation. And therefore, military support Ukraine is the path to peace. I don’t believe we can change Putin’s mind. He wants to control Ukraine. But I believe we can change this calculus by arming Ukraine. So that’s the first condition for a lasting peace.

The second condition, and that’s perhaps—and that’s related to NATO membership. And that is that I don’t know when, but when some negotiations take place and they’re able to realign, the ceasefire line most likely, then we have to be certain that that’s the end. Because remember, the war didn’t start in 2022. It started in 2014. They took Crimea. And we said it was unacceptable. They waited for some weeks, or a couple of months, and they went into eastern Donbas. And then we said that was unacceptable, and we negotiated the Minsk One agreement, the ceasefire back in autumn of 2014.

Russia signed that paper and started to violate the agreement. They moved the frontline. You may remember the battle of Debaltseve, a big battle, where they were able to violate the line and then move the front lines further west. And then we negotiated again. And we got the Minsk Two, a new line. That was in 2015. Then the Russians waited for seven years, and they launched a full-scale invasion and took much more of Donbas, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia. If you now have a new agreement, a new line, then that cannot be Minsk Three, because then we’ll—that’ll only give them time to regroup, and retrain, and then attack again.

So we have to be certain that when that line is agreed, and it’s for Ukraine to decide what is acceptable. But when that is—that is agreed, we need to be 100 percent certain that it stops there. And the only way to make sure that it stops there is partly to arm the Ukrainians, as we do, but I think that in top—on top of arming the Ukrainians, we need some credible security guarantees. And the credible—the most credible security guarantees you can get is Article Five. So therefore, I think that NATO membership is the way to answer the beautiful quote you have, that if you want a peaceful Europe, you need a stable Ukraine. And NATO guarantees for Ukraine is the way to achieve that.

MOHYELDIN: Because you brought up the line of the ceasefire, I do want to ask you about something. And we—maybe I’ll get two questions in before we open it up to the floor. And that has to do with what is taking place in this country. Do you have a preference as to which president wins? (Laughter.) Because it—I mean, look, it’s not—I’m not trying to be facetious here. We have very clear differences in the two presidential candidates about their views on Ukraine. And to your point, the vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance just said, you know, his vision—the Trump peace plan probably looks like the current line of demarcation between Russia and Ukraine, that becomes a demilitarized zone. That’s not what you’re describing right now.

STOLTENBERG: First of all, let me just say that I am—I have been—I have been secretary general for NATO for ten years for many reasons, but I think one main reason is I’ve never gone into domestic politics. So I—

MOHYELDIN: But you’re outgoing now, so you don’t have—

STOLTENBERG: No, I know. I know. But—

MOHYELDIN: You have four days left. It’s—

STOLTENBERG: I need to behave also the last few days. (Laughter.) So that’s point number one.

MOHYELDIN: OK. But put the candidates aside. Put the candidates aside. If you’re just evaluating the plans of what these two candidates are positioning as foreign policy on Ukraine, you clearly—based on what you’ve described, there’s one candidate that meets that definition and the other doesn’t.

STOLTENBERG: No, but what I’m saying is that it is for the Ukrainians to decide what is acceptable. So I will not define the exact line or what are the conditions for accepting a solution. I’m only saying that unless we arm Ukraine, they will lose the war. And then there will be occupation, no peace, because I don’t think that President Putin has changed his mind, his ambition. There’s no doubt that the purpose of the invasion was to control Kyiv, to control Ukraine. They were on the doorsteps of Kyiv. So the only thing that can prevent them from that is some kind of strength that ensures that they cannot win and achieve that by military means.

Then, of course, most wars, or at least many wars, end at the negotiating table. But we know that a lot happens around that negotiating table is inextricably linked to the strength on the battlefield. So the better outcome for Ukraine, the stronger they have to be on the battlefield.

It’s not for me to decide the price they are willing to pay, how painful that has to be. But my responsibility, our responsibility, is to enable them to achieve a result where they can prevail as a sovereign, independent nation.

MOHYELDIN: Just to follow up on that and I’ll put a—one of our candidates said I would encourage Russia to do whatever the hell they want if NATO members don’t pay. Do you agree with that? (Laughter.)

STOLTENBERG: I don’t agree with that. But I strongly believe that it is in the interest of the United States, regardless of who wins this election, to continue to have a strong NATO. And I expect whoever wins to live up to that because NATO is good for Europe, but NATO is also very good for the United States. It’s a very good deal.

Remember that it is in the security interest of the United States to have a strong NATO, because in NATO the United States has something no other major power has, and that is more than thirty friends and allies. I have a great respect for the United States. It’s by far the biggest ally. You pay a lot. You really contribute. But the United States is 25 percent of the world economy. Together with NATO allies, we are 50 percent of the world economy, 50 percent of global GDP, and 50 percent of the world’s military might. So you are safer with NATO than without.

And the U.S. have never gone to war alone since the Korean War without NATO allies. And many European allies have paid the highest—and Canadians—have paid the highest—the ultimate price in those wars in support of the United States. And one of the reasons why Russia and China are so eager to criticize NATO, to divide NATO, to undermine NATO is that they see the strength of NATO for the United States. So since they are so heavily against NATO, maybe that’s an indication for you to be in favor of NATO. (Laughter.) And so that’s the first thing.

MOHYELDIN: Diplomatically answered, very diplomatically.

STOLTENBERG: Yeah. OK. (Laughter.)

The second thing is that if you look at the—at the opinion polls and also speak with people in the—in the Congress from both sides, there is broad bipartisan support for NATO in the United States. That’s the fact. It continues to be. So I just want to relate these poll(s) have been record high.

The third thing is that the criticism we have heard from the U.S. and also from former President Trump has not primarily been against NATO; it has primarily been against NATO allies not paying enough for NATO. And they have been right. But NATO allies have changed. They’re paying. They are paying significantly more, added I think it’s six hundred and—several hundred billions extra for defense. And as I said, twenty-three are spending more than 2 percent. The U.S. is not now the highest defense spender based on GDP. Poland and some of the Baltic countries, yeah, are spending more. So, on that issue, where the U.S. has been right, things have changed, and they’ve improved significantly.

MOHYELDIN: Let me just do one more question real quick, and then I’m going to open it up to the floor, and then we’ll take some virtual questions. And this one, again, I’m going to share a quote of yours, get your reaction to it, because it ruffled some feathers in Beijing. You said recently, “Our security is global. While NATO is a regional alliance, we need a global approach. And that includes also our approach to China because, again, the war in Ukraine demonstrates that our security is not regional. That’s the reason why NATO has stepped up further cooperation. We have our Asia-Pacific partners, that include South Korea, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand.” From a Beijing perspective, it ruffled some feathers because it’s been seen as NATO, a European, North Atlantic alliance. Now you’re suggesting it has responsibilities in the Asia-Pacific as well.

STOLTENBERG: But I try—sometimes I try to be precise. It’s very difficult, but what I tried to say with that quote—which is—

MOHYELDIN: Yeah, that’s—it’s your quote. Yeah.

STOLTENBERG: Yeah, yeah, very good quote. So we can hear it again. But I can try to say it without reading it back to you, but I’ll fundamentally try to say the same. (Laughter.) NATO is and will remain a regional alliance. Meaning, we will be an alliance of European countries and North America. That’s enshrined in our founding treaty. So to become a NATO ally you need to be either Canada or United States. Cannot be Mexico. Cannot be Colombia. Cannot be any other countries, as we say in Europe, on the other side of the Atlantic, except for United States and Canada. They are explicitly mentioned in the treaty.

Then we are open for all European countries, as long as they’re democratic and live up to NATO standards. Most European countries are already members of NATO. So it’s not so—there are some more, but there are very few. So, but OK, we can discuss Ukraine is important, Georgia and some others, but most of Europe are members. So NATO will remain, according to our founding treaty, an alliance of Europe and North America, no question.

But this region, the transatlantic region, faces global threats. So we need to address those threats. And they are outside the transatlantic territory. And that’s actually fundamentally nothing new. Terrorism has been global for decades. Terrorism has emanated from Afghanistan, from Iraq, from Syria, ISIS, al-Qaida. And that has brought NATO into the Middle East, Iraq, Afghanistan. Cyber is global. We have to address those threats. And space, which is more and more weaponized, global. You cannot say that’s transatlantic. It’s quite big. (Laughter.) Then—yeah.

Then, of course, China matters for our security. Not because we are moving out in the South China Sea as NATO, but because they are coming close to us. We see them in Africa. We see them in the Arctic. We see them trying to control critical infrastructure in our own countries. We see them in cyberspace. And we see how China is fueling the most serious military conflict in Europe since the Second World War by propping up the Russian war economy. The microelectronics, the components which are used to build the bombs on the missiles that Russia is using against Ukraine every day, are based on deliveries from China.

So then to say that this is a regional thing, no, it’s not a regional thing, because the main enablers of Russia’s war are from outside Europe—North Korea, Iran, and China. So therefore, we need to address that challenge. And China’s threatening neighbors, cracking down on democracy, don’t share our values. And therefore, we will work closely with our partners in the Indo-Pacific.

MOHYELDIN: OK, well I’ll leave it at that for now. I have a lot more, but I want to open it up to members of the floor. Please, if you don’t mind, stand up, state your affiliation, and ask your question. No statements, please. We’ll start in the back and work our way to the front. This gentleman right here. Yeah.

Q: Hi. I’m Daniel Silverberg from Capstone in Washington, D.C.

Mindful, Mr. Secretary that you don’t comment on the domestic politics of NATO members, I’m curious what you would recommend to your successor in dealing with the challenge of democratic backsliding in Hungary, and also the shifting political winds particularly in Germany, what seems like against support for the mission in Ukraine, and possibly the NATO mission. Thank you.

STOLTENBERG: First—(coughs)—sorry. I think you have to understand that NATO was established, and is, an organization which is designed to deal with external threats. The European Union, for instance, is a bit different. They have mechanisms. They have paragraphs, provisions in their founding treaties which are addressing also more internal things, to address them with raising sanctions and so on when states or member states doesn’t give up to the principles of the organization. We don’t have that kind of things. Also, the founding members of NATO didn’t develop those. So we don’t have any sanctions against any ally that we feel is not fully living up to our standards. And if we had, based on the way we make decisions in NATO, they have to be agreed by consensus. And, of course, the likelihood of a consensus to punish one member is zero.

So is not as if we can do anything against an ally we don’t like, except for—and that is the way we do it—is that then we sit down with them and we address those concerns, and we use NATO as a platform to push, to facilitate, to find solutions, and to address, for instance, concerns on whether all allies live up to the democratic standards. So I will—I welcome both the next secretary general to do as I have done. It’s for him to decide, but to do as I have done, and also other allies have done, is that when there are concerns about specific allies’, as I’d say, yeah, level of respect for these values, we erase it inside NATO. And we should continue to do that. But then NATO is a platform to raise concerns and to try to do something with them, not an organization to impose sanctions or to push anyone out.

Then the other one was about?

Q: Shifting political winds in Germany.

STOLTENBERG: Yeah. Well, again, it’s a paradox, because people ask me questions like that, and that’s a fair question to ask, as if I, in a way, could guarantee anything. But, you know, we are in alliance of 32 allies, with a lot of elections all the time. And if I could say I can guarantee this or that, well, then it’s not democracy anymore. So it is a democratic right to make stupid decisions. (Laughter.) And if I said no, no, I 100 percent guarantee that—for instance, in my own country, there are many people who are voting not to my party. It’s a big mistake, but it just happens. (Laughter.)

So that can—I cannot guarantee anything. But what I can say is that NATO has proven extremely resilient. And I read just now, because we’ve had a 75^th anniversary, a book about NATO. You know, people have been concerned about new governments in this alliance since the beginning. Also, in the—in the ’50s and the ’60s. But, for instance, with the new government in Portugal in ’75 there were big concerns, because then you had a stable dictatorship for some years that was supportive of NATO, so it worked. Then suddenly they had a democratic election. There were some radicals there. And there were deep concerns, not least in Washington, about can that work? It worked very well.

And we had big concerns now in Italy, with the new government there, they were not so supportive of NATO and Ukraine. Well, they support NATO and Ukraine. When I became prime minister for the second time, I brought in a left socialist. They left my party as a kind of—my party’s the moderate social democrats. They left my party in the ’60s because they were against NATO. And then they put them into government in 2005. And we invested in F-35s and increased defense spending, and everyone was happy. So—

MOHYELDIN: NATO does that to you, basically, is what you’re saying. (Laughter.) Once you’re in NATO, you can’t get out. (Laughs.)

STOLTENBERG: Yeah, but what I’m saying—and we had a new election in Netherlands, and people were concerned about support for Ukraine and NATO. And so, again, I believe that that reason also prevails, and that NATO will prevail mainly because people realize that we are safer together than alone. And be whatever you want for it, that’s a very strong incentive to stay in NATO.

MOHYELDIN: This lady right here.

Q: Hello. I’m Lucy Komisar. I’m a journalist.

So I wanted to ask whether any of these things had led to the situation now: First, the NATO expansion to the east, against the promise made to Gorbachev. The support of the 2014 coup against an elected government of Ukraine because it wanted an economic deal with Russia instead of the EU. Eight years of Ukraine bombing the breakaway Donbas of Russia(n) speakers who were opposed to the coup. And then the U.S. supporting the military that ended up on the border, about to invade, in the Donbas that caused the Russian invasion. Did any of this happen? And by the way, you mentioned the Minsk Accords, and those were violated because the U.S. and the U.K. told Zelensky don’t do it. So it seems to me, from my vantage point, that NATO and the U.S. have been using this war as a proxy war against the Russians, and the poor Ukrainians have been the cannon fodder.

MOHYELDIN: Thank you so much for the question.

STOLTENBERG: First, on the issue of whether NATO ever promised not to enlarge or to allow new members after the end of the Cold War, I’ve seen, you know, people saying that that’s the case. First, it was never promised. It was never an agreement. And if so, it must have—

Q: The U.S., not NATO. The U.S.

STOLTENBERG: Ah. But the U.S. discussed that possibility with Russia back in 1990, but when they agreed—and two things. That was about the unification of Germany. It was not about any enlargement of NATO beyond Germany, because then we still had the Warsaw Pact and that was not the issue at all. It was unification of East and West Germany.

It was based on whatever. Out of all the reports and everything I read about that is that, yes, it was an issue that was discussed, but when they had the four-party agreement facilitating the unification, there were no provisions about that East Germany cannot be part of NATO.

So when the deal was made, it was not in the deal. So, yes, maybe it was discussed, but it was not part of the deal that allowed the unification of Germany. So that’s the first thing to say. It’s a bit strange to say that something has been agreed when actually, in the agreement that was signed by also Russia at that time, or Soviet Union, there were no provision against East Germany becoming part of NATO when Germany was unified.

Second, this idea has been used against any NATO enlargement. And that has been not an issue at all, meaning that it has never been in any document or any negotiation that we should deny Poland, Lithuania, the Baltic countries and so on, any right to join the alliance.

And NATO and Russia signed something called the Founding Act. That was in ’97, I think. And that’s about how we can work together. Nothing about no enlargement of NATO. So it is a bit strange that, in one way, there should be a kind of secret deal, and especially if it was the U.S. and Russia deciding that Poland cannot become a NATO ally. Which right has they to deny Poland that? Poland is a sovereign, independent nation. They can—they can choose their own path. No one can deny them that.

So I think this is about—this is really about the sovereign right of every nation to choose their own path. And I mentioned Norway. Again, we are happy that no one tried to deny us that right. We were then the only country bordering Russia, and Russia had the same kind of rhetoric: this is a threat. It was not a threat. And Poland, the Baltic countries joining, it’s the democratic right of these countries.

Then—(laughs)—all the statements that you had about the war in Ukraine, there have been—

Q: A coup in 2014.

STOLTENBERG: It was not a coup. It was the Ukrainians that didn’t want to be coerced from agreeing—an agreement with the European Union. And since then, there have been several elections in Ukraine where they have elected people—the last one now is President Zelensky—with a clear message of an independent Ukraine and, actually, a Ukraine that wants to join NATO. If you look at the election results, if you look at the opinion polls, Ukraine is a country that wants to join EU, wants to join NATO, and they have the right to do so. And Russia invaded to prevent that from happening.

MOHYELDIN: We have time, probably, for one more question, because I know you have a very busy schedule. Do we have a virtual question? We’ll take a virtual question.

OPERATOR: We’ll take the next question from Vanessa Newman (sp).

Q: Hi. Thank you very much, Secretary General Stoltenberg. I once met you at the Aspen Security Forum.

I wanted to shift gears a bit and talk about the importance of your—NATO’s biotechnology strategy, which was published but is still remarkably vague. How do you view it in the context of, you know, Russian aggression toward Europe and using, perhaps, Eastern European capabilities to further develop biotechnology in a defensive aspect? Thank you.

STOLTENBERG: Well, NATO has stepped up what we do on technology in general because we realize, or we have acknowledged for years and we recognize, the importance of technology. We have established a new innovation fund. We have established a network of research centers that are working together. And we’re working very closely with the private sector, because before most of the defense-related technology was developed by government institutions, by the defense itself, but now—also like nuclear or GPS or internet was very much something that came out from state-owned entities—now most of the advanced technological development happens in the private sector, and therefore we need to work more closely with the private sector. So this is the broad picture, what we do to maintain NATO’s technological edge.

And you said biotechnology, and of course that also applies for biotechnology. We also believe it’s important to not only develop technologies, but also develop guidelines, ethical rules for the use of technology. The challenge is, of course, that we can develop those guidelines and those ethical standards, but the—but the challenge is to also make sure that potential adversaries adhere to a minimum of ethical standards.

MOHYELDIN: All right. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Stoltenberg, thank you so much. Really appreciate your time. I know you have a very busy schedule. Thank you so much for the questions, everyone. Thank you. (Applause.)

(END)

This is an uncorrected transcript.