NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg may be signaling that he's open for Ukraine to join the alliance, but now isn't the right time to bring Ukraine in and he knows that, retired U.S. Air Force Brigadier Gen. Blaine Holt told Newsmax on Sunday.
"I don't really think that was the purpose of Secretary General Stoltenberg's remarks," Holt, a former deputy military adviser for NATO and Newsmax contributor, said on "Wake Up America Weekend." "He understands full well that Ukraine can't be a member right now."
And if Ukraine "somehow miraculously" got a unanimous vote to join the alliance, that would mean NATO has "invoked Article 5 and would be at war, in World War III."
Stoltenberg last week said during a news conference that "Ukraine's rightful place is in NATO," but Holt said that means after the war ends, not now.
"What he is saying is that after this war gets wrapped up, it looks like then the alliance will be very interested in bringing Ukraine into the fold, and that's still going to go through a political process," said Holt. "What he's trying to do is create pressure on Moscow to say we're going to take them in any way even though those were some of your stated goals."
Stoltenberg also wants to create "political tension around the Kremlin" and around Russian President Vladimir Putin "that NATO is not backing down [and that] NATO is still putting its arms around Ukraine," he added.
Holt also commented on an article in The Telegraph, a British newspaper, which claims Putin is preparing to attack the United Kingdom.
"Where we're at is probably a misinterpretation of Russian strategic intent," he said. "The Russians have spy ships. They've been operating off of the U.K. coast for some time."
Russia is also "very upset" about the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, no matter who denies or claims they did it, and "they're mapping out what it would look like to take apart England from around the island in the event of war."
Russia is sending the message to the U.K. that it's preparing for war, but only to keep the pressure up since the U.K. supports Ukraine.
"This does not mean that Russia's got an imminent attack plan for the U.K.," said Holt. "War planning, certainly, that's very true."
Holt further commented on leaks from the trove of Pentagon documents showing that ISIS is using Afghanistan again as a base for terrorism, saying that the United States "went backward" with the withdrawal from that nation.
"We set the Taliban up in a way that they're far better off than they were on 9-11," he said. "They've got power projection with terrorist groups in the country, and they're starting to work together… the way that the Taliban brutalizes people has not stopped. Our allies and partners are wondering what the heck we're doing and if we're a reliable partner or not, so this is the gift that keeps on giving."
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