In the margins of Wilton Park’s conference on European security in 2020, a timely reminder that for some of the delegates here – who, collectively, represent a clear majority of European states – the concept of ‘European security’ is much more real than for other delegates (like us Brits, who tend to see it as an interesting theoretical exercise in blue sky thinking).
Talking to two eastern European diplomats over lunch today, I asked them how they felt about the argument – made by a western European participant yesterday – that NATO had expanded too fast during the 1990s, and that perhaps some of Russia’s misgivings about the Conventional Forces in Europe agreement were understandable.
Rubbish, they answered immediately, and with surprising intensity. Both cited chapter and verse on when Russia had invaded their respective countries – and how many of their compatriots had been lost. Only when Russia was on the back foot, as it was during the 1990s, did their countries have a chance to make progress in foreign policy. From the point of view of many eastern European foreign ministries, recent Russian behaviour – on energy, on Lugovoi, on the British Council – is a totally predictable reversion to type.
