Here, in The Ministry of Truth, we like to correct false notions even when those notions are espoused by those holding the highest office in the land. The following is a direct quote from current president, Donald J. Trump, on February 13, 2025:
“Biden went out and said that they could join Nato, and he shouldn’t have said that. As soon as he said that, I thought, you know what? You’re going to have a war now. And I was right about that. This is a war that would have never happened if I were President.”
Unlike the falsehoods of sensationalist, Tucker Carlson, we do not believe that the president’s occasional factual errors are intentional. This is why we do not call them lies. We occasionally all say things that are not so. Hopefully, we want to know when that happens. In that spirit, let us examine whether Biden actually “went out and said they (Ukraine) could join NATO.”(1)
Actually, it appears the Biden administration did not even realize the issue of Ukraine and NATO was a factor in the military buildup that lead up to the invasion of February 24, 2022. According to a counselor of Secretary of State, Anthony Blinkin:
“We made clear to the Russians that we were willing to talk to them on issues that we thought were genuine concerns they have that were legitimate in some way, I mean arms control type things of that nature.” (“The administration didn’t think that”) “the future of Ukraine” was one of those issues and that its potential NATO membership was a “non-issue.”(2)
The truth is, Biden never said Ukraine could join NATO – not before the invasion and not after the invasion. CNN reported on June 14, 2023:
“’The fact is they still have to clean up corruption and the fact is they have to meet other criteria to get into the action plan,’ he (Biden) said in June 2021, declaring ‘school’s out’ on the question of whether Ukraine could join the organization.(3)
We are not saying that NATO expansion was not an excuse Russia stated for invading Ukraine, we are simply saying that Biden never gave Ukraine any hope that the country would ever really be included in the organization. Europe talked about Ukraine joining NATO, but Biden never promised anything more than America’s continued support and security assurances. NATO was never on the table.
President Trump also said the war would not have happened if he had been president instead of Joseph Robinette Biden. This can only be a matter of opinion since the theory is hypothetical, but it is a very reasonable statement in light of the track record of his first administration. Cast by his detractors as a dictator who would provoke World War III, Trump turned out to be quite dovish. Perhaps, this was owing to his strong leadership or maybe his unpredictable rhetoric. Regardless, it became clear later how weak leadership in America is not good for world peace.
Having said that, it should be remembered that the Russia’s war on Ukraine did not start during the Biden years. The war began in 2014 while Obama was president and continued during the Trump administration and escalated during the Biden administration. Trump’s mistake regarding the origins of the war is an easy mistake to make, but it behooves us all to remember that there is no one to blame for this war except the Russia. Feel free to comment below.
(2) https://responsiblestatecraft.org/vance-munich-conference/
(3) https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/14/politics/ukraine-nato-joe-biden/index.html
Eric Yodis 