Contagious expansion

Why the North Atlantic Alliance keeps moving East

NATO bases are increasingly deployed all over the world. Firstly, the United States pinpoints the areas of its interests by doing so. Secondly, this allows to suppress Europe’s initiative to create its own united army. Thirdly, the US military industrial complex is supported due to new orders. However, everyone else is clearly on a losing side. Why?

The supply of illusions

NATO is a fungus, a mould, a military pathogen in the global security system, which reproduces by bases, like by spores. Wherever its signs appear on the map, security in the region decreases multiple times resulting in growing threats from the local to global scale. NATO is a harbinger of evil and potential trouble. The states hosting NATO units do not really receive any guarantees of their territorial inviolability but only an illusion of defence. After all, most of such ‘landlords’ in military uniforms do not represent any value in terms of strategy or purpose of military planning. This was especially vividly exemplified by the escape of American soldiers from Afghanistan. United States troops were in such a hurry to flee that they even abandoned their equipment and weapons. 
The NATO website has recently come up with an anti-fake campaign about itself, emphasising its defensive nature. However, the alliance remained silent about the fact that the number of NATO’s combined forces is several times higher than the military component of any potential opponent. If you look at the world map, it becomes absolutely obvious that this ‘peaceful’ military bloc has surrounded the Union State of Belarus and Russia from all sides and is now allegedly afraid of it.  

It is not the Union State that is approaching NATO bases, but vice versa — NATO keeps moving towards our borders. Interestingly enough, despite the fact that the whole world has ceased to be safe in principle, NATO for some reason is expanding exclusively to the East, towards the threats it declares. It is usually considered dangerous when a threat is approaching you. Yet, according to NATO’s logic, it is the other way around. Thus, if the problem will not come to you, then you must go to the problem? 

NATO bases virtually serve as sticks that mark the zone of influence. Or rather, a type of animal scent-marks used to identify their territory. However, animal instinct has nothing to do with NATO’s activities. It is mostly about a long-standing element of the global economy where everything is supposed to serve the interests of the United States. This postulate was confirmed personally and vociferously by the European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell. According to him, the interests of Europe can no longer extend so far. Only the United States can afford it. Therefore, the reproduction of military bases is prompted by the road map of Washington politics. The rest of the world are just performers, potential targets and victims. 

Flags on the border

The peculiarity of the current time is that new members of the alliance have neither troops nor equipment to supply new bases with. The only way out of this awkward situation is regular membership fees of 2 percent of their GDP. Yet, the shortage of forces and military means of NATO’s recruits per se nullifies all the meaning of moving East. Therefore, all their marks on border territories stopped being a sign of military dominance long ago. Formally, they just imitate NATO’s growing presence being a sort of a claim as to whose cones are in the forest.  
In other words, it is only the number of NATO’s flags along the border line that has increased. In fact, this is nothing else than a painful conceit which does not make our counterparts feel calmer. Permanent fear, degradation and panic attacks are the format of the current political climate in the West. Then, where does the NATO determination come from, what is the hidden motive? It is all simple. In reality, the alliance is certain that there is no any threat coming from the East. NATO behaves as if deranged, which causes the corresponding attitude towards it. All these descendants of Scythians, Balts, Varangians, Anglo-Saxons as well as genderless bodybuilders are no more than Hollywood fog, which is blown out by a good current of air from the East.  
Now the matter concerns the pedagogy of indifferent contemplation of children playing carelessly with matches. They may cause trouble out of ignorance and misunderstanding — burn half the world. Therefore, it is better to hide matches from them.
In this regard, Aleksandr Lukashenko, when making a working visit in Grodno Region, virtually conducted a lesson on fundamentals of health and safety as well as good neighbourliness for Belarus’ neighbours. The President called them for sowing crops and fighting for the harvest instead of fighting with each other. The Head of State also showed what fields in the border area should be used for — they should have tractors and combine harvesters on them, not tanks. 
Unfortunately, aggression has completely replaced the mind of the neighbourhood elite. The NATO shell only adds the tragic nature to their situation, economically, socially and even militarily. It would be fine if they just hurt themselves. As they say, it is their choice. But what do they want from us? What is the point of their militaristic mania? Despite the fact that we do not ask them, they keep preparing some kind of paramilitary units in order to bring democracy to us on their machine gun barrels. Well, they may be free to consume the democracy of their own making. In contrast, Belarus does not interfere in internal affairs of any country in an effort to make it more humane, although our neighbours kill unfortunate migrants on a regular basis and throw their corpses on the Belarusian territory. This is a telling example of how the so-called democrators act.

American marketplace

Another interesting point is that in recent years, Europe has begun to talk about forming its own combined army. These unintentional aspirations provoked accelerated Scandinavian conscription into the ranks of NATO. Americans were in such a hurry to stifle the sprouts of army freethinking in the European barracks that they hastily took the oath from conscripts who did not even have time to understand what kind of mess they were entered into. As a result, hardly had the hangover syndrome passed when at least a third of the territorial defence disappeared.
The policy of NATO’s expansion to the East is so far the only strategy of the West, taking into account its budget, resources and capabilities. Along with that, it is needless to try and look for a defensive meaning in its actions. In addition, it is a pity that all military activities carried out by the alliance pose a threat to the environment, complicate the lives of local people and divert from common concerns about the future.  
NATO bases are points and centres of US military logistics for deploying troops and storing weapons according to the principle of Amazon, the well-known American marketplace. This is a system for distributing points of receiving and issuing military orders around the world. Thus, since the Union State of Belarus and Russia refuses to obey the alliance, this logistics will move closer to their state borders, with military cargo being delivered and personnel being concentrated. This is a sort of preparation for war and not protection from it, which also involves supplies of American military industrial complex products to European consumers along the way. Not for free, sure enough. 

By Aleksandr Tishchenko, national security expert