A quote by Russian President Vladimir Putin from his address on February 24, 2022, in connection with the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army: “... practically everywhere where the West comes to establish its order, there is disregard for international law. Our country's promises not to expand NATO not one inch eastward. I repeat - deceived, or in popular parlance, simply thrown away... You and I were simply left with no other opportunity to defend Russia. In this connection... I have taken the decision to conduct a special military operation.
Putin repeatedly voiced this claim to NATO countries both before and after February 24, 2022. It was on the basis of this claim that Russia's demands to the U.S. and NATO to provide it with “security guarantees,” made in December 2021 against the backdrop of the accumulation of Russian troops near Ukraine's borders, were drafted. Putin used the violation of the West's alleged promise not to expand NATO eastward as one of the main justifications for invading Ukraine.
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Igor Todorov, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor.
Facts
The question of the existence of an agreement not to expand NATO into Eastern Europe has been discussed since the early 1990s. Hundreds of articles and dozens of books have been written about it. They contain a huge amount of factual material (names, dates, ...) and interpretations of the authors (who, to whom, what they promised ...). All this creates such a background in which the essence of the issue is lost. In our analysis, we will not repeat all these details and will focus only on three fundamental aspects that allow us to unambiguously answer the question put in the title of the article: did the West really fail to fulfill its obligations and thus gave Russia a reason to violate the norms of international law?
Aspect 1: What type of agreements is V. Putin talking about?
In inter-state relations, all “promises” (more precisely, agreements) are divided into two types: a) legally binding and b) non-legally binding. The former are governed by international law and are binding. The latter may have political significance and influence the relations between the parties, but are not legally binding, i.e. such promises are not obligations.
In international law, legally binding treaties are governed by principles established, for example, by the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties [1]. According to these principles, international law does not recognize the breach of informal arrangements as a justification for the breach of legally binding treaties. States are bound to comply with their legal obligations regardless of political or informal arrangements [2, 3]. In other words, a breach by one State of a non-legally binding agreement cannot be a legitimate basis for a breach of legal obligations by another State.
President Putin does not deny the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army on February 24, 2022, which is an open violation of international law, including Article 2(4) of the UN Charter [4], UN General Assembly Resolution 3314 (XXIX) [5] and the 1994 Budapest Memorandum [6]. However, he claims that the invasion is justified by the West's violation of the agreement not to expand NATO eastward. Thus, Vladimir Putin implies that this arrangement is of the first type mentioned above, namely, legally binding agreements.
So, this is about the West allegedly violating a legally binding agreement not to expand NATO eastward.
Aspect 2: What form of arrangement can we talk about?
It is absolutely certain that neither the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev nor the post-Soviet Russian Federation under all its presidents received written guarantees about NATO's non-expansion into Eastern Europe [7; 8]. At the same time, it is well known that the issue of NATO's non-expansion to the East was repeatedly discussed in 1990-1993 at meetings of officials of the interested parties, which is confirmed by documents [7-10]. However, all these discussions ended only with expressions of opinion that NATO should not expand eastward, but did not contain any commitments in this regard. No one has ever given written guarantees; they do not exist.
Thus, the agreement not to expand NATO eastward (even assuming that there was such an agreement) could only have taken place verbally. Vladimir Putin himself has repeatedly confirmed this (several more references: a, b, c). In other words, if the promise in question was made, it belongs to the form of an oral agreement.
Aspect 3: Can an oral agreement be legally binding in the case at hand?
In principle, there are cases in legal practice where an oral agreement may have legal force. However, in this particular case, it is absolutely impossible, because an oral agreement does not comply with NATO's decision-making procedure (unanimous vote plus ratification by each country). In other words, even if one of the leaders of NATO member states promised that NATO would not expand, the general consent and approval of each NATO member state would be necessary. Therefore, in matters of admission or non-admission of new members to NATO, an oral agreement certainly cannot be legally enforceable.
So, to summarize:
First. When speaking about the promise not to expand NATO eastward, Vladimir Putin means not just a verbal assurance, but a legal obligation, the violation of which gave him a reason to violate the norms of international law.
Second. The promise not to expand NATO eastward, even if it was made (which is not proven), was made only verbally, i.e. in the form of an oral agreement. Written guarantees have never been given, they do not exist.
Third. In the issue of the expansion of NATO membership, an oral agreement cannot have legal force, because the form of an oral agreement contradicts the procedure for making such decisions in NATO.
In conclusion, let us recall one more fact, which in itself removes all questions in the dispute of whether Russia was “deceived” or “not” in the issue of NATO's eastward expansion. In 1997, i.e. two years before the first Eastern European countries (Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic) joined NATO, Russia signed the NATO-Russia Founding Act (signed by Boris Yeltsin and Javier Solana), which recognizes for all states “the right to choose ways to ensure their own security” [11].
Verdict
Putin's claim that NATO has violated its commitments not to expand eastward is not true. NATO never gave either the Soviet Union or the Russian Federation legal guarantees not to expand eastward. Putin uses NATO's invented “perfidy” to justify Russia's violations of international law, especially with regard to Ukraine.
Source of information
1. Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Vienna, 23 May 1969.
2. Report on non-legally binding international agreements / by Mathias Forteau, Special Rapporteur. United Nations General Assembly. International Law Commission. Seventy-fifth Session. Geneva, April 29-May 31 and July 1-August 2, 2024.
3. Non-Legally Binding Agreements in International Law. Strasbourg. Council of Europe. Committee of Legal Advisers on Public International Law, 26 March 2021.
4. Charter of the United Nations.
5. Resolution 3314 on December 14, 1974, adopted at the XXIX session of the UN General Assembly. Definition of aggression.
6. United Nations Treaty Collection, Vol. 3007, I-52241 - Budapest Memorandum in English, Russian and Ukrainian with signatures of the parties + French translation (English) (Russian) (Ukr.) (French) (PDF). treaties.un.org, United Nations Treaty Collection (October 2, 1994). Date of access: August 25, 2022. Archived January 29, 2022.
7. M.E.Sarotte. Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate. Yale University Press, 2021, 568 p.
8. James Goldgeier. Promises Made, Promises Broken? What Yeltsin Was Told About NATO in 1993 and Why It Matters. War on Rocks. July 12, 2016.
9. Von Klaus Wiegrefe. Neuer Aktenfund von 1991 stützt russischen Vorwurf. Spiegel Ausland. 18.02.2022.
10.One of the arguments for invading Ukraine is the West's alleged promise not to expand NATO eastward. And there are even new documents that confirm this (Spoiler: they don't). Medusa, February 25, 2022 [in Russian].
11. Founding Act on Mutual Relations, Cooperation and Security Between NATO and the Russian Federation.
Cover photo: Mirror of the week
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