“Forget About NATO”: How Donald Trump’s Words Will Affect Ukraine and Georgia

Donald Trump’s return to the White House marks a clear shift in the United States’ foreign policy. Trump abandoned his predecessor Joe Biden’s strategy of isolating Russia and is focusing on establishing contact with Moscow, bringing new challenges for Ukraine as well as Georgia. In the West, many consider this a surrender to the Kremlin as Trump’s comments on NATO renewed fears that Putin has the power to veto the alliance’s expansion. 

Translated by Adrian Bader

“Eliminating irritants”

United States President Donald Trump has practically fulfilled one of Moscow’s main demands–not expanding NATO. The head of the White House rejected the opportunity to introduce Ukraine to the North Atlantic Alliance. 

“NATO–forget about it,” the American leader stated on February 26 in answer to a question on the possible conditions needed to end the war in Ukraine. 

In Trump’s view, the war began solely becasue of the issue of Kyiv’s membership in the alliance. 

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has been consistently against such membership for many years. It’s worth noting that Donald Trump’s statement was on the day before negotiations between Russian and American delegations in Istanbul. The main purpose of the meeting, which took place in Bosphorus on February 27th, was mutually restoring diplomatic missions in the two countries.

Little is known about what the two sides agreed to following the negotiations during the 6.5 hour meeting closed to the press. The delegations left without comment. 

Earlier, however, the U.S. said that the goal of their current approach with the Kremlin was to resolve conflict in Ukraine, quickly sign a peace treaty, and improve diplomatic and economic relations between Washington and Moscow. 

Russia also hoped that the Istanbul meeting would “strengthen trust” between the two countries. As official representative of Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova put it, the negotiations will look for a “solution for the many irritants that exist in the two-sided dialogue.”

Zakharova didn’t clarify what exactly she meant, but one of the obvious “irritants” for the Russian side is a sovereign Ukraine. Many experts today suggest that the American leader’s refusal to expand the North Atlantic Alliance might be a part of the strategy for making a deal with Putin: Ukraine’s neutral status in exchange for ending the war.

According to University of Georgia professor Lasha Dzebisashvili, such a statement by the White House head was entirely expected. 

“Trump and the representatives of his team were often skeptical of U.S. membership in NATO. Even during his first presidential term, he planned to informally announce the exit. He was simply discouraged then. However, Trump didn’t hide that he didn’t like the organization. Sooner or later he wants to leave it. And naturally, this is projected onto other governments.

This is related to Trump not wanting to be burdened by any obligations. Moreso, he doesn’t want to provide any guarantees of safety. But we know how NATO works.”

Donald Trump recently dsimssed not only Ukraine’s introduction to NATO, but also the possibility of guaranteed safety for Kyiv by the U.S, as Volodymyr Zelenskyy previously requested. The American leader essentially placed this burden on Europe’s shoulders, which according to him is responsible as Ukraine’s “next-door neighbor.” 

“I’m not planning to give security guarantees beyond what there already is. We’re leaving this to Europe. […] But we of course will make sure that everything goes well.”

Ukraine’s safety by the U.S. according to Trump can be ensured by a deal on natural resources. This question became one of the points causing public controversy between the two leaders. 

During the Istanbul meeting between Americans and Russians, Washington and Kyiv seemed to agree on specific points. On February 28th, Zelenskyy arrived in the U.S. to sign a deal on rare earth metals. 

News agency Bloomberg cited anonymous Ukrainian officials the day before the meeting reporting that the president hoped to use the deal with the U.S. as a starting point for further discussions on American security guarantees. 

Vice President of the Atlantic Council Matthew Kroenig articulated that if the U.S. is interested in Ukrainian resources, then they are also interested in Ukraine remaining a sovereign country and not just coming under Russian control. 

Ukraine-Georgia-NATO

Amid the shift in politics by Trump aimed at reevaluating the United States’ national interests and practically refusing Kyiv’s integration into the alliance, Georgians are talking about the new challenges for Tbilisi. Over the course of many years, Georgia and Ukraine had been in tandem when it came to NATO aspirations. The alliance stated in a 2008 summit in Bucharest that its doors to Tbilisi and Kyiv were open but didn’t give the two Eastern partners so-called MAPs (Membership Action Plan).

Recently, Georgia is increasingly being considered separately from Ukraine. Back at the 2023 Vilnius summit, it was decided Kyiv’s path to NATO was “one step,” while Tbilisi needed to take “two steps.”

Many international observers have noted for years that the politics of Tbilisi’s ruling party look more like Georgia is trying to “leave the game.” In 2023, American diplomat and former Atlantic Council researcher Daniel Fried expressed concern that at this point Georgia had “taken itself out of the process needed for NATO membership.”

Additionally, after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Georgian Dream leaders repeatedly called Kyiv’s aspiration to join NATO one of the main reasons for the war. 

The recession of Tbilisi-Brussels relations resulted in the Pentagon announcing last year that Noble Partner joint military exercises were on pause. The decision was made after reviewing the two countries’ relationship amid the adoption of anti-democratic laws and accusations of Western partners by the Georgian government.

In the context of a sharp turn in White House politics and their skepticism of Kyiv’s entry to the alliance, Georgian experts expressed that the gap between Georgia and NATO might be even greater. 

“In regards to Trump’s statement on the impossibility of Ukraine’s entry in NATO, there of course is a parallel to Georgia. But the war in Ukraine has made it a bigger priority. Ukraine has especially revealed the issue of joining NATO and the lack of real security guarantees. There are no real security guarantees at this point in joining NATO, the fifth article doesn’t work yet.

The problem comes down to not every NATO country being ready to adequately look at the situation in terms of threats and adequately respond to the threats. Thus, if there’s no potential, and there’s no desire to respond to the threat, then there’s no security guarantee. Ukraine revealed this problem,” stated Lasha Dzebisashvili.

Amongst Trump’s skepticism about the alliance and Georgian Dream’s consistent distancing from joining NATO, various proxy organizations affiliated with oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili’s party are already throwing around the idea of revising Article 78 of the Georgian Constitution. It requires all bodies of power to do the maximum to integrate the country into Euro-Atlantic structures. For instance, members of the pro-Kremlin platform Alt-Info believe that Georgian Dream should correct their mistake and delete the record from the constitution. However, according to Dzebisashvili, a theoretical rejection from NATO should not mean rejection from the European Union.

“Well, we’ll need to watch. If the United States of America’s position doesn’t change and Washington embarks on a radical path reducing its path from NATO or entirely leaving NATO, then there’ll be no talk about the alliance which has existed for the last 80 years. And of course, the question of how relevant NATO is to us will arise.  

No one can remove the issue of European integration. And European integration for us isn’t important in the sense we want to join Europe, but important in the context of political, economic, and legal systems. That is, all of these values and principles. Therefore no one can eliminate the relevance of Europe for us. This is even impossible to imagine for the next 10-20 years.”

As Lasha Dzebisashvili says, the fact that proxy organizations are already removing this issue from the information field means that in the near future Georgia Dream will look closely at society’s reaction. 

“After clear conclusions made in response to this analysis and these processes, Dream will start a more active policy. For instance, if they notice that there won’t be a united European Union and a guaranteed preservation of European safety, then it’s quite possible we see another proposal for a referendum on Article 78.”