Kissinger, 99, who is considered a follower of political realism, had called months ago for a cease-fire in Ukraine, even if that involved conceding some of Russia’s military gains.
And the former US Secretary of State, during his video participation at the World Economic Forum in Davos, said that Ukraine’s accession to NATO would be an “appropriate result.”
“Before this war, I was against Ukraine’s membership in NATO because I was afraid it would cause exactly the process we are witnessing now,” he said.
“Now that this process has reached this level, the idea of a neutral Ukraine under these circumstances is no longer feasible,” he added.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has described Ukraine’s aspirations to join NATO as a threat, in justifying the invasion of the neighboring country on February 24 last year.
And while the United States stressed that the decision on joining NATO belongs to Ukraine, the European powers did not show any enthusiasm due to concern over granting mutual security guarantees to a country that has been in conflict with Russia since 2014.
In an article published last month in the conservative British magazine The Spectator, Kissinger warned that the conflict in Ukraine had similarities to 1914, when major powers inadvertently descended into world war.
In his article, he called for a cease-fire under which Russia would withdraw to the pre-invasion lines, but not further, so that it would remain in eastern Ukraine as well as Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014, with these lands subject to a subsequent negotiation process.
At Davos, Kissinger noted that it was important to “prevent the war from becoming a war against Russia itself” and also “to give Russia an opportunity to rejoin the international system.”
While Kissinger acknowledged that countries once controlled by Moscow would be reluctant to make such a proposal, he stressed the importance of avoiding instability in this large, nuclear state.
He pointed out that a diplomatic process might help Russia “reassess its historical position, which was a mixture of attraction to European culture and fear of its hegemony.”
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