Document confirms US told Russia NATO won’t expand

[Jack]

Not so fast!

Putin's 'false flag' refugee crisis that is set to spark war in Ukraine: 700,000 civilians arrive in tent cities after Pro-Russian separatists ordered them out and staged 'fake' bomb attacks

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ar-Russian-separatists-call-men-reserves.html

I just watched 'Fareed Zakaria GPS' and he had Condoleeza Rice on.
She said there was an agreement about not sending any non-German NATO troops into East Germany. Adding, at the time, no one even considered Poland, Romania, or other east European countries joining NATO. She said this didn't really come up until Missile Systems were placed in these former East Bloc countries.

Another segment was about Ukraine. Putin calls it 'Little Brother'. This segment concluded with the real reason is that Putin wants to 'annex' Ukraine.

 

[moon]

The situation is farcical . Here you have an aggressive NATO advancing on Russia on the pretext that its moral code is to support those seeking ' self-determination '

YOU MEAN LIKE THE PALESTINIANS, JOE ?

Haw, haw..........................................haw.

 

[Jack]

The situation is farcical . Here you have an aggressive NATO advancing on Russia on the pretext that its moral code is to support those seeking ' self-determination '





Haw, haw..........................................haw.

It's an alliance of Democracies.

 

[Jack]

I wish I had the time.

What papers such as this do reveal though is that the Russians do strive to honor international agreements in their own courts.
Where is the American equivalent ?
This whole threat of war is due to NATO advancement and Russian objection. If there IS a legal basis which binds both states then it ought to be aired- instead of all this pissing-contest that Biden is cheerleading.

Didn't Russia sign an Agreement to insure Ukraine Borders when the latter gave up Nuclear Weapons?

 

[Cypress]

superceded by actual documents -not Gorby's take on it

Gorbachev was there and he does not remember any treaty or guarantees of this nature.

Post a link to the actual treaty, not a link to a Kremlin state news service.

 

[Diesel]

Well- your concern with Israel denotes complicity by silence.



It's claimed that NATO agreed not to advance eastward beyond East Germany. That seems to me to fit with Gorbachev's actions in winding down the territories of the USSR. ' Glasnost ' had a great deal of appeal to the world's peaceniks at the time, we're told- and the Russians, under Gorbachev , certainly won the high moral ground. They also saved billions upon billions in armaments spending and so ended the Cold War rather than losing it - a victory for peace and a defeat for the warmongers. You're entitled to see it differently, of course.
Still- agreements with the US aren't worth the paper they're not written on, according to the description of policy offered by member ' Flash ' earlier , so Russia still holds the high moral ground - as a defender of its territory- and the US, as usual, is the aggressor. Putin has drawn his lines- back off or it's on- and that means for everybody.
Still want to push ?

As you are complicit with the illegal and violent overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy by the US government. You're complicit with the intentional obliteration of an entire country, society, and culture. See how that works?

The US can't make decisions for NATO and didn't agree to anything. You have yet to say a single word about the other three ally countries that were present at that meeting. You're claiming that a note written about a statement that was supposedly made at a meeting 31 years ago constitutes an "agreement" between a country that had no authority to make it and another country that blatantly undermines democracy around the globe and openly murders its own citizens and other people when they piss off the single individual who runs that country, for life, with an iron fist.

It's that second country, Russia, that you claim has "the moral high ground". By any objective standard, that isn't true. In fact, I believe that you only say it because you hope such an anti-American sentiment will cause a reaction. From me, you'll get a response but not a reaction. There are millions of reasons to criticize the US. The conflict with Russia is the least of them; and I think you know that.

 

[Diesel]

As agreements are , apparently, worthless then that is meaningless, isn't it. The point was that the word of the US is easily dismissed while that of a Russian drunkard is to be honored.


Haw, haw.......................haw.



That depends upon your criteria for judgment. Mine is , essentially , to judge leaders by their skill in avoiding wars and not killing people. Russia isn't perfect in that area but the US is the supreme villain with Beelzebub's hot trident up its ass.

You could start by honestly evaluating what happened rather than hyperbolically misrepresenting what happened for the sole purpose of the calling the US a pile of shit. I can't remember where you live. Isn't it overseas somewhere?

 

[Diesel]

Gorbachev was there and he does not remember any treaty or guarantees of this nature.

Post a link to the actual treaty, not a link to a Kremlin state news service.

There is no treaty. There isn't a memorandum of understanding. There aren't even documents (plural). There is one document that a guy found in a library in Boston: the minutes of a meeting attended by four NATO members and Russia. The feigned offense in this thread stems from a sentence that indicates that someone said in 1991 at a meeting that could not bind NATO that NATO shouldn't expand eastward.

But it seems obvious to me what the actual grievances are about: Depending on the poster, it's either 1.) the US is generally an evil force that does more bad than good in the world or 2.) everything the US does under a Democratic administration is evil/bad/wrong.

 

[moon]

As you are complicit with the illegal and violent overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy by the US government. You're complicit with the intentional obliteration of an entire country, society, and culture. See how that works?

No- the Hawaiian monarchy , to my knowledge , has never featured here. Israeli fascism is featured every week- to silence.

The US can't make decisions for NATO and didn't agree to anything. You have yet to say a single word about the other three ally countries that were present at that meeting. You're claiming that a note written about a statement that was supposedly made at a meeting 31 years ago constitutes an "agreement" between a country that had no authority to make it and another country that blatantly undermines democracy around the globe and openly murders its own citizens and other people when they piss off the single individual who runs that country, for life, with an iron fist.

It's that second country, Russia, that you claim has "the moral high ground". By any objective standard, that isn't true. In fact, I believe that you only say it because you hope such an anti-American sentiment will cause a reaction. From me, you'll get a response but not a reaction. There are millions of reasons to criticize the US. The conflict with Russia is the least of them; and I think you know that.

NATO's ' promise' not to advance eastward is confirmed by an attendee. That, along with the documentary evidence, constitutes a scenario that I can envisage Gorbachev complying with. The fact is that we can't say for certain and simply have to follow our own logic. Mine tells me that - whatever transpired- the Russians believed it and trusted that as a basis for future detente.

 

[moon]

There is no treaty. There isn't a memorandum of understanding. There aren't even documents (plural). There is one document that a guy found in a library in Boston: the minutes of a meeting attended by four NATO members and Russia. The feigned offense in this thread stems from a sentence that indicates that someone said in 1991 at a meeting that could not bind NATO that NATO shouldn't expand eastward.

But it seems obvious to me what the actual grievances are about: Depending on the poster, it's either 1.) the US is generally an evil force that does more bad than good in the world or 2.) everything the US does under a Democratic administration is evil/bad/wrong.

NATO did promise Moscow it wouldn't expand, former German defense official tells RT
Willy Wimmer told RT he personally witnessed the West vowing that NATO would not expand to the east

Despite their denials, Western leaders did make a promise to the USSR that NATO would not expand to Central and Eastern Europe when Moscow agreed to Germany’s reunification, Willy Wimmer, a former vice president of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), has claimed in an interview with RT on Saturday.

The veteran politician, who served as parliamentary secretary to Germany’s defense minister between 1985 and 1992, said that he personally witnessed this promise when he “sent Chancellor Helmut Kohl the statement on the Bundeswehr in NATO and NATO in Europe, which was completely incorporated into the treaties on reunification.”

Berlin’s decision at that time “not to station NATO troops on the territory of the former East Germany and to stop NATO near the Oder” was part of this promise, Wimmer added.

https://www.rt.com/russia/549961-west-nato-expand-willy-wimmer/

..............

 

[dukkha]

Gorbachev was there and he does not remember any treaty or guarantees of this nature.

Post a link to the actual treaty, not a link to a Kremlin state news service.

I posted link to multiple documents

Declassified documents show security assurances against NATO expansion to Soviet leaders from Baker, Bush, Genscher, Kohl, Gates, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Hurd, Major, and Woerner

https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-...rd-western-leaders-early#.WjAX9r_XxYI.twitter

The documents show that multiple national leaders were considering and rejecting Central and Eastern European membership in NATO as of early 1990 and through 1991, that discussions of NATO in the context of German unification negotiations in 1990 were not at all narrowly limited to the status of East German territory, and that subsequent Soviet and Russian complaints about being misled about NATO expansion were founded in written contemporaneous memcons and telcons at the highest levels.

The documents reinforce former CIA Director Robert Gates’s criticism of “pressing ahead with expansion of NATO eastward [in the 1990s], when Gorbachev and others were led to believe that wouldn’t happen.”[1] The key phrase, buttressed by the documents, is “led to believe.”

 

[Diesel]

No- the Hawaiian monarchy , to my knowledge , has never featured here. Israeli fascism is featured every week- to silence.



NATO's ' promise' not to advance eastward is confirmed by an attendee. That, along with the documentary evidence, constitutes a scenario that I can envisage Gorbachev complying with. The fact is that we can't say for certain and simply have to follow our own logic. Mine tells me that - whatever transpired- the Russians believed it and trusted that as a basis for future detente.

By whom? You? I have both seen and participated in threads about the Israel/Palestine conflict. I can't say I've seen one every week nor that I participate in all of them. Whomever you're trying to accuse of "silence", however, ain't me, so try harder. As I've tried to get you to understand, people have different interests. I don't need to scream "FASCIST" every time those people attack each other in order to care about the Middle East any more than I need to scream "RACISM" every time a group of white people murder a black person to care about race relations.

I don't care what a single attendee to a meeting that had no authority and occurred more than 30 years ago thinks he remembers. The fact is that NATO has grown larger, by the desires of its newer members, and that bothers Putin. NATO has not attacked Russian interests nor invaded Russian territory. The Russians have done exactly that in reverse. If a comment made at an inconsequential meeting last century caused the Russians to comply with detente then, as you suggest, and doesn't now, as is apparent, so be it. Let Putin begin a war. The West has been abundantly clear about what the consequences of that will be and no amount of finger pointing into the past is going to change that.

 

[Diesel]

..............

Did you have something to say? I know you're a voracious consumer of Russian propaganda because you hate the US, but that article doesn't address anything I wrote.

 

[Cypress]

There is no treaty. There isn't a memorandum of understanding. There aren't even documents (plural). There is one document that a guy found in a library in Boston: the minutes of a meeting attended by four NATO members and Russia. The feigned offense in this thread stems from a sentence that indicates that someone said in 1991 at a meeting that could not bind NATO that NATO shouldn't expand eastward.

But it seems obvious to me what the actual grievances are about: Depending on the poster, it's either 1.) the US is generally an evil force that does more bad than good in the world or 2.) everything the US does under a Democratic administration is evil/bad/wrong.

Poland, Lithuania, and the Czech republic are sovereign nations who can decide for themselves what international organizations they want to join.

The days of major powers being entitled to colonies and spheres of influence should have ended in 1945.

 

[moon]

By whom? You? I have both seen and participated in threads about the Israel/Palestine conflict. I can't say I've seen one every week nor that I participate in all of them.

Whomever you're trying to accuse of "silence", however, ain't me, so try harder.

Perhaps you could direct me to a few so that I can know what you think. At present I don't because I can't recall any of your contributions.

As I've tried to get you to understand, people have different interests. I don't need to scream "FASCIST" every time those people attack each other in order to care about the Middle East any more than I need to scream "RACISM" every time a group of white people murder a black person to care about race relations.

Your condescension doesn't sit well with your posturing.

I don't care what a single attendee to a meeting that had no authority and occurred more than 30 years ago thinks he remembers. The fact is that NATO has grown larger, by the desires of its newer members, and that bothers Putin. NATO has not attacked Russian interests nor invaded Russian territory. The Russians have done exactly that in reverse. If a comment made at an inconsequential meeting last century caused the Russians to comply with detente then, as you suggest, and doesn't now, as is apparent, so be it. Let Putin begin a war. The West has been abundantly clear about what the consequences of that will be and no amount of finger pointing into the past is going to change that.

No, you don't care. I care. I admire honor and truth. I was raised in the ' John Wayne ' school of Americana wherein the bad guys lied and wriggled and the good guys' values were different to that. That's real to many people- and it's very sad that it's just theater to US politicians.

" Let Putin begin a war " ? You're deranged.

 

[Diesel]

Poland, Lithuania, and the Czech republic are sovereign nations who can decide for themselves what international organizations they want to join.

The days of major powers being entitled to colonies and spheres of influence should have ended in 1945.

I agree. I don't know how much NATO members persuaded those former Soviet satellites to join NATO, but it is abundantly clear that it was their choice to do so. That's as much an "aggression" toward Russia as other countries entering into trade alliances with each other is an "aggression" against the US.

Russia, the US, and the UK still exercise more influence over other sovereign countries than they should, but Putin having a hissy fit about Ukraine is not Joe Biden's fault.

 

[Diesel]

Perhaps you could direct me to a few so that I can know what you think. At present I don't because I can't r4ecall any of your contributions.

I find this site's search function clunky and can't easily search my 9,000+ posts. What I can tell you is that I'm no authority on the Israel/Palestine conflict. I'm not terribly interested by it. I think that the creation of Israel after WWII was necessary and right. I also think the Palestinians have an inalienable right to nationhood.

I understand you have a horse in the race, but I'm under no illusion that both sides use unacceptable tactics to advance their own goals. Israel exists today because the US supports it. Hamas is a terrorist organization, but Palestine wouldn't be the first country to be ruled by terrorists. Russia's a good example of that, which is actually the topic of this thread.

Your condescension doesn't sit well with your posturing.

If the phrase, "As I've tried to get you to understand," doesn't sit well with you, you're really not going to like other things that I say.

No, you don't care. I care. I admire honor and truth. I was raised in the ' John Wayne ' school of Americana wherein the bad guys lied and wriggled and the good guys' values were different to that. That's real to many people- and it's very sad that it's just theater to US politicians.

Ah, the beauty of a free society. I can't watch you post that without laughing out loud though. You admire honor and truth, but you support Russia. The US is not always magnanimous, but Russia is neither honorable nor honest. Your two positions are mutually exclusive.

As the hell pit age of Trumpism continues to show us, there are no such things as universal truths anymore to millions and millions of people. I, too, remember a time when Americans rallied around their flag and faced their common areas in solidarity. Those days are clearly over. We can't even agree that up means up and green is a different color than yellow anymore. How are we supposed to agree on who are the bad guys and who are the good guys when a third or more of the country wants to hand over power to bad guys? Unfortunately, our educational systems suck and memories fade. It's more expedient for some people to say, "Fuck the libs, let's support Russia," than it is for them to realize what history tells us that will lead to.

" Let Putin begin a war " ? You're deranged.

No, Putin is deranged. Get your moralistic judgments turned upright.

 

[moon]

I find this site's search function clunky and can't easily search my 9,000+ posts.

Well- come back when you've found a way to back your own statements.

I repeat;

No, you don't care. I care. I admire honor and truth. I was raised in the ' John Wayne ' school of Americana wherein the bad guys lied and wriggled and the good guys' values were different to that. That's real to many people- and it's very sad that it's just theater to US politicians.

 

[Dutch Uncle]

.... I admire honor and truth. ....

Your definition of honor and truth is the reverse of the standard American definitions. Where were you raised?

 

[PostmodernProphet]

Of course- I'm not a practitioner of international law- but I am inclined to go with what feels right and just.

what felt right to the former satellites of the Soviet Union.....should they have remained satellites of Russia because that was right and just to Russia?.....