The American Lie at the Root of the Ukraine War
"Not One Inch Eastward" and the Russo-Ukraine War
Imagine that you woke up to the news that China was sending hundreds of billions of dollars worth of military equipment and economic aid to Mexico and Canada. Not only that, but the aid was mainly flowing to terrorists, neo-Nazi militias, and other hardliners agitating for an invasion of America to “restore” Mexico’s pre-Mexican-American War borders. Now imagine that all that aid followed China’s promise that it would never send aid east of the Marshall Islands, but it was now even considering admitting Mexico to its military alliance structure and training cartel shock troops.
Surely, you would be angry, right? Not only that, but you would expect to find your politicians similarly alarmed by the situation and desirous of bringing an immediate end to it, even if it meant an invasion of Mexico to stamp out the terrorist operation before it was too late.
That is the situation in which the Russian Federation now finds herself. After pledges from the H.W. Bush Administration and its NATO allies that NATO would never expand east of Germany, not even by a single inch, NATO now rings Russia, with the almost sole exception of Ukraine. Further, it was planning to make Ukraine a member state while providing immense aid to neo-Nazi organizations, such as Right Sector and the Azov Battalion. This article will unpack that dark history and how America’s feckless politicians bear the brunt of responsibility for the current Russo-Ukraine War.
NOTE: This is the third article in our foreign policy series. The first was on how America promoted white genocide in Southern Africa and the second was on how America helped murder Syria’s Christians.
Background to Betrayal: The Promises Made
The Soviet Union was collapsing in 1990 when Western leaders began to meet with Soviet leadership and discuss what a post-USSR Europe would look like, namely in terms of what limits would be prescribed on NATO borders, if East and West Germany would be reunited, and what aid the former states of the USSR would receive.
Throughout the process, Western leaders, particularly West Germany’s Foreign Minister, Hans-Dietrich Genscher and US Secretary of State James Baker, pledged to the Soviets that NATO would not expand “one inch eastwards.” As George Washington University’s National Security Archive provides (emphasis added)1:
The first concrete assurances by Western leaders on NATO began on January 31, 1990, when West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher opened the bidding with a major public speech at Tutzing, in Bavaria, on German unification. The U.S. Embassy in Bonn (see Document 1) informed Washington that Genscher made clear “that the changes in Eastern Europe and the German unification process must not lead to an ‘impairment of Soviet security interests.’ Therefore, NATO should rule out an ‘expansion of its territory towards the east, i.e. moving it closer to the Soviet borders.’” The Bonn cable also noted Genscher’s proposal to leave the East German territory out of NATO military structures even in a unified Germany in NATO.
This latter idea of special status for the GDR territory was codified in the final German unification treaty signed on September 12, 1990, by the Two-Plus-Four foreign ministers (see Document 25). The former idea about “closer to the Soviet borders” is written down not in treaties but in multiple memoranda of conversation between the Soviets and the highest-level Western interlocutors (Genscher, Kohl, Baker, Gates, Bush, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Major, Woerner, and others) offering assurances throughout 1990 and into 1991 about protecting Soviet security interests and including the USSR in new European security structures. The two issues were related but not the same. Subsequent analysis sometimes conflated the two and argued that the discussion did not involve all of Europe. The documents published below show clearly that it did.
The “Tutzing formula” immediately became the center of a flurry of important diplomatic discussions over the next 10 days in 1990, leading to the crucial February 10, 1990, meeting in Moscow between Kohl and Gorbachev when the West German leader achieved Soviet assent in principle to German unification in NATO, as long as NATO did not expand to the east. The Soviets would need much more time to work with their domestic opinion (and financial aid from the West Germans) before formally signing the deal in September 1990.
The conversations before Kohl’s assurance involved explicit discussion of NATO expansion, the Central and East European countries, and how to convince the Soviets to accept unification. For example, on February 6, 1990, when Genscher met with British Foreign Minister Douglas Hurd, the British record showed Genscher saying, “The Russians must have some assurance that if, for example, the Polish Government left the Warsaw Pact one day, they would not join NATO the next.”
Having met with Genscher on his way into discussions with the Soviets, Baker repeated exactly the Genscher formulation in his meeting with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze on February 9, 1990, (see Document 4); and even more importantly, face to face with Gorbachev.
Not once, but three times, Baker tried out the “not one inch eastward” formula with Gorbachev in the February 9, 1990, meeting. He agreed with Gorbachev’s statement in response to the assurances that “NATO expansion is unacceptable.” Baker assured Gorbachev that “neither the President nor I intend to extract any unilateral advantages from the processes that are taking place,” and that the Americans understood that “not only for the Soviet Union but for other European countries as well it is important to have guarantees that if the United States keeps its presence in Germany within the framework of NATO, not an inch of NATO’s present military jurisdiction will spread in an eastern direction.” (See Document 6)
Afterwards, Baker wrote to Helmut Kohl who would meet with the Soviet leader on the next day, with much of the very same language. Baker reported: “And then I put the following question to him [Gorbachev]. Would you prefer to see a united Germany outside of NATO, independent and with no U.S. forces or would you prefer a unified Germany to be tied to NATO, with assurances that NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastward from its present position? He answered that the Soviet leadership was giving real thought to all such options [….] He then added, ‘Certainly any extension of the zone of NATO would be unacceptable.’” Baker added in parentheses, for Kohl’s benefit, “By implication, NATO in its current zone might be acceptable.” (See Document 8)
Well-briefed by the American secretary of state, the West German chancellor understood a key Soviet bottom line, and assured Gorbachev on February 10, 1990: “We believe that NATO should not expand the sphere of its activity.”
…
Thus, Gorbachev went to the end of the Soviet Union assured that the West was not threatening his security and was not expanding NATO. Instead, the dissolution of the USSR was brought about by Russians (Boris Yeltsin and his leading advisory Gennady Burbulis) in concert with the former party bosses of the Soviet republics, especially Ukraine, in December 1991.
So, the Soviet Union fell and assented to the reunification of Germany on the condition that NATO would not expand to the east and leave Russia surrounded. That was a lie, and it set the stage for the Russo-Ukraine War.
What Actually Happened
Despite the assurances of America’s best liars, NATO soon expanded far to the east and Goldman Sachs concurrently raped Russia,2 leaving it poverty-stricken and broken.
The betrayal of Baker’s promise came near immediately. Despite the assurance that NATO wouldn’t move an inch eastward, three nations in Russia’s traditional sphere of influence and close enough to threaten it- the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland — joined NATO.3 That came alongside NATO’s bombing campaign against Serbia, a Russian ally.4 Shortly afterward, in 2004, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania joined NATO.5 Notably, many of those countries had not only been part of the Soviet Union, but were also former territories of the Russian Empire.6 Russia was left almost completely ringed by an expansion it was promised would never happen.
It would be the equivalent of China entering into military alliances with Hawaii, Alaska, and the Philippines while also convincing Canada, Mexico, and Cuba to join its alliance system and point missiles at America as it bombed Britain and France.
NATO before and after expansion:7
The Russians, of course, are no fools. They realized what was going on. Despite their being the first to respond to 9/11,8 despite their repeatedly offering the hand of friendship, America had surrounded Russia with a network of military bases and alliances. As Ambassador William Burns wrote in 2008, “not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests… Russia is particularly worried that the strong divisions in Ukraine over NATO membership, with much of the ethnic-Russian community against membership, could lead to a major split, involving violence or at worst, civil war. In that eventuality, Russia would have to decide whether to intervene; a decision Russia does not want to have to face.”9
2008 was also when Russia had finally had enough. The three important holdouts that were not yet in NATO were Finland (a former part of the Russian Empire), Georgia (a former part of the Russian Empire), and Ukraine (a former integral territory to the Russian Empire). Ukraine is also the birthplace of the Kievan Rus, the medieval state from which Russia got its name.10 Of those three holdouts, Finland stuck to neutrality while Georgia and Ukraine indicated a willingness to join NATO, and “NATO countries welcome[d] Ukraine and Georgia’s aspirations to join the alliance.”11
The Russian Empire at its height, with Ukraine, Georgia, and Finland cleary part of the dominion of the Tsars:12
Russia refused to allow that continued violation of its sphere of influence and breaking of NATO’s promise, so when war broke out in Georgia over the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Russia decisively intervened and beat the Georgian military. By winning the war without ending the territorial dispute, Russia effectively blocked Georgia from joining NATO, as now admitting Georgia would be tantamount to accepting war with Russia via Article V of the founding NATO treaty.13
From then on, US-Russian relations grew more and more filled with mutual distrust and suspicion. In the eyes of America’s foreign policy establishment, many of whom are from the former lands of the Tsars,14 Russia is a neo-imperial power bent on revanchism and expansion at the expense of “democracy” and “liberal values.” In the eyes of Russia, America made a clear promise not to expand an inch eastward and then broke that pledge near-immediately with the clear intention of keeping Russia poor and surrounded. Further, they see our color revolutions15 as a way of replacing Christian government with16 the woke pieties of godlessness, loose sexual morals, mass immigration, and rapacious “capitalism” that impoverishes all but a few oligarchs, as happened thanks to Goldman Sachs and American banksters in the wake of the USSR’s collapse.17
How NATO Expansionism and Broken Promises Led to War in the Ukraine
The situation then repeated itself numerous times in the following years, culminating the Ukrainian Civil War and the Russo-Ukrainian War. America would depose or attempt to depose a Russian client, cause chaos and suffering, and then the Russians would step in to deal with the situation as the West lied shamelessly about it.
Take Libya, for example. Momar Ghadaffi wasn’t a good man, nor was he a “democrat,” but he did keep a lid on things and create a very high standard of living for most Libyans.18 They were provided healthcare and schooling, the nation’s infrastructure wasn’t falling apart, the slave trade was stamped out, and order ruled instead of anarchy. Then, NATO involved itself in the country’s internal affairs. It promised it would simply "protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of attack," then proceeded to destroy Ghadaffi’s forces from the air19 and let bloodthirsty savages20 turn the country into a Mad Max-like wasteland full of warlords and open-air slave markets.21 Once again, Russia was lied to by NATO, and chaos and suffering resulted. Russia is trying to pick up the pieces22 as America remains unrepentant.23
Then came Syria, where NATO tried its same tricks, but the Russians responded with firepower of their own and kept Assad in power. It’s thanks mainly to that last-minute intervention on Russia’s part that Christians in the country weren’t wiped out entirely by US-backed jihadists.24
From then on, Russia responded to NATO provocations, particularly in Ukraine. When ethnic Ukrainians began burning ethnic Russians alive25 during the US-sponsored Maidan Revolution, Russia provided aid to the breakaway Donetsk and Luhansk Republics, helping stop the genocide. When post-Maidan Ukraine threatened close ties with NATO and the EU, Russian troops secured Crimea. When the Ukrainian military and US-sponsored neo-Nazis26 barreled toward27 the breakaway regions, Russia helped stop them.28 And when the ceasefire broke down, with the Ukrainians obviously preparing for an offensive as the US refused to preclude Ukrainian membership in NATO, Russia launched a pre-emptive attack. As Darryl Cooper put it in his article on the subject:29
On February 16, the number of major ceasefire violations increased from 41 the previous day to 76. From there, they increased to 316 violations on February 17, 654 on February 18, 1,413 on February 19, 2,026 on February 20 and 21, and 1,484 ceasefire violations on February 22. In all cases virtually all of the explosions were recorded by OSCE observers as taking place in neighborhoods and other areas controlled by the separatists. During this period, both the Russians and Ukrainians were rushing forces to the border area, and the Biden administration was informing the world that a Russian invasion was imminent. Russia, for its part, insists that Ukraine’s troop movements and sudden use of thousands of heavy weapons in the ceasefire zone were all in preparation for an invasion of Donbas and Crimea. Putin said as much in his May 9 Victory Day speech:
Last December, we proposed signing a treaty on security guarantees. Russia urged the West to hold an honest dialogue in search of meaningful and compromising solutions, and to take account of each other’s interests. All in vain. NATO countries did not want to heed us, which means they had totally different plans. And we saw it.
Another punitive operation in Donbas, an invasion of our historic lands, including Crimea, was openly in the making. Kiev declared that it could attain nuclear weapons (Zelenskyy had said in a speech that week that it was possible Ukraine might seek to procure nuclear weapons. -DC). The NATO bloc launched an active military build-up on the territories adjacent to us.
Thus, an absolutely unacceptable threat to us was steadily being created right on our borders. There was every indication that a clash with neo-Nazis and Banderites backed by the United States and their minions was unavoidable.
Let me repeat, we saw the military infrastructure being built up, hundreds of foreign advisers starting work, and regular supplies of cutting-edge weaponry being delivered from NATO countries. The threat grew every day. Russia launched a preemptive strike against the aggression.
The Wages of Deceit
The war could have been avoided. The hundreds of thousands dead, the millions who are now refugees, the wasted resources and human misery all could have been avoided. All it would have taken is NATO keeping its word and not expanding, not recklessly dancing on Russia’s red line30 for indiscernible reasons not related to the national interest.31
But it didn’t do that. As with its lies about NATO expansion after the Cold War, lies about Libya, and lies about Assad, among many others, NATO and America lied about their intentions in Ukraine and the situation in the country and then funded the very worst sorts of people32 without ever pausing to consider the consequences of doing so. Now, the world dances around World War III as Ukrainian and Russian boys butcher each other in the mud of the Donbas.
And all for what? So America could fund neo-Nazi groups that burn ethnic Russian Ukrainians to death? So the Kagan Cult33 members can get their jollies off thinking about Russians dying because the Tsars were mean to their Eastern European ancestors? So Europe can be impoverished? There’s no strategic reason for America to be meddling in a corrupt oligarchy34 that used to be part of the Russian Empire, much less to be starting World War III. All that’s there are grievances from the Cold War and before it paired with bloodthirsty imbeciles that want to do to Russia what they did to Rhodesia,35 Iraq,36 and Syria,37 which is to say empower evil terrorists to kill all the Christians for no reason other than a hatred of Western Civilization and Christianity.
Not only that, but this situation could have been avoided. Russia was the first country to call when 9/11 happened.38 Even after what American bankers did to them after the end of the Cold War, Russia helped us fight the terrorists in Afghanistan,39 tried to warn us about 9/11,40 and proudly stands for Christian values.41 But America lied. NATO lied. And now we’re funding the worst sorts of people42 and risking nuclear hellfire for no clear reason other than that Putin isn’t a fan of moral degeneracy.43
If Russia did to us what we did to it - fund terrorists on our borders, economically strip mine us when we trusted it for guidance, surround us with an alliance system focused on our destruction after explicitly promising not to do so, turn functional countries abroad into blood-soaked rubble on a whim, arm and train armies that gloat about committing war crimes against out troops - we would be outraged and chomping at the bit for blood. The Russians were remarkably patient, but at a certain point, enough is enough. And now young men are dying in their thousands because of it.
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