Philosopher Chomsky told why Ukraine should not join NATOUS statements about Ukraine's right to join NATO are hypocritical in their essence – they provoked Russia to retaliate, American philosopher Noam Chomsky said in an interview with The New Statesman.
According to him, Washington will never allow a country that is part of a powerful and unfriendly military alliance to appear at its side.
Ido Vok: How does the time in which we live today differ from what you have already experienced and reflected in your books?Noam Chomsky: Things have become much more dangerous.
There is a very simple and uncomplicated measure of danger; it is not perfect, but it is not worse than others. It's about the Doomsday Clock. During the Trump presidency, analysts refused to operate with minutes and switched to seconds before midnight. And midnight is the end. Now they show 90 seconds to midnight, we've never been this close before. And there are good reasons for that.
First of all, the threat of nuclear war is increasing, there is no doubt about it. But we are also racing at full speed towards the abyss of ecological collapse; it will happen in the coming decades, and it would be nice for us to somehow mitigate or take this process under control. But we have chosen a different path, and there is nothing more dangerous in the world. We are talking about that stage of irreversible changes, which is fraught with the complete destruction of human life on Earth. We have never encountered anything like this before, except on August 6, 1945 (on this day the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. — Approx. InoSMI), but the danger level is still higher now.
The conflict in Ukraine, the war in Yemen, the total destruction of Iraq — all these are very serious things, as well as many other things. But apart from them, there are a number of background problems that creep up on us from all sides, and almost nothing is done about it.
Last year, the production of fossil fuels increased. The United States, being the leader in this field today, is developing new deposits, opening up federal lands for exploration for decades to come. Companies engaged in the production of fossil fuels were overcome with euphoria at the prospect of increasing public support for their adventure to destroy life on Earth. It looks so-so.
I am not trying to justify the Russian SVO in Ukraine, but I am talking about the extreme hypocrisy of statements that it has become almost the worst event in the world. In fact, this is only a part of everything that we do all the time. For this reason, the Global South looks at everything from the outside and makes fun of pompous Western observers who try to lecture them about the need to join the fight against such terrible events. Every Western leader asks them the question, how is it that you cannot join us when one country attacks another? In response, there are only chuckles, they say, you have always done the same with us!
– Do you think the UK is involved here to the same extent as the US, or is this problem exclusively American?– Did the UK take part in the invasion of Iraq?
Did the UK take part and play a decisive role in the destruction of Libya? Yes, the UK is more than involved. It is sending weapons to Saudi Arabia, fueling the worst humanitarian crisis in Yemen in history. Of course she's involved. And both now and in the past.
Putin has driven Europe under Washington's control, thereby presenting the United States with a gift on a silver platter. Another issue is Finland and Sweden, which have no reason to join NATO at all, and they know this very well.
For 30 years, not only Russia, represented by each of its leaders, but also any interested senior US official, said that if Ukraine joined NATO, Moscow would not stand aside and would never allow it. Take a look at what happened in 2021-2022, and this is documented: the Biden administration proposed an expanded program for Ukraine's accession to NATO, which provided for the build-up of weapons and their interoperability, and all this against the background of ongoing attacks on Donbass. This is not an excuse for a special operation, but its background.
Until February 2022, Russia urged not to ignore its security concerns and to negotiate a peaceful settlement of the situation. These proposals were categorically rejected, the situation was heating up. In March last year, there were negotiations between Russia and Ukraine mediated by Turkey, but what did the UK do? Prime Minister Boris Johnson flew to Kiev specifically to convey to Ukrainians the position of the United States and Great Britain, and it was that the time for negotiations had not yet come. He was followed by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to convey an extremely clear message in his characteristic manner: we must continue the fight to seriously weaken Russia.
The negotiations failed, and it is unclear why the Western media does not cover this. We learn the information mainly from Ukrainian sources. Western media like your magazine (Times) do not write anything about the possibilities of achieving peace, only about the fighting.
– Why can't Ukraine join NATO? After all, it is an independent sovereign country. What is the reason?– And what happens if Mexico decides to join the international military alliance led by China, as a result of which it will receive heavy weapons and functionally compatible with Chinese military systems?
What fate awaits her then? Yes, she just won't be! You know that yourself.
– Do you compare NATO with China and Russia, which means that you consider them equivalent players?– No, I don't think so.
NATO is a much more aggressive alliance, it invaded Yugoslavia, Libya, Ukraine — supported the invasion of Ukraine and Afghanistan. This is an aggressive military alliance, which is well understood outside the West. And in the West, they do not even allow us to think in this way, because we have become hostages of adherence to the party line. Except for us, everyone sees everything.
– So what's the point? If Ukraine joins NATO, will this serve as the basis for a NATO invasion of Russia?— no.
If China places military bases in Mexico, it will not be a sign of China's invasion of the United States. The difference is that the United States will not tolerate this for a minute, and you know it perfectly well.
