Hegseth Says No NATO Membership For Ukraine, Return To Pre-2014 Borders ‘Unrealistic’ – Antiwar.com

 Hegseth Says No NATO Membership For Ukraine, Return To Pre-2014 Borders ‘Unrealistic’

The secretary says Ukraine needs ‘robust security guarantees’ that won’t involve a NATO troop deployment

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Wednesday dismissed the idea of NATO membership for Ukraine as part of a peace deal with Russia and said the goal to restore Ukraine to its pre-2014 borders was “unrealistic.”

Hegseth made the comments while addressing a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels. “The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome for a negotiated settlement,” he said.

Hegseth said the Trump administration’s goal is to end the war through diplomacy, which he said must start “by recognizing that returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective. Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.”

Restoring Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders has been a war goal of Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky, although there have been signs in recent months that he’s accepted that’s unrealistic. But he is still calling for strong security guarantees from the US that involve the deployment of troops, which Hegseth also dismissed.

“Any security guarantee must be backed by capable European and non-European troops. If these troops are deployed as peacekeepers to Ukraine at any point, they should be deployed as part of a non-NATO mission, and they should not be covered under Article 5,” he said.

🔗SOURCE ➡️ Antiwar.com

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