How NATO and Sanctions Perpetuate War and Suffering — 국제전략센터/The International Strategy Center

by Dae-Han Song (Networking Team)

On April 10, the International Strategy Center held its monthly Progressive Forum on “How NATO and Sanctions Perpetuate War and Suffering.” It hosted Reiner Braun (executive director of the 131 year old International Peace Bureau, a founder of the No to NATO Network, and author of Einstein - Peace Now); and Vijay Prashad (journalist, author, and director of the Tricontinental Institute for Social Change). The event involved presentations, followed by questions from the ISC and audience members. Below is a synthesis of the presentations and Q&A.

A Global Military Alliance

Despite the end of the Soviet Warsaw Pact and, soon after, the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO, not only persisted but expanded. This violated the 1990 Charter of Paris (officially ending the Cold War) which Reiner explains “very clearly said we want a united Europe, including Russia, on a peaceful basis of cooperation and disarmament.” Yet, instead of a unified Europe, NATO continued excluding Russia while expanding its military alliance towards it. Even after multiple rounds, NATO enlargement continues with discussions today about Georgia, Moldova, Sweden, and Finland joining NATO.

Yet, joining NATO would escalate tensions. In particular, Finland’s membership would violate its neutrality treaty with Russia. NATO’s expansion towards Russia’s borders is exacerbated by NATO and Europe’s exclusion and rejection of Russian requests for NATO membership and economic cooperation. Reiner explains how Europe chose confrontation instead of cooperation with Russia in 2001 when it rejected Putin’s appeals in the German Parliament to work together in a mutually profitable development of Russia.

Putin in the German Parliament in 2001 *(Image Source:* *Zaronews*)

If the reason for its existence, countering the Soviet Union, ceased to be relevant, why has NATO persisted, even expanded? To Reiner, it’s because it “protects the dominance of the so-called white supremacy of the last 500 years.” Currently, it does so by “encircling Russia and China.” As he points out, one need only look at a map of NATO’s military bases and fleets encircling both countries to realize this point. NATO is not a regional security agreement but is, rather, the biggest “global military alliance in the world” with military agreements, exercises, and bases in Asia such as in: Japan and South Korea, both who regularly attend NATO conferences and are part of the US nuclear umbrella; Singapore, which provides a “key harbor for the military exercises in the whole Pacific”; and Malaysia and the Philippines. Furthemore, as Reiner explains, NATO uses “the old colonial relations, above all those of France and Great Britain,” to establish its presence and bases in Africa such as the US drone base in Niger and the US military training facilities in Nigeria. Ultimately, NATO is a global military alliance comprising “56% of the world’s military spending.” The wars it has waged around the world have left countries in ruins: as a result of the 20 year war in Afghanistan “95% of the people in Afghanistan are now suffering from hunger.”

An American Trojan Horse

Vijay Prashad elaborates that NATO is not a military alliance of equal partners but rather one dominated by the United States: “Do you really think that the foreign ministers of the defense chiefs of Germany, of the Netherlands, of the Baltic States, Lithuanian, Estonia, Latvia…have an equal say in Brussels at the NATO meetings as the US generals?” NATO is a Trojan horse for the US “to impose its general political line…in Europe and the world.”

Likely, US President Biden’s term in office will, according to Reiner, “make NATO into a strong united military alliance” with the European Union being “a smaller sister of the United States in NATO, taking over the responsibilities above all in relation to northern African and maybe the Balkan countries.” As Reiner points out, “Biden is maybe the most aggressive president you have seen in years,” a continuation of his long support of US wars as a senator. He explains how Biden continues sending weapons to Ukraine while doing nothing about the fascist elements in Ukraine’s politics or military.

No to NATO Movement

In 2009, Reiner [and his organization the International Peace Bureau (IPB)] was one of the founders of the No to War-No to NATO Network (Network). With membership organizations in most of the major countries, and peace activists in the Baltic ones, the Network seeks to de-legitimize and eventually abolish NATO and replace it with an inclusive security system for the world based on Olaf Palme’s common security.

On April 21, the “IPB, together with the International Trade Unions Confederation and the Olaf Palme Center,” will create a follow-up Olaf Palme report to the first one 40 years ago. Furthermore, the Network is planning protest actions against the next NATO summit in Madrid in June and awareness-raising and protest actions in different parts of the world.

Nonetheless, given NATO’s popularity after the war in Ukraine, the terrain of struggle remains difficult. The peace movement “is not the same way strong like…at the beginning of the eighties. Our peace movement is in many, many countries much too old…[and] not able to mobilize millions of people.” So, it must figure out “how we can become, again, stronger, and how can we develop our influence in society.”

Peace Amidst Uncertainty and Contradiction

In response, to a question on the impact of the war in Ukraine on the transition from a unipolar to a multipolar world, Vijay’s response is clear, “How can you be in an era of multipolarity when one country [the United States] has 800 military bases around the world…and fleets of ships all over the place with nuclear weapons in them?”

Rather we are in a world with “people struggling through the contradictions: desperate attempts by countries to create new kinds of platforms” such as BRICS. Sanctions exacerbate these contradictions. For example, even close US allies such as Germany and Japan, despite sanctioning Russia, can’t but keep on importing cheap Russian fossil fuels lest it drive their economies into recession. Furthemore, sanctions generate greater uncertainty not only in the lives of ordinary Russians that can’t access necessary goods but also to the rest of the world. If a drought in Ukraine and Russia between 2009 and 2010 that impacted 30% of the world’s wheat production led to a spike in world food prices destabilizing countries and creating mass unrest such as the Arab Spring, then what impact will war in Ukraine and sanctions in Russia have on it? According to Vijay, “the United States does two things without thinking: bomb countries and place sanctions on them….The dragon [United States] is firing from its mouth at the whole planet. It’s whipping its tail. It still doesn’t realize, perhaps, the damage it’s going to do.”

Both Reiner and Vijay echo the need for peace, especially when humanity is confronted with planetary challenges such as climate change. As Reiner explains, war erodes democracy and peace is the starting point of finding “the best idea for solving the global problems of the world” such as poverty, hunger, climate change, and democracy.

In navigating our way towards peace, Vijay takes inspiration from the Bandung Non-Aligned Movement, born in 1955 by the newly independent former colonies, which refused to “join this contest that the US wants to impose against the Soviet Union.” His answer today is building internationalism through the International People’s Assembly, “a political and social movement of 200 political and social organizations” including Brazil’s Landless Workers, the Workers Party of Tunisia, and the Communist Party of Nepal.

“Internationalism is a lot of work, comrades. It’s not easy…But we are here. We have to be courageous. We have a long way to go. We can’t allow a divided planet.”