Rethinking Ukraine's NATO future with the new Secretary General: the outcome of Rutte's visit to Kyiv

On 1 October, former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte officially took over as NATO Secretary General. He received the "symbol of authority" from his predecessor Jens Stoltenberg – a ceremonial hammer gifted to the Alliance by Iceland back in 1963. NATO Secretaries General have used it to open meetings of the North Atlantic Council for the past 70 years.

That same day, during his first press conference, Rutte announced that supporting Ukraine would be one of his three priorities in office and promised to bring Ukraine closer to joining the Alliance. To illustrate that this was not just rhetoric, shortly after taking office he began preparing for a visit to Ukraine, arriving in Kyiv on 3 October for a brief visit (preparations for which had started back in September under Rutte's direction, before he officially took office and had the trip approved by the Allies).

In international relations, the choice of capital for a first foreign visit always sends out a signal. The fact that this visit took place just a day after Rutte’s appointment (as he had left Brussels on Wednesday) made this signal even stronger.

Rutte emphasised this in Kyiv, stating that he wanted "to make it crystal clear to you, to the people of Ukraine, and to everyone watching, that NATO stands with Ukraine. As the new NATO Secretary General, it is my priority and my privilege to take this support forward, working with you to ensure that Ukraine prevails."

Unfortunately the public signals from the new Secretary General began and ended with this symbolic gesture. Mark Rutte, who as Dutch Prime Minister gained a reputation for making robust statements, has had to refrain from this upon moving to NATO. In his comments regarding Ukraine's path towards membership, he stuck to general statements and revealed no new developments.

That does not mean there has been no progress, however.

The possibility of inviting Ukraine to join the Alliance is being seriously discussed, albeit privately.

This had been kept secret for some time, but after the US media leaked the news that even the White House is now working on this idea, Kyiv and partner states admitted that discussions are underway.

There is no doubt that the invitation will be on the agenda at the Ramstein meeting being held in Germany on 12 October. This is one of the reasons why the Ukraine Defence Contact Group is meeting at leader level, in the presence of the US president.

So what has changed? 

Up until now, this topic had been absolutely off limits for the White House!

It’s worth recalling that during NATO’s Vilnius Summit in July 2023, Joe Biden did not conceal his anger at Ukraine and its European allies for wanting to at least start discussing the idea of such an invitation. Subsequently, according to European Pravda's sources, the US president shut down all attempts to put this issue back on the agenda. Kyiv received repeated signals ahead of the Washington Summit that the US president considered any repetition of the Vilnius scenario unacceptable, implying that for its own good, Kyiv should not even mention the issue of NATO membership.

Now, less than four months later, the situation has changed.

European Pravda has received confirmation from multiple US and Ukrainian sources that Biden and his national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, are now seriously considering this idea.

The reason for this seismic shift is that Biden has stepped down as a presidential candidate and realised that this term will mark the end of his political career. Thus the question of his legacy has arisen.

Biden has dedicated over 50 years of his life to politics and cares deeply about the legacy he will leave in the history books,

and the last four years haven’t yielded much in the way of good news. His presidency has been fraught with challenges, both domestically (with much of the pandemic and the difficult vaccination period falling in Biden’s term) and even more so internationally.

The first year of Biden’s presidency saw the disastrous withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, and the following year Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. While the US president is certainly not to blame for Putin’s actions, history will record this coincidence in timing and will not overlook the fact that the White House was overly cautious in responding to Russian aggression, drawing constant criticism from its European partners.

With three and a half months left to go, the 46th US president is therefore keen to change this trajectory and leave office on a very different final note.

Abandoning the overly cautious policy toward Russia’s war and inviting Ukraine to join NATO are being considered as potential ways of achieving this.

That is why Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy included a clause on NATO membership in his Victory Plan. According to European Pravda's sources, he initially received positive feedback on this idea from Washington.

So does this mean the invitation is a done deal? Unfortunately not.

Comments made by Zelenskyy after talks with the NATO Secretary General bear this out.

"Now we are focused on getting Ukraine invited to join the Alliance. This is a very important step. It will be difficult to achieve," Zelenskyy said.

Indeed, even with Biden’s backing, there are still several significant obstacles standing in the way of an invitation.

The first (and simpler) obstacle is that while the US’s influence within NATO is substantial, the Alliance does not make decisions unilaterally: it operates by consensus. In order to invite Ukraine to join, it will be necessary to win over German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and the leaders of two countries that have special relationships with the Kremlin – Slovakia and Hungary.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán could be particularly difficult to convince, considering that Biden has little credibility as far as he is concerned. Orbán is openly betting on Donald Trump winning the US election and is unlikely to agree to such a move before the American elections are over. And if Trump does win, it seems highly unlikely that Orbán would be willing to help Biden secure his legacy after election day.

But there is another obstacle that probably poses even more of a challenge.

Even now, the vision that Biden and his team have of Ukraine’s future does not fully align with what Ukraine and Zelenskyy want. 

The devil is in the details.

How will this invitation be formulated given that part of Ukraine’s internationally recognised territory is occupied? To what part of Ukraine will NATO’s Article 5 collective defence obligations apply if Ukraine becomes a member? How can the compromise wording be made acceptable to President Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian people? How can this be reconciled with the vision of the White House, which – while its position may have softened somewhat – still doesn’t believe in the possibility of fully restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity?

And ultimately, how can any wording avoid being perceived by the world as an indication that the West has resigned itself to the occupation of part of Ukraine's territory and is ready to abandon that part to Moscow, thereby handing Putin at least a partial victory?

There are as yet no answers to any of these questions. But the search for these answers is what makes the NATO Secretary General’s visit so significant.

The position that Mark Rutte now holds is unique. While he may be externally perceived as the NATO leader, in reality the Secretary General’s power is fairly limited. There’s even reason to joke that the hammer the Secretary General uses to open meetings contains a large share of his authority. Indeed, the Secretary General can decide unilaterally whether to use the hammer or to open a meeting without it, but on most other issues, he must consult with the Allies.

Beyond his direct decision-making power, however, the Secretary General also has hidden bureaucratic leverage, influence over draft decisions, the ability to promote initiatives, and the opportunity to propose creative ideas.

That’s exactly what we can expect from the new Secretary General once he fully assumes his influence at NATO HQ. And the fact that Mark Rutte demonstrated an ability to make bold decisions in his previous position gives grounds for cautious optimism regarding the format of the invitation – provided, of course, that the discussion reaches its final stage.

In any case, it’s good that the discussion has begun at all. After all, just four months ago it seemed completely impossible.

Sergiy Sydorenko,

Editor, European Pravda