Stoltenberg explains why NATO did not close the skies over Ukraine
9 November 19:12
Former North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has explained why NATO did not establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine after Russia’s full-scale invasion, despite Kyiv’s requests to do so.
Stoltenberg mentioned this issue in his memoirs titled On my Watch, the British newspaper The Times reported, "Komersant Ukrainian".
In his memoirs, the former NATO Secretary General called the moment when he refused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s request to close the skies over Ukraine in February 2022 “extremely painful”. According to Stoltenberg’s recollections, Zelensky called him from a bunker in Kyiv at a time when there was a real threat of a Russian offensive on the Ukrainian capital.
“(Zelenskyy – Ed.) said: “I accept that you are not sending NATO ground troops (to Ukraine. – Ed.), although I do not agree (with this. – Ed.). But please close the airspace. Don’t let Russian planes, drones and helicopters fly and attack us,” Stoltenberg quoted the Ukrainian leader as saying. – He also said: “I know that NATO can do this because you have done it before.”
Stoltenberg recalled that NATO had indeed closed airspace over certain countries in the past to protect civilians, for example, over Bosnia and Herzegovina or over the northern part of Iraq, where it was necessary to protect the Kurds.
However, Stoltenberg told Zelenskyy that he “understood” why he was asking for this, but that closing the skies over Ukraine with NATO aircraft “will not happen.”
NATO feared a direct confrontation with Russia in 2022, Stoltenberg admitted
Explaining the Alliance’s position to Zelenskyy, Stoltenberg emphasized that the creation of a no-fly zone over Ukraine would require the prior destruction of Russian air defense systems located in Russia and Belarus. Without neutralizing these systems, NATO aircraft would not be able to operate safely in Ukrainian airspace, Stoltenberg added.
“And if there is a Russian plane or helicopter in the air, we have to shoot it down, and then we will find ourselves in a full-fledged war between NATO and Russia. And we don’t want to do that,” he explained.
“As Biden, who was the president of the United States at the time, said, we will not take the risk (of starting) World War III for the sake of Ukraine,” Stoltenberg admitted.
Stoltenberg admits that Western aid to Kyiv was “too little, too late”
At the same time, Stoltenberg said that he still recognizes the right decision not to send NATO troops to Ukraine and not to take direct part in the military conflict with Russia. However, he now admits that Western assistance to Kyiv has been “too little, too late.”
If Ukraine had received more military support from NATO immediately after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, a full-scale invasion in 2022 might have been avoided, the former NATO secretary general suggested in his memoirs, The Times reports.
