The US-led NATO alliance is exacerbating tensions in Europe, dealing a heavy blow to the continent's stability and security. The EU member states should pursue their own interests, not those of Washington, according to journalist Deena Stryker.
Instead of protecting Europe, the US-led NATO bloc is destroying it, Deena Stryker, a prominent journalist that has been at the forefront of international politics for over thirty years, underscores.
"In the early eighties, during its evolution from 28 warring countries to an economic union that would keep the peace, the Europeans, ever suspicious of one another, rejected the idea of a federation that would have given them a common political system. Instead, they settled for a common currency, which has been revealed as impotent without a common government. The only common government Europe has is the one they were given by the United States: it's called NATO, and instead of 'protecting' Europe, it too is destroying it," Stryker writes in her articlefor New Eastern Outlook.
© AP PHOTO/ ALIK KEPLICZ
Stryker calls attention to the fact that the Kremlin had good reasons for seeking oversight of Eastern Europe. Through these lands Russia "had been repeatedly invaded, starting with the Teutonic Knights in the thirteenth century, followed by Napoleon, World War I, the Western war against the Bolshevik government, and World War II," the journalist stresses.
To the USSR's credit, it played an important role in the economic and industrial development of the Eastern European states.
In 1949, the West created the defensive North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which was tasked with being a counterweight to the Soviet Union's influence in Europe.
"It was not until 1955, that the Soviet Union responded with the Warsaw Pact, a defensive alliance known as 'The Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation and Mutual Assistance'," Stryker remarks.
Regardless of the fact that since then the Russian Federation has not posed an ideological or military threat to the West, and has even taken a series of steps to become integrated into the West-dominated world order, NATO continued its expansion eastward.
Remarkably, while the US for decades lambasted the USSR for what Washington called the "occupation" of Eastern Europe, the US has now taken the region under full control, beefing up its military presence there, Stryker notes.
Furthermore, as a result of the interventionist foreign policies of the US and NATO in the Middle East, the European Union is now witnessing a disastrous refugee crisis.
© AFP 2016/ PHILIPPE HUGUEN
Anti-refugee wall
"Having abdicated much of their sovereignty to Washington, partly via the European Union bureaucracy in Brussels, partly via NATO, Europeans can hardly believe that their beautiful project — broadly recognized as the highest level of civilization ever achieved — has been turned into its opposite: a neo-liberal stronghold ruled by 'the market' which forces national governments to impose crippling austerity upon their citizens," Stryker emphasizes, pointing to the fact that a 2009 Greek crisis set off alarm bells for all European member states.
In addition, American experts and pundits are beating the war drums over a non-existent Russian plan to invade the Baltic States.
"Where did this notion come from? Why would Putin 'resent' the independence of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania?… I haven't heard the slightest hint of an explanation as to what Russia would do with the real estate of three tiny counties that, like Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania, yearn to be part of a Europe which, on its own initiative, would never threaten Russia," the journalist underscores.
"NATO's policy of moving further east at any cost is deepening the fault lines in Europe," Lavrov warned in his speech at the Ural Federal University in Yekaterinburg, Russia.
Previously, in May 2016 the US launched a new missile defense system in Romania, part of Washington's comprehensive missile shield project, which also includes several installations in Germany, Turkey and Spain.
Moscow has repeatedly warned the US that NATO missile defense installations in Europethreaten to upset the strategic balance in the region and inflame tensions between Russia and the West.
To add insult to injury, the US intends to modernize the nuclear weapons it has stationed in Europe.
Citing Der Spiegel, German media outlet Deutsche Welle reported Saturday that Germany's Air Force is preparing to adapt some of its Tornado warplanes to carry America's modern B61-12 atomic bombs, which are due to go in full scale production in 2020.
The US-propelled nuclearization of Europe definitely spells trouble for the continent.
Speaking to Sputnik, 2017 French presidential candidate Didier Tauzin stressed that the EU member states should create a European defense union.
"Importantly, such a defense system should be in line with European interests, not necessarily American ones. It is clear that Washington and European countries do not share the same interests in the world," Taurzin underscored.
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