Now do Ukraine giving up its nukes in exchange for security assurances against threats or the use of force on Ukraine's territorial integrity and sovereignty, pursuant to the Budapest Memorandum.
Ukraine
- Thread starter Dadar
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LOL... so what you have is AI saying people say people said it.
Was. There. Any. Formal. Agreement?
And that's actually written down. An actual agreement.
It has been well known for 10 or 15 years at least that the United States and Western Europe lied to russia. Russia has good reasons to be suspicious of the United states. Do your own research and get yourself up to par if you don't believe this. (Ai is right about 80 or 90% of the time, and I'm not going to prove that two plus two equals four)This has been common knowledge for a long time. I don't know why you ask whether there was a formal agreement because what I quoted said there wasn't. The Russians were dumb enough to trust the West.
Is dailybuck a reincarnation of nat Algren/warrior poet?
Rather than go back and forth, I will cite one link to what is obvious. https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-...on-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early
Part of the quote from the link is :
"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)
Sooo... no. That's what I thought. There was no agreement.
You might want to examine the 1997 NATO-Russia Founding Act where Russia accepted NATO expansion in exchange for concessions. This would be after 1990. The deal states "NATO has expanded and will continue to expand its political functions". Yeltsin didn't like the idea of NATO expansion but said, "the negative consequences of NATO's enlargement will be reduced to the minimum through the NATO–Russia deal". Russian acceptance of NATO expansion is on the record... unlike your implied promise that was never codified.
Take a knee, comrade.
Comrade, that 1997 paper was merely hot air. Here is what Claude had to say.:
"It was not a binding treaty — it was explicitly a political commitment, and this was true by design on NATO's side.
Why it wasn't a treaty:
NATO deliberately refused to make the Founding Act legally binding. That's a key, well-documented fact — the U.S. and NATO wanted the flexibility to keep expanding without being constrained by treaty obligations to Russia.
It was signed as a political declaration between NATO and Russia, not ratified as a treaty by national legislatures the way something like the CFE Treaty (Conventional Forces in Europe) was.
The text itself is full of the language of a political framework, not enforceable law: phrases like "shared desire," "affirm their shared commitment," and structures built around "consultation" and "joint decision-making" rather than binding legal obligations with enforcement mechanisms."
I would note that you gave no citations for your post and that Claude is very specific. If you disagree with Claude be specific. Also, I would point out that people with your viewpoint in this thread had said that because there was no formal treaty that the promises made by the United States in 1990 were irrelevant. If you're going to take that view, the 1997 papers are not binding either.
Damn, you really are as stupid as a box of rocks.Founding Act | NATO Official text
So a written agreement acknowledged by the president of Russia carries no weight but the musings of people seven years prior that were never officially recorded anywhere are iron-clad? Tell us how Putin's balls taste and then GTFO with your BS, comrade.
I never said the oral agreements [made by about 6 heads of state] were ironclad dummy. I am saying that they were relevant. [If it isn't beyond your reading capacity try to understand the second to the last sentence in the post you are criticizing -- I was explicitly discussing relevance] In the meantime, you are giving great stock to a written document that was designed to be open ended and not enforceable.
Founding Act | NATO Official text
So a written agreement acknowledged by the president of Russia carries no weight but the musings of people seven years prior that were never officially recorded anywhere are iron-clad? Tell us how Putin's balls taste and then GTFO with your BS, comrade.
"During the 1990 summit, Zoellick says President Gorbachev accepted the idea of German unification within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, based on the principle that every country should freely choose its own alliances.
“I was in those meetings, and Gorbachev has [also] said there was no promise not to enlarge NATO,” Zoellick recalls. Soviet Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, later president of Georgia, concurred, he says. Nor does the treaty on Germany’s unification include a limit on NATO enlargement.
idk if I should believe this guy who was there at the negotiations, or random AI slop from Claude
hls.harvard.edu
“I was in those meetings, and Gorbachev has [also] said there was no promise not to enlarge NATO,” Zoellick recalls. Soviet Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, later president of Georgia, concurred, he says. Nor does the treaty on Germany’s unification include a limit on NATO enlargement.
idk if I should believe this guy who was there at the negotiations, or random AI slop from Claude
‘There was no promise not to enlarge NATO’ - Harvard Law School
Robert Zoellick, the U.S. diplomat who helped negotiate the end of the Cold War, says Vladimir Putin’s claims about Ukraine are part of a disinformation campaign.
hls.harvard.edu
BS... You said there was an "agreement". There was no such thing. I cited an actual written agreement and you dismissed it. Yet, following that actual agreement, NATO expanded east of Germany. Many times. You're full of shi.it.
A lot of confusion in Russia these days with proposals and written agreements. The fact of the matter is that Russia has a tendency to invade it's neighbors and that incentives all these countries to bound together and align with NATO. If Ukraine had been able to join NATO as well would be no Ukrainian invasion. Russian invasion in both the chicken and egg in this scenario, NATO members are not at fault for Russian agression.
I use the word agreement loosely one time. I have been clear that there was no formal agreement. My original statement regarding the expansion of nato was this quote:
"documents show Secretary of State James Baker assured Gorbachev that if a united Germany stayed in NATO, there would be no extension of NATO's jurisdiction eastward" (the operative word was "assured", not binding agreement.) in fact later on from that quote it was explicit saying there was no formal agreement.
The documents you cited were not formal binding agreements or treaties. You are ignorant about what an agreement is because you think that because something is in writing that is a binding agreement. There can be memorandums of understanding and signed statements of intent which are not binding. That is what you have cited. Nothing that was binding on either side and no treaty was signed.
I've never said that anything was ironclad. All I've been saying, which goes way above your head, is that the Russians at certain points in time had good reasons to believe that NATO would not expand. After the fall of the iron curtain, Russia attempted to cooperate with the United States and Western Europe, and those countries took advantage of Russia's disorganization and weakness to press geopolitical advantage. No reason for Russia to trust the good faith and good intentions of the West.
I see a lot of Hillary Clinton bots posting here. Maybe you can blame the heat Wave on Russia and Putin. Have your 51 intelligence agency people tied down Russia's link to Hunter biden's laptop yet? (Russia must have been very slick to slip in that laptop, particularly since Hunter not once denied that it was his) Lazy and uninformed people whenever they want to cast blame somewhere, look for Russia which is not only stupid but dangerous.
Assured Gorbachev, eh? I guess we need to get the word of Mikhail Gorbachev on that, then. What could be more authoritative than that?
RBTH: One of the key issues that has arisen in connection with the events in Ukraine is NATO expansion into the East. Do you get the feeling that your Western partners lied to you when they were developing their future plans in Eastern Europe? Why didn’t you insist that the promises made to you – particularly U.S. Secretary of State James Baker’s promise that NATO would not expand into the East – be legally encoded? I will quote Baker: “NATO will not move one inch further east.”
M.G.: The topic of “NATO expansion” was not discussed at all, and it wasn’t brought up in those years. I say this with full responsibility. Not a single Eastern European country raised the issue, not even after the Warsaw Pact ceased to exist in 1991. Western leaders didn’t bring it up, either. Another issue we brought up was discussed: making sure that NATO’s military structures would not advance and that additional armed forces from the alliance would not be deployed on the territory of the then-GDR after German reunification. Baker’s statement, mentioned in your question, was made in that context. Kohl and [German Vice Chancellor Hans-Dietrich] Genscher talked about it.
Everything that could have been and needed to be done to solidify that political obligation was done. And fulfilled. The agreement on a final settlement with Germany said that no new military structures would be created in the eastern part of the country; no additional troops would be deployed; no weapons of mass destruction would be placed there. It has been observed all these years.
The assurances you keep referencing were never made. Ever. Gorbachev is telling you that directly. The assurance, included in the agreement that WAS signed, was that there would be no movement of NATO into the former EAST Germany.
Go ahead and take the word of Putin over the word of the man YOU say was party to this "assurance". Make it clear where you stand. If you have any integrity at all, you'll just stop. I don't even ask for an admission of error - Just. Stop. Posting. Here.
Maybe you want to read the rest of the article. Here's what Gorbachev stated later:
"The decision for the U.S. and its allies to expand NATO into the east was decisively made in 1993. I called this a big mistake from the very beginning. It was definitely a violation of the spirit of the statements and assurances made to us in 1990. With regards to Germany, they were legally enshrined and are being observed."
Like I said, assurances to Russia were violated.
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So you don’t believe him when he says, “The topic of “NATO expansion” was not discussed at all, and it wasn’t brought up in those years. I say this with full responsibility.”
But you do believe him when he claims “assurances”, that were never recorded anywhere, were made. Seems situational. I’ll go with what was actually written down and agreed and I’ll dismiss the idea that anyone in NATO assured the Russians that they would NEVER consider for membership any country to the east of a reunified Germany. The idea of that is flatly ludicrous… but that’s where you do your best work.
You need to get back on your meds. The assurances were made 3 times by Baker and were in the National Archives. Gorbachev confirms that assurances (not legally binding) were made. You may want to check the meaning of "not one inch" which was recorded in the archives.
RBTH: I will quote Baker: “NATO will not move one inch further east.”
M.G.: Another issue we brought up was discussed: making sure that NATO’s military structures would not advance and that additional armed forces from the alliance would not be deployed on the territory of the then-GDR after German reunification. Baker’s statement, mentioned in your question, was made in that context. Kohl and [German Vice Chancellor Hans-Dietrich] Genscher talked about it.
Oops.
And, for future reference, when you devolve into putting your opponent "on meds", you've made it very clear you feel like you're losing. It's a poor rhetorical crutch. You should avoid it.
Again, I repeat get your meds. Baker made the statement which is what I said ,which was an assurance. It was made in the context of German unification but it was still made. The statement was all over the place by Baker as well as other foreign leaders. It was not made in the context of trying to reach a legal agreement regarding the expansion of NATO. It was made in terms of discussing the general context of what was happening at the time and was intended to explain future intentions at the time it was made without being a guarantee. You do a great job of miss stating the facts and arguing with yourself.
LOL... so NOW you admit it had nothing to do with NATO expansion to the east but you still maintain it meant... something... in relation to NATO expansion. That comment was literally all you had that was on the record and now you have Gorby telling you it didn't mean what you claimed it meant. And it WAS codified in the agreement. NATO did NOT put assets in the former GDR. Gorby told you that, as well. How can I "miss state" (sic) what Gorbachev said when I'm quoting him?
Time to move the goalposts. GTFO