HOW THE WEST WON: Post-Cold War negotiations on NATO enlargement in the 1990-2000s

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Boris Kyrychenko
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
German Reunification ◽  
The West ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Military Alliance ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Nato Enlargement

With the disappearance of the Soviet Union, in 1991, the American-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) became the triumphant military alliance in Europe. Following prolonged deliberations, NATO eventually conducted a systematic enlargement of the alliance into Central and Eastern Europe. This expansion of the alliance was fiercely contested, and according to many critics was based upon a ‘broken promise’ of no-NATO expansion east of a newly-reunified Germany, an assurance given during the negotiations on German reunification by the leaders of the Western alliance. This paper will explore the enlargement of NATO in the 1990s, whether or not it was indeed based on a broken promise of non-expansionism, how this enlargement was accomplished, and how it has affected the subsequent geopolitics of Europe. In doing so, this paper shall argue that a multitude of false assurances on NATO expansion were given to Soviet officials during the negotiations on German reunification.

scholarly journals INTRODUCTION by Co-editors and Contributors of the Special Section Elena Chebankova and Piotr Dutkiewicz

2021 ◽  
pp. 8-13
Author(s):  
Elena Chebankova ◽  
Petr Dutkiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Special Section ◽  
The United States ◽  
The West ◽  
Virtual Currency ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Western Idea ◽  
Global Discourse

The collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the twentieth century ended the pre-existing bipolar Cold War system and resulted in a unipolar moment in which the United States enjoyed a position of almost unchallenged global and civilizational leadership [Krauthammer 1991; Waltz 1993; Wohlforth 1999]. However, despite the initial elation of some Western politicians and analysts [Fukuyama 1992; Brooks, Wohlforth 2008; Kagan 2008], who hoped to see the triumph of the Western idea universally, this situation was relatively short-lived. Global dialogue soon moved beyond this moment of unipolarity toward its more conventional form, in which states struggle for power and influence and search for areas of mutually beneficial co-operation. At the beginning of the third decade of the twenty-first century, we see a qualitatively different world. There have been profound political changes since the post-Cold War unipolarity. In this world, the idea of civilization has become a virtual currency of international relations and global dialogue. Many analysts [Coker 2019; Acharya 2020; Stuenkel 2016; Higgott 2019] discuss the rise of civilizations in world affairs as the new sociopolitical reality. Countries such as Russia, China, India, Turkey, and Brazil are often considered civilizational states – challengers to the West. Historically, philosophers have oscillated between the idea of multiple civilizations, with the West being one civilization of many (Spengler, Huntington, Danilevsky), and a single and universal Western civilization (Hayek, Kant). The former approach became a cardinal frame of reference of the global discourse during the past decade.

Deal or No Deal? The End of the Cold War and the U.S. Offer to Limit NATO Expansion

2016 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 7-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Diplomatic History ◽  
German Reunification ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Security Environment ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War

Did the United States promise the Soviet Union during the 1990 negotiations on German reunification that NATO would not expand into Eastern Europe? Since the end of the Cold War, an array of Soviet/Russian policymakers have charged that NATO expansion violates a U.S. pledge advanced in 1990; in contrast, Western scholars and political leaders dispute that the United States made any such commitment. Recently declassified U.S. government documents provide evidence supporting the Soviet/Russian position. Although no non-expansion pledge was ever codified, U.S. policymakers presented their Soviet counterparts with implicit and informal assurances in 1990 strongly suggesting that NATO would not expand in post–Cold War Europe if the Soviet Union consented to German reunification. The documents also show, however, that the United States used the reunification negotiations to exploit Soviet weaknesses by depicting a mutually acceptable post–Cold War security environment, while actually seeking a system dominated by the United States and opening the door to NATO's eastward expansion. The results of this analysis carry implications for international relations theory, diplomatic history, and current U.S.-Russian relations.

Precluded or Precedent-Setting? The “NATO Enlargement Question” in the Triangular Bonn-Washington-Moscow Diplomacy of 1990–1991

2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 4-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristina Spohr
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
Foreign Minister ◽  
European Security ◽  
Full Membership ◽  
The North ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Nato Enlargement ◽  
German Question

Controversy arose in the mid-1990s when Russian officials accused Western governments of reneging on binding pledges made to Moscow in 1990 during German unification diplomacy. According to the allegations, Western leaders had solemnly promised that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) would never expand beyond Germany into Central and Eastern Europe. Were such pledges ever made? Was the Soviet Union betrayed, and if so, by whom, how, and when? Or have various tactical comments been misinterpreted in hindsight? This article seeks to offer new answers to these questions by exploring not simply U.S.-Soviet-West German triangular diplomacy in 1990 but also the evolution of different approaches, ideas, and visions regarding Germany's security arrangements and the wider European security architecture. These ideas were floated publicly and privately, at home and abroad, by Chancellor Helmut Kohl, Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, and other senior West German officials. In showing how ultimately a “unified Germany in NATO” came about after months of intense diplomacy in 1990 to resolve the “German question,” this article refutes the recently made claim that the extension of full membership to the whole of Germany was a precedent-setting expansion of NATO.

scholarly journals EXPLORING AND EXPLAINING THE ECONOMIC POLITICAL RELATIONS BETWEEN IRAN AND THE SOVIET UNION IN THE SECOND PAHLAVI ERA EMPHASIZING THE SYSTEM THEORY

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimia Zare ◽  
Habibollah Saeeidinia
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
International System ◽  
World War ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Political Relations ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Cold War

Iran and Russia have common interests, especially in political terms, because of the common borders and territorial neighborhood. This has led to a specific sensitivity to how the two countries are approaching each other. Despite the importance of the two countries' relations, it is observed that in the history of the relations between Iran and Russia, various issues and issues have always been hindered by the close relations between the two countries. The beginning of Iran-Soviet relations during the Second Pahlavi era was accompanied by issues such as World War II and subsequent events. The relations between the two countries were influenced by the factors and system variables of the international system, such as the Cold War, the US-Soviet rivalry, the Second World War and the entry of the Allies into Iran, the deconstruction of the relations between the two post-Cold War superpowers, and so on.The main question of the current research is that the political relations between Iran and Russia influenced by the second Pahlavi period?To answer this question, the hypothesis was that Iran's political economic relations were fluctuating in the second Pahlavi era and influenced by the changing system theory of the international system with the Soviet Union. The findings suggest that various variables such as the structure of the international system and international events, including World War II, the arrival of controversial forces in Iran, the Cold War, the post-Cold War, the US and Soviet policies, and the variables such as the issue of oil Azerbaijan's autonomy, Tudeh's actions in Iran, the issue of fisheries and borders. Also, the policies adopted by Iranian politicians, including negative balance policy, positive nationalism and independent national policy, have affected Iran-Soviet relations. In a general conclusion, from 1320 (1942) to 1357 (1979), the relationship between Iran and Russia has been an upward trend towards peaceful coexistence. But expansion of further relations in the economic, technical and cultural fields has been political rather than political.

scholarly journals Military Security in Central and Eastern Europe – from overarching principles to current NATO perspectives

2019 ◽  
Vol 193 (3) ◽  
pp. 547-557
Author(s):  
Sławomir Wojciechowski
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
The North ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Collective Defense ◽  
Military Security ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Adaptation Processes

This year, NATO is celebrating its 70th anniversary and the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty. The Alliance was founded in the early days of the Cold War, but found itself in a new geopolitical situation after the col-lapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the bipolar world. The organi-zation has been transforming ever since and over time this transfor-mation has included both expansion and adaptation to new circum-stances. With the return of Russian neo-imperial ambitions in the re-cent years, NATO has been given new impetus. Emerging threats and challenges, which are mainly of a military nature, have been addressed by NATO through further recent adaptation processes which were based on the return to the core role of the Alliance, namely collective defense and deterrence. This, in turn, has created a boost of NATO ac-tivity on the ground, which means that improvement with regard to interoperability and integration is now in high demand.

The United States and the Soviet Union

2020 ◽  
pp. 138-152
Author(s):  
Matthew Kroenig
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
The United States ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Global Peace ◽  
Otto Von Bismarck ◽  
The Cold War

Otto von Bismarck famously said that “God has special providence for fools, drunks, and the United States of America.” Divine providence may not have hurt, but it was America’s domestic political institutions that transformed a smattering of British colonies in North America into, first, an independent nation and, then, a global superpower with a network of allies and partners spanning six continents. The United States faced off against the Soviet Union for a half century during the Cold War. But Washington possessed the better institutions, and the stress of the competition caused Moscow’s political system to collapse altogether. In the post–Cold War period that followed, Washington deepened and expanded the Pax Americana, and spread unprecedented levels of global peace, prosperity, and freedom. For the first time since Ancient Rome, a single superpower so overawed any potential competitors that great power rivalry itself came to a temporary halt.

Inventory Control of Dual-Use Equipment

1995 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 244-247 ◽  
Author(s):  
David R. Franz
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Biological Weapons ◽  
Dual Use ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The World ◽  
Biological Weapons Convention ◽  
The U.S

Proliferation of biological—as well as chemical and nuclear—weapons is a threat to the security of the U.S. in the post-Cold War era. The number of states with biological weapons (BW) programs or with a strong interest in having a BW program has increased significantly since the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) was signed in 1972 (Office of Technology Assessment, 1993). BW programs present difficult intelligence targets. Thus, the Soviet Union was a signatory to the BWC at the time of the Sverdlovsk incident in 1979, yet we knew little of the scope of its BW program until 1991 (Meselson et al., 1994). The spread of biotechnology throughout the world in recent years has made even more governments potentially BW capable.

American power and the empire of capitalist democracy

2001 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 191-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. John Ikenberry
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
World Order ◽  
The United States ◽  
World Politics ◽  
American Power ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
American Hegemony ◽  
Capitalist World

The United States is today a global superpower without historical precedent. It stands at the centre of an expanding democratic-capitalist world order that is itself, fifty years after its creation, the dominant reality in world politics. Despite expectations that American hegemony would disappear and trigger the emergence of a new and unstable multipolar post-Cold War order, the opposite has in fact happened. American power has grown even greater in the decade since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Although American power is not uniformly welcome around the world, serious ideological challengers or geopolitical balancers are not to be found. Scholars who a decade ago were debating the prospect of co-operation and conflict in a post-hegemonic world are now debating the character and future of world politics within an American unipolar order.

The Sociology of New Thinking: Elites, Identity Change, and the End of the Cold War

2005 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 43-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert English
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Identity Change ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
New Thinking ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Gorbachev Era ◽  
General Secretary

This article recounts the origins of Soviet “new thinking” as a case study of how Soviet intellectuals sought to redefine national identity in response to the West. It demonstrates that new thinking was fundamentally normative, not instrumental, insofar as it was developed in a period (1950s–1960s) when “socialism” was thought to be materially outperforming capitalism. It also demonstrates that new thinking decisively affected Soviet policy in the second half of the 1980s. Putting forth a socialization argument to show how newthinking ideas originated in the post-Stalin period within a community of intellectuals, the article charts the growing influence of these intellectuals through the 1970s and 1980s. In the mid-1980s, when Gorbachev became general secretary of the Communist Party and empowered many of the new thinkers as advisers, their liberal, Westernizing ideas played an indispensable role in shaping his reforms. The analysis focuses on mechanisms of identity change at two levels: that of the community of reformist intellectuals, and that of the Soviet Union itself. The analysis challenges realist and rationalist views that new thinking was largely instrumental. Until the Gorbachev era, Soviet reformers advocated new-thinking ideas often at the risk of their personal, professional, and institutional interests.

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