Outgoing NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has met with top United States officials at the White House to preview topics for an upcoming alliance summit in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Stoltenberg, who will step down as secretary general in September, said at the Vilnius meeting that the NATO alliance would work “to support and step up support for Ukraine” and “further strengthen our defense deterrent”.
He also underlined the need to send a strong signal to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been in favor of his country’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine since its launch in February 2022.
“It was an attack not only on Ukraine, but also on our core values and on free people everywhere,” Stoltenberg said Tuesday as he sat across from US President Joe Biden.
“And that is why President Putin must not win this war, because that will not only be a tragedy for the Ukrainians, but also make the world more dangerous. It will send a message to authoritarian leaders around the world, including in China, that when they use military force, they get what they want.”
Other priorities for the Vilnius Summit, set for July 11-12, include a stronger partnership with countries in the Indo-Pacific region. Commenting on Tuesday, Stoltenberg also said he would urge NATO allies to honor a 2006 pledge to spend two percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense spending — a pledge many of the 31 Member States have not complied in recent years. years ago.
“I expect allies to agree that 2 percent of GDP for defense should be a minimum that we should all invest in our defense, in our collective security,” Stoltenberg said.
Reunion with Biden
Tuesday’s meeting came a day later than scheduled, after Biden had an unexpected root canal on Monday that forced the 80-year-old president to postpone several White House appointments.
It is Biden’s fourth meeting with the NATO chief, a Norwegian politician and former prime minister who assumed the role in 2014. Ahead of Stoltenberg’s departure, Biden congratulated him on his tenure in the military alliance, which NATO member states extended three times.
“I think you did a fantastic job,” Biden told Stoltenberg. “NATO allies have never been more united. We both worked really hard to make sure that happened. And so far, so good.”
“We have strengthened NATO’s eastern flank, made it clear that we will defend every inch of NATO territory,” Biden continued.
He also referred to an important principle of the North Atlantic Treaty, NATO’s founding document: Article 5, which states that if any NATO ally is attacked, it will be regarded as an attack on the alliance as a whole. Biden stressed that the provision is ironclad.
“I’ll say it again,” Biden said. “The United States’ commitment to NATO with Article 5 is ironclad.”
New US aid for Ukraine
Earlier in the day, the Biden administration announced a new one security utility package for Ukraine, the 40th use of presidential “drawdown” authority to collect US Department of Defense equipment.
The $325 million package included weapons and equipment such as artillery shells, anti-tank weapons and ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS).
Tuesday’s aid coincided with a newly launched counter-offensive by Ukrainian forces seeking to drive Russian military members from their territory.
So far, gains have been modest, but Stoltenberg expressed optimism about the effort in his White House remarks. “The offensive is being launched and the Ukrainians are making progress, making progress,” Stoltenberg said.
“It is still early days, but what we do know is that the more land the Ukrainians manage to liberate, the stronger they will be at the negotiating table. And the more likely that at some point President Putin will understand that he will never win this war of aggression on the battlefield.”
Support for Sweden at NATO
The war in Ukraine has also increased pressure to boost NATO membership, with both Biden and Stoltenberg expressing support for welcoming Sweden into the military alliance on Tuesday.
Sweden is one of only five members of the European Union not part of the NATO alliance. A bulwark of military neutrality for nearly 200 years, Sweden has joined NATO over rising fears of Russian aggression in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.
Sweden’s northern neighbour, Finland, became NATO’s 31st member in April, overcoming objections from Turkey and Hungary.
Although Sweden submitted its application for the alliance at the same time as Finland, it faced more entrenched opposition from Turkey, which accused the northern European country of harboring “terrorists” from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party.
Negotiations stalled further when protesters in the Swedish capital Stockholm burned a copy of the Quran and hung an effigy of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in January. Turkey denounced the incident as evidence of Islamophobia. Swedish officials, meanwhile, denounced the protests, but said they were protected by the country’s freedom of expression.
Nevertheless, Stoltenberg struck a positive note when he spoke on Tuesday about Sweden’s possible entry into NATO. He has previously urged Turkey to remove its concerns.
“We all look forward to welcoming Sweden as a full member of the alliance as soon as possible,” said Stoltenberg.
Biden echoed that assessment and took the opportunity to also criticize his Russian counterpart. “Putin is making a mistake even in seeking the Finlandization of NATO,” Biden said, referring to efforts to make NATO allies neutral in military matters, as Finland once was.
He added: “You have the NATOization of Finland and hopefully soon of Sweden.”